You know when you go for a facial, and the therapist whips out what I lovingly refer to as The Eye of Sauron or The Light of Doom? It's that UV light that shows problem areas in your skin, the blemishes and pigmentation that aren't visible to the human eye.
Well, I went for a facial recently and for the first time, the therapist asked did I want to use a mirror to have a look at what the UV revealed. I hesitated. But only for a second. Of course I want to see what's going on, I mean, I'm the type of person who looks at the syringe as I am giving blood at the hospital, and I'll peek through my hands at those operation programmes on TV.
And it wasn't as bad as I had expected. Except for one God-awful area, which I'll come to in a moment.
The lamp shows up oil producing areas as little orange dots, while dry skin shows up as a purple shade. All the sun damage is laid bare in the form of freckles, sun spots and pigmentation - none of which are visible to the naked eye.
But I am militant in my SPF'ing. It's one of the best things you can do for you skin. And I know we say it ad nauseam, and Imma say it again (but in the tone of Mr T this time, just to mix it up a bit) - I pity the fool who doesn't wear sunscreen (hundreds of Mr T gold chains are optional).
So overall my skin looked ok. The protection plan had paid off and the sun damage wasn't too bad. But what was horrendous was my eye area.
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Sweet Lord. I looked like I had gone ten, nay , twenty rounds with Katie Taylor, where her sole focus had been on my eyelids. And when I say that the skin around my orbital bone was purple, I mean it was so bad that it looked like I was wearing those little round, lilac-tinted glasses that you might wear to a 70s fancy dress.
It frightened me into upping my skincare regime around my eyes and bringing out the big guns.
If you haven't yet experienced the Eye of Sauron for yourself and you're wondering how bad could it really be, then check out this video.
Thomas Leveritt and his team decided to take to the streets and to show people what they looked like in ultraviolet and what the sun was actually doing to their faces every time they forget to wear sunscreen.
And check out the sunscreen application around the two minute mark - it's like magic, non? If this doesn't have you reaching the sunscreen, nothing will.
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Now pass the Factor 50.
