Quest For Face Cream

I never really paid much attention to face creams, not even after discovering the wonderful world of more natural handmade soaps.  I had fallen into a habit of just using whatever product my mom had tried and didn't like and passed on to me.  That was almost always Avon products and I'd never really had any problem with it.  My skin is not sensitive so it's not usually an issue to just slather on whatever I have available.  Then one day a couple months ago I actually looked at the ingredients and was a bit surprised and shocked.

This is what I had been using . . . an extra hydration face cream from the Avon Basics line.  Looking at the ingredients, it contains (among other things) mineral oil (which people scream about), petrolatum (which people scream about), methylparaben (which people scream about), and urea (which is just gross to me).  Well alrighty then!

Now, I am not an all-natural extremist.  I don't get too worked up about most health risk propaganda because it seems that anything and everything is bad for you in some way.  It also seems to depend what camp you're in as to which thing you find more dangerous.  Some might be more accepting of parabens, but completely against petroleum, etc.  I also do not think that all natural things are good for you just because they are natural.  It's like tea tree is a natural ingredient with many perks but it can kill your pets.  And still, so many soapers put out pet shampoo products with harmful ingredients but most people don't realize there is a danger because they just assume "all natural" is the best choice.

Anyway, I admit I don't even know why mineral oil is frowned upon.  I think I've heard people are against petroleum products not so much because of a health issue but because of environmental concerns.  Parabens have been found, although in very trace amounts, in breast cancer tumors or something like that.  Then there are sulfates and phthalates and any number of other things.  As you see, my information is severely lacking because I just don't concern myself with it that much.

Having said that, if there are products out there that are indeed more basic and natural, I'm all for trying them out!  And that's what made me finally look at that Avon label and decide to look for something else.

When I next went shopping after realizing there were creepy things in my Avon, I had thought I would just go back to the very simple Ponds that I had been using previously.  I was shocked when I checked the label in the store and found nasties in that one too.  Well, what the heck?  Have I been spreading cancer and death on my face my whole life??  And I started just going down the shelf in the face care aisle, checking them all.  The ones that looked like better choices all seemed to come with higher prices than I wanted to pay.  'Can you put a price on health?!' I hear you all screaming at me.  Well, when you're cheap like me, apparently you can.

I was thrilled when I found this Eucerin face lotion over in the regular lotions aisle.  Unscented, SPF 30, recommended by the skin cancer foundation, none of the usual taboo ingredients . . . I bought it in a heartbeat.  At first I thought it was so fabulous.  It had a really light consistency, spread so easily that you only needed a little.  I thought my search was over as quickly as it had begun!  But within days I found I just wasn't liking it.  Because of the sun blocking ingredients it had a sort of sun block smell, and had a sort of chalky dry down feeling.  It didn't *look* chalky on the skin but there was just a sort of feel.  And I did notice after a few days that I was having some dry skin, some flakiness.  I decided to look for something else.

I have used Olay creams in the past and thought surely they must be acceptable, but no.  I passed on them the first time but now I'd come back to them and picked the least evil one I could find.  This one does contain petrolatum and some other scary looking things but no parabens and no urea.  I thought this would be fine and happily bought it.  Again, the first few days were ok but then the fragrance started to really jump out at me.  I *hate* the way this stuff smells!  It's like a stale old grandma perfume or something.  Ugh.  And it became enough of an issue that I switched back to the Avon and decided my search would need to continue.

(Source)

Meanwhile, my mom had also been trying different face creams and had passed another on to me.  This time it was Garnier - Moisture Rescue - Refreshing Gel-Cream.  At first I was excited, thinking it was all plant based and natural, but one look at the ingredients killed that buzz.  I don't have the actual box that lists the ingredients for this gel-cream but she had also given me a cleansing foam and that had two kinds of parabens and other scary looking things so I assumed the gel-cream would be similar.  I tried it anyway.  I didn't like it at first because the gel consistency was almost runny and just felt very weird going on.  Not long after I noticed my forehead was itchy like crazy.  I can't say for sure that it was this product but I'd not had an itchy reaction with anything else soooo . . .   It only took one use for me to decide I would not be using this product.

So then I had to decide what to use until I could pick up something else to try.  I decided to go back to the smelly Olay cream for now.  This weekend when I do my regular shopping I will find yet another face moisturizer to try. I'm leaning towards trying Burt's Bees next.

I am totally open to suggestions on this.  What face moisturizer to you use?  Are you picky about your ingredients?  Do you know of an affordable paraben-free, petrolatum-free, mineral oil-free, urea-free product I should try?  I would LOVE to hear about them!