Antioxidants play an important role for clear skin. I’ve talked about other important antioxidants like glutathione and vitamin E, but another important antioxidant for clear skin is Vitamin C — I’d say it’s the most important water-soluble antioxidant in your diet.
Antioxidants protect the skin from free radicals, which helps in healing. But antioxidants also protect the squalene in your sebum from oxidizing and forming squalene peroxide, which is EXTREMELY pore-clogging…
The good news is that antioxidants build themselves into the sebum and prevent it from oxidizing.
On a larger scale, antioxidants protect you from toxins and pollution and even inflammation.
What’s more is that people with acne have been shown to have depleted overall levels of antioxidants! This means that their bodies are fighting hard against something, and using up a lot of antioxidants…
So eating more antioxidants is kind of the obvious strategy for better skin…
The question is, why do we need more antioxidants? Can’t we just get them from food?
Unfortunately, because of the silly farming practices of today, our food doesn’t contain the same levels of nutrients as it once did. So no matter how much food you eat, chances are you aren’t getting the right amount of nutrients.
An analysis of 12 different vegetables found that the average vitamin C content fell by about 30% between 1975 and 1997.
So a 100g of organic strawberries provide 97% of the recommended daily allowance,
broccoli 148%, and kale 200%… but the recommended daily allowance is ONLY 60mg!!!
What’s interesting is that about 31% of the American population, and 1 in 8 Canadians is Vitamin C deficient.
However, people with acne have up to 40% LESS Vitamin C than people with healthy skin!
2 Things You Need To Know About Vitamin C And Clear Skin
1. Vitamin C Heals Your Skin
Vitamin C helps create new skin because it’s a part of collagen production. Its antioxidant properties help with skin regeneration — it keeps the free radicals away which improves skin healing!
Collagen helps form scar tissue, form blood vessels, tendons… Keeping in mind that collagen is the body’s most important protein, and basically keeps your body literally from falling apart, I’d say that Vitamin C is a superstar.
Collagen also affects transepidermal water loss, which means that your skin will be more hydrated and smooth if you have adequate amounts of it in your body.
The more vitamin C you have in your system, the more other antioxidants you’ll have in your system. It picks up the slack for the other antioxidants, and decreases antioxidant depletion.
It also gets built into your skin, protecting and strengthening your skin from free radicals and intruders — making your skin super resilient. Vitamin C can also improve the appearance of red skin, and red inflammation!
2. Vitamin C Lowers Cortisol Levels
Normal levels of cortisol, your stress hormone, are great, they keep you awake and motivated. The problem is with sustained elevated cortisol levels. Elevated stress hormones means that your skin isn’t healing, nutrients aren’t being properly absorbed, inflammation goes up…
Inflammation dramatically worsens the appearance of pimples.
I told you how important lowering stress is for clear skin. Stress is a HUGE acne trigger.
But probably the cheapest and easiest way to lower stress is to take Vitamin C (and magnesium) because it clears up excess stress hormone build-up in your blood!
If you are chronically stressed then start mega-dosing on Vitamin C!
Megadosing on Vitamin C
Because the recommended daily allowance of Vitamin C is only 60 mg, anything beyond this EXTREMELY low amount is considered megadosing.
Vitamin C is safe in large amounts because it’s water soluble, the excess will simply rinse away down the toilet…
You can take around 1000mg a day and expect amazing skin-clearing results, and smoother skin that’s better hydrated too!
I’ve read about people who take 10,000mg-50,000mg a day and they’re alive and well.
I won’t recommend eating fruits for vitamin C because they won’t give you a mega dose of it — you’ll have to eat a LOT of strawberries to get 1000mg of Vitamin C.
Though berries are probably the best kind of fruit to eat, they still contain fructose. And fructose wreaks havoc on the skin.
There are two better ways you can take vitamin C.
1. Camu Camu Powder!
Camu camu is nature’s best source of Vitamin C, it’s extremely bioavailable, and a teaspoon a day has 600-1000% of the recommended daily allowance.
2. Ascorbic Acid
You can take 1000mg of just plain ascorbic acid a day to get your mega dose of this incredibly important vitamin.
Final Thoughts
Vitamin C has been known to cure cancer, improve immune function, improve skin in a big way… And it doesn’t have any side effects!
If you decide that you’d like to incorporate it into your diet, then make sure to start slowly, and then up your dose as you listen to your body. Never rush with supplementation!
Love,
Olena
P.S. Don’t miss a single one of my best 28 hacks for clear skin — sign up to get them in your inbox!
