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American Morning
Is Your Skin Older Than Rest of You?
Aired May 28, 2002 - 09:42 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
PAULA ZAHN, CNN ANCHOR: For many women pursuing that perfect tan, it may be time to face facts and consider this question: Is your skin older than the rest of you? We already now we know that sun exposure is bad for us, but there are other lifestyle factors that can also cause your skin to age prematurely. You may not be able to see the damage, but that does not mean it's not there.
And joining us now to talk more about that is Lesley Jane Seymour, editor in chief of "Marie Claire" magazine.
Good to see you, welcome.
LESLEY JANE SEYMOUR, EDITOR IN CHIEF, "MARIE CLAIRE" MAGAZINE: Hi, how are you?
ZAHN: Looks like you haven't been doing anything bad lately.
SEYMOUR: I tried to stop. I got scared when I become a beauty director.
ZAHN: Let's talk about the determination you make in this month's magazine. I thought it was fascinating. You took four women, you look at how they look today, and you're able to project what their skin age in the future.
SEYMOUR: This is scary moment for all of us. We did what's called a UV picture of them, which can see underneath your skin. Actually sees through makeup and everything. It can see sun damage and all kinds of skin damage that's coming. We sent them to Dr. Jalomin (ph), who's a well-known dermatologist, and she looked at them, and you would be shocked with what happened and what this picture can see that's not obvious to the eye.
ZAHN: Let's look at some examples right now to better illustrate that, and you're going to start off with Nancy.
SEYMOUR: Right. Well, Nancy was a major sun worshiper. See all those little dots underneath. Look how pretty she looks right now at age 27, but her Skin age is 36. This is scary. Sun damage is the worst thing that can happen to you.
ZAHN: You can't reverse this.
SEYMOUR: By stopping now, you can stop it there, and it actually does improve, but you can't take off of that away. But you know what, you can keep it from getting a lot worse that fast. I mean, that's one scary thing, and sun damage is the worst thing that happens to you; 90 percent of all wrinkles are sun damage.
If we all hid out a in dark room all the time like the old Victorians who, you know, carried little umbrellas.
ZAHN: Boy, didn't they have fun?
SEYMOUR: And you wouldn't see any of these dots.
Let's take a look at a picture of Christine right now. Right, this is Christine, and her problem is smoking. Now we know, everybody stops listening when they hear about the dangers of smoking. But guess what, it makes your skin yellow, it dries out all around your lips. It creates for every 10 years that you smoke, it's 14 years of skin damage. It's older. You get much older skin every time you smoke.
ZAHN: Let' go back to picture of Christine one more time, because it also appeared as though the bags under the eyes were much more prominent than they were at the...
SEYMOUR: It sees everything. I'm telling you, all that stuff that we cover up, it can see through. And what's interesting is smoking actually breaks down a protein in the skin called MMP-1 and breaks down the collagen.
ZAHN: Yet another reason to get people to quit, I guess.
SEYMOUR: Yes, smoking is pretty terrible. And it's a good idea to stop.
ZAHN: Now there are a number of things that you say contributed to premature aging of skin. Let's go through those so we understand what the red flags should be.
SEYMOUR: Right, well, the most interesting things obviously are Sun exposure, smoking. Stress is an interesting one. I didn't know -- we know stress creates all kinds of other problems for your body, but not only does it give you permanent dark rings under your skin, but it also creates all kinds of proteins in your skin that breakdown collagen and all that stuff.
Same thing with sleep deprivation. Not only can it make you look terrible, but can actually effect the aging of your skin, and the terrible thing for someone like me, I admit I'm a sugar junkie. I do the other stuff well. But if you take a large intake of sugar, and that means two doughnuts at breakfast. You know, a sugar addition to your lunch, something going on in the evening, and all those sugar junkies out there know who they are, because it's not just somebody with a little teeny, you know, cup of coffee and one little sugar, people like me. That does actually breakdown proteins in the skin.
ZAHN: Really?
SEYMOUR: It's like we got to come clean now.
ZAHN: Food police, every corner we turn, they're there.
SEYMOUR: I know, it's terrible.
ZAHN: You have a list of foods you highly recommend for making the skin more attractive.
SEYMOUR: These are the obvious things that your mother talked to you about and every magazine like us talks to you about, asparagus, blueberries, broccoli, cantaloupe, carrots. What they say is look for color. The more color, the better the food is for you...
ZAHN: Tell me why. I don't get that.
SEYMOUR: Well, it has more nutrients. I mean, it has no carotenes It has all kinds of vitamins in it. Pale, pasty, looking stuff doesn't have as much, and that's just an easy fast way to go about it. Broccoli is bright green, anything with a lot.
ZAHN: You're asking us to change a lot of things in our lives today.
SEYMOUR: One thing at a time.
ZAHN: You came up with a list of some ideas how to prevent skin problems as related to sun exposure, short of staying out of the sun all together.
SEYMOUR: Stay out for the sun is the obviously one. Don't do tanning booths. Teenagers are doing tons of tanning booths get yourself moisturizer SPF or 15 or more. Every day, we must realize it's not just baking on the beach, it's the time between your car, and the supermarket or between the car and the office that creates a lot of sun exposure, especially now with the ozone layer being depleted, and you can go for skin peels at the dermatologist, three to help will help you. Various things like Retin A (ph), or there's a new product called Avita (ph), which is a kind of softer version doesn't create rash and stuff like that, really will help you.
ZAHN: Before we let you go, if you really want to impress yourself, you want to get one of the UV photos, do most them?
SEYMOUR: They're about $200, and sometimes the cosmetic companies doing them at counter, so around the summertime you can check. Sometimes they do it, because they know this is what scared me into behaving. When you see photo of yourself, and you say, I look great today. I'm frightened what I look like. You will change your habits and they want to be there to help you.
ZAHN: Another one of the creepy photos, and you can put on that refrigerator with magnets.
SEYMOUR: Then you can stop. It's a great something to stop you.
ZAHN: From doing anything in the refrigerator. SEYMOUR: Great to see you. Marie Claire, editor and chief of "Marie Claire" magazine.
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