A remedy for damaged skin: Aloe and Shea Butter

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Last week I shared my review of a recipe for homemade lotion. I love this recipe, and it is great for an every day, quick lotion application. But some days (and nights), my eczema leaves my skin in rough shape and I need something a little deeper for true healing and repair.

The answer isn’t fancy creams or anything bizarre. It’s just two simple ingredients that I always, no matter what, keep in the house. And in my humble opinion, if you don’t always have these two products, you should. They are my Windex (My Big Fat Greek Wedding, anyone?).

Aloe and Shea Butter

Simple, right? These two simple substances are amazing for healing skin. If you have ever had any sort of burn, you know what aloe can do. It soothes damaged skin and helps it heal. It even adds moisture to skin. I find that if my eczema is really itchy, aloe quickly reduces the urge to scratch.

And shea butter. Well, if you’ve read any posts about skin products here, you know my love of shea butter. Shea butter moisturizes and leaves a protective layer on the skin. It cuts through my eczema and nourishes the skin for deep healing. A good layer of shea butter will produce noticeable improvements in my skin by the next morning, whether I just needed moisture to dry skin, or if I needed to heal a patch of eczema raw from scratching. I find that shea butter also helps reduce itchiness.

It is important to be using good quality versions of aloe and shea butter. The shea butter should be raw and the aloe should have as few additives as you can find. Growing your own aloe plant and extracting the gel yourself would be ideal.

So here’s the great part. Not only are these two products amazing for healing skin (and maintaining that skin health), but the application is very simple. First, I apply the aloe to the affected area. I let it soak in and dry, then I massage in a generous amount of shea butter. I define this as a large enough quantity that my hands move freely over my skin, and the skin will be left a little greasy. Not too much more than this, though, or it will just rub off on clothing.

Speaking of clothing, it is best if this is done right after a shower or sometime when you can walk around without clothes covering the affected area. This will give the shea butter more time to soak in and nourish your skin, rather than just wiping off on the cloth.

This remedy can be used every day – this is what I do when I am too lazy to make up a batch of lotion for daily use. However, I find it to be more time consuming than just throwing on a thin layer of lotion in the morning, so when I do have lotion made, I only use this method as needed. I will note that it doesn’t fix everything overnight. When my diet has been bad, that needs to be fixed before I will be able to use this method to fully heal. You can read more about how I healed my skin with food here.

Enjoy your healing skin! I hope it works as well for you as it has for me.

Do you have problems with damaged skin? Do you have any other suggestions for quick, effective healing?

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