Facials Once a Month

by: SarahJoyce

I have oily-combination skin. What this means is that most of the time, my face is oily, shiny, with enlarged pores around my cheeks, and blackheads along with whiteheads. As much as I wash my face in the morning and exfoliate at night, oil and sebum build up on my face. Sometimes when I look in the mirror, I can see the whiteheads around my nose just ready to exit out.

So once a month I go to a facial spa and get a routine facial to get rid of my blackheads and whiteheads and help shrink my pores. I always go when I have 2 days off from school because after I get a facial, my face tends to be red and sore. I like to have a day where I stay in so that my face can breathe a little bit from makeup and just relax. Before I lay down, I always drink Tylenol or some pain reliever because the extraction is painful.

The first thing that the aesthetician does is place a blanket over my body, pull my hair back with a spa headband, and place 2 cucumbers on my eyes. She then turns on this bright light and cleans my face first with a gel-like soap, massaging it at the same time, and then washes it off. After that, she’ll place a steamer above my face. The water steam will help open my pores which will make it easier during extraction. Sometimes, I’ll ask her to adjust the steamer because I have a hard time breathing if it is directed toward my nose. However, the steamer that she uses automatically rotates every minute.

After the steaming process of about 15 minutes, she’ll take my needle and proceed with extracting my whiteheads and blackheads. I bring my own pricking needle. She’ll start off in the less sensitive area with is my forehead and then work down my temples to the side of my cheeks. The last that she’ll extract is my nose, chin, and upper lip. This extraction phase is about 30-45 minutes depending on the amount of build up that I have. During this phase, I’ll have tears coming down my eyes and she’ll wipe it for me. That’s how much it hurts.

When the extraction is finished, she’ll clean my face again and mix up the mask. A cloth is placed on my face and my aesthetician will take a brush and pat a clay mask on my face. I then fall into a quiet 30 minute nap. When the mask is washed off, my face is cleaned again and she’ll place a specific cream on my face and tell me not to wash it off until the night time.

This process takes about 2 hours but it is worth the pain of having my pores less visible.