Natural Home Remedies
Making Your Own Whitening Facial Mask
You can make your own all-natural whitening
facial mask with ingredients from the refrigerator.
Cucumber Avocado Facial Mask
Ingredients:
½ cup chopped cucumber
½ cup chopped avocado
1 egg white
2 tsp powdered milk, 2 tsp
Instructions:
Combine all
ingredients in a blender until they form a smooth, paste-like consistency.
Apply mask immediately, or after 30 minutes of refrigeration to reduce
puffiness and refresh your face.
For application,
use 2 teaspoons of the cucumber avocado mask spread over your face and neck in
circular, upward motions. Leave on for 30 minutes or until dry. To remove,
rinse with warm water, followed by a second rinse in cold water. Pat dry.
You can do this
twice per day if you like.
Lemon Egg-White Mask
Ingredients:
Strained juice from half a lemon
1 egg white
Instructions:
Beat together the
egg white and lemon juice for 3 minutes, until well-blended. Apply directly to
face, avoiding eyes, and leave on for 30 minutes. Rinse with warm water.
You can do this
once or twice per day. You can also follow the mask with a face whitening
treatment; the lemon and egg white should strip away the dead skin and other
impurities from your face, leaving it primed for your treatments.
Honey Oat Mask
Ingredients:
1 tsp. crushed almonds
1 tsp. oatmeal
2 tbsp. of honey or milk
Instructions:
Blend the
ingredients to make a granular
paste. Rub in a circular motion on your face for a few minutes to remove dead
skin. Never use your index finger when doing this; instead, use your ring
finger and, if necessary, your middle finger
Papaya-Besan Mask
Ingredients:
One papaya skin, grated
½ cup fuller’s earth or besan
2 vitamin A capsules
Instructions:
Crush capsules, and
blend all ingredients together well. Apply to face and let dry (about 20
minutes). When dry, pat with water or milk, scrub and rinse with water.
Sugar Scrub
Ingredients:
½ tsp of sugar granules
Your favorite cleansing cream
Instructions:
Blend, and work
into skin by rubbing in a circular fashion and focus on blemishes. The sugar
will dissolve and be absorbed. Rinse with hot, then warm, then cool water. Use
this scrub twice per week with oily skin, only once with dry.
Lemon-Cucumber Extract
Ingredients:
Lemons
Pureed peeled cucumber
Instructions:
Squeeze the juice
of lemons into a container, extracting also the juice of the rind as far as you
can. Strain lemon juice and pureed cucumber separately through a cheesecloth,
squeezing to get as much liquid as possible. Equal amounts of lemon and
cucumber extract should then be mixed in a clean glass container, sealed, and
stored in the refrigerator. Don’t keep longer than a week. You can bathe your
face in this every day.
Niacinamide Lotion
Ingredients:
5-7 capsules of 500mg niacinamide (purchase at pharmacy in vitamin aisle)
Enough filtered water to dissolve
Your favorite lotion
Instructions:
Dissolve contents
of niacinamide capsules in the filtered water. Put
this solution in a 4 ounce bottle, and fill the bottle with your favorite
lotion. Mix well. Use for two to three weeks before discarding. If you have no
adverse reactions, you can start adding more niacinamide
to boost lightening action.
Lemon-Honey Mask
Ingredients:
1 tsp honey
1 tsp cold milk
1-2 drops lemon juice
Instructions:
Mix ingredients and apply to face. Rinse with cold water after fifteen minutes. This will tighten pores and help lighten skin.
Aspirin Mask
Ingredients:
6-10 aspirin (noncoated, generic is fine)
Small amount of water
Instructions:
Mix aspirin with
water to make a paste, and apply to skin. Rinse with a circular motion. If
desired, water can be replaced with milk, honey, another mask, etc. The
salicylic acid will lighten your skin and clear blemishes.
Fruit Peel
Ingredients:
1 cup fresh diced pineapple
½ cup diced fresh papaya
2 tbsp honey
Instructions:
Puree pineapple and
papaya, add honey and mix. Wash your face thoroughly, then apply fruit peel to
your face. Leave on for no more than five minutes, then rinse with cool water.
Apply a moisturizer. Use no more than once per week.
This peel depends on
the bromelain in pineapple and papain
in papaya, proteases that can break up proteins and remove dead cells from your
skin. Both these fruits also contain a little alpha-hydroxy
acid. Honey is included for moisturizing and germicidal qualities.
Yogurt-Oatmeal Mask
Ingredients:
2 tbsp plain yogurt
1 tbsp oatmeal
1 tbsp honey
Instructions:
Mix ingredients to
form a paste; you can grind oatmeal into a powder with a coffee grinder prior
to mixing. Wash face, massage with paste in circular motion. Leave for a minute
or two before rinsing. Lactic acid in yogurt stimulates collagen and removes
dead skin; oatmeal and honey are moisturizers.
Yogurt-Aloe Mask
Ingredients:
½ cup plain yogurt
2 tbsp aloe gel (or one fresh aloe leaf)
Instructions:
Mix ingredients to form a paste; if you’re using an aloe leaf, remove the skin and pulp prior to adding to yogurt. Apply to clean skin in a circular massaging motion; leave on for a minute or two prior to washing off.
Other Home Remedies and Tips
Freckled or
pigmented skin can be gently bleached with the following:
- Washing the face with fresh buttermilk
- Apply soymilk to your face and leave on
for at least a half hour, or overnight if you wish. Don’t use if you
intend to be outside. This works well on superficial melasma.
- Equal parts of malt vinegar, cucumber
juice and rosewater, used as a toner
Zinc oxide is a
drying agent, but will help bleach out dark spots as well. It’s available in Desitin (a baby rash ointment). Zinc oxide is also a very
good sunblock, seals out infections from open wounds,
and encourages skin to regenerate and turn over.
Occlusion is a
great lightening accelerator; instead of applying and leaving your lightening
creams open to the air, cover them with a non-porous material like plastic
wrap. Don’t cover too much of your body at once, as your skin needs to breathe.
You should not use this method for more than two or three weeks at a time.
Don’t use
depilatory creams on any part of your skin you’re trying to lighten. Irritation
to the skin can cause your skin to experience hyperpigmentation.
Use sugar and olive
oil in equal amounts as an exfoliant scrub.
Remove clay masks
with a clean sea sponge and water; this will exfoliate and will also be easy to
wash away.
Rub lemon or lime
over your face and other exposed parts of your skin as a daily exfoliant.
Rubbing your face
with milk helps lighten skin; this is why women historically took milk baths.
It is the lactic acid in milk that lightens your skin.
Have your skin
analyzed by an expert before treating it to avoid using the wrong products for
it. (For instance, acne can be caused by dehydration, not oily skin, and drying
products will actually make it worse.)
Do not over-treat
your skin. If it starts drying out, let it rest a while.
If you buy an expensive
exfoliant, don’t go over it with a cheap moisturizer
that will subsequently clog your pores.
Apply used teabags
to shrink undereye circles
Put Visine on
blemishes to remove the red.
If you’re having an
acne breakout, be very careful of your whitening products. They all contain
moisturizers, and can make your breakout worse.
Green tea makes an
excellent toner; leave the tea steeping for much longer than normal, then
strain and put the tea in a bottle and keep in your refrigerator for no more
than a week.
