Fighting dry, chapped, or cracked hands? It’s no surprise - with all the hand-washing and sanitizing many of us are doing these days, it’s easy for hands to get out-of-control-dry.
Luckily, the right-hand cream can make all the difference. Here are the ingredients you should use – and the ones you should avoid.
Why Your Hands Get So Dry
First thing’s first: why exactly are your hands getting so dry? Well, our hands are our number one way of interacting with the world around us – grabbing door handles, holding items, exchanging money… we literally greet the world with our hands day-in and day-out.
That means our hands get more of a beating than any other part of the body. In other words, they’re the most likely to get stripped, dry, and damaged over time.
Unfortunately, many hand cream ingredients can actually make these symptoms worse.
Hand Lotion Ingredients to Avoid
The top ingredients on our list of no-no’s? Parabens, perfumes, alcohols, and silicones.
- Parabens: These chemicals are often added to lotions to increase their shelf lives and make them more shelf-stable. However, when they get in the bloodstream, they can be horrible endocrine disruptors. They can also cause reproductive issues – nothing any hand cream should do.
- Perfumes and alcohols: Added to make lotions look and feel nice, perfumes and alcohols can both actually dry out hands and cause irritation. No, thanks!
- Silicones: These slippery ingredients are added to make lotions feel great on the hands. That said, they actually work as a barrier and prevent lotion from sinking into the skin. Translation? Your hands only feel good until you wash them again – then it all goes down the drain (literally).
Luckily, it’s not all bad news. In fact, there are many ingredients that can help you ward off your dry hands once and for all.
Ingredients That Really Work
When looking for a lotion, you’ll want to make sure to find one that has a combination of humectant, emollient, and occlusive ingredients. That’s the only way you’ll draw and seal in moisture for lasting hydration – without the grease or the back-to-dry drawbacks.
Ingredients that really work include:
Plant Butters
First, you’ll want to look for effective emollients and occlusives that work to seal in moisture long-term (aka keep your skin from drying out again after a few hours). Our favorites include cacao butter and shea butter.
Though we don’t always recommend these heavier kinds of butter for face application – after all, they contain heavy oils that could occlude the skin and cause acne or congestion – we do recommend them for the hands. For one, hands don’t have the same break-out risk. Plus, they need that extra oil when they’ve dried out.
Hemp Seed Oil
Next, you’ll want a powerful humectant – and you can look no further than hemp seed oil. Extracted from the cannabis plant, hemp seed oil is rich in omega-3 fatty acids, omega-6 fatty acids, antibacterial properties, and humectant properties that help:
- Draw in moisture
- Provide anti-inflammatory benefits
- Slow the signs of aging
Vitamin C
Next, you’ll want to protect the skin against environmental stressors like UV damage, pollution, dirt, and debris. The best way to do this? Antioxidants like vitamin E, vitamin C, and green tea.
Our number one antioxidant MVP is vitamin C. A powerful antioxidant, vitamin C is known to:
- Reduce common signs of aging like hyperpigmentation
- Repair oxidative photo-damage
- Slow down the formation of fine lines and wrinkles by reducing oxidative stress
- Make your sunscreen stronger
Not too shabby for a hand cream.
Avocado Oil
If you’re looking for a true super-fruit ingredient, look no further than avocado oil. This natural oil is absolutely packed with healthy minerals and antioxidants, including magnesium, vitamin C, vitamin E, vitamin K, niacin, and potassium.
When applied topically, these translate to:
- Improved skin hydration
- Soothed, even-looking skin
- Faster wound healing
Ready to say goodbye to dry, chapped hands for good? Find all of these ingredients (and more) in our Almond Butter Sugar High Restorative Hand Cream.