Weight gain can be uncomfortable in many ways. As your body changes, your skin must adjust to cover the additional surface area. Whether you're experiencing weight gain as a result of a pregnancy, stress, a medical condition, or something else, your skin is being pulled at a fairly rapid pace, which can cause it to loose elasticity. When this happens, those unwelcome, pigmented lines known as stretch marks often begin to appear.

Where Do Stretch Marks Come From?

Collagen and elastin are your body's best friends when you're gaining weight. Collagen is a naturally occurring protein that connects your body's tissues, including your skin cells. It's responsible for keeping your skin firm and supple. Elastin is another important protein, which is responsible for giving your skin structure, allowing it to resume its beautiful shape even after it stretches and contracts.

As you gain weight, these proteins can become weak, and sometimes your body simply isn't able to produce enough of each protein to keep up with the changes.

Think of your skin like a rubber band. When a rubber band is new, it can easily stretch, contort, and return to a relaxed state without incurring any harm. As it ages, becomes over-stretched, or dries out, it becomes fragile, forming a brittle texture that's no longer able to contract back to its naturally relaxed state. This is exactly what happens to your skin when you gain weight.

How Can You Combat Stretch Marks?

It's important to take great care of your skin all the time, but when you're gaining weight, your delicate skin needs a little extra special TLC.

Cleanse & Hydrate. It's important to look for a cream cleanser that will help you avoid the negative, drying effects that soap can cause. You'll want to find a cleanser that's formulated with natural ingredients that are known to enhance the skin's natural moisture. Ingredients such as coconut, palm, and nutmeg can do amazing things to cleanse and reinvigorate the skin. Glycerin and eucalyptus also have qualities that are excellent for soothing and healing skin while facilitating skin cell turnover, which helps keep fresh, young, elastic skin on the top of its game.

Use Nutrient-Boosting Products. Serums can do amazing things for your skin. While many people immediately think of using serums on their face, they're actually quite useful for other delicate parts of the body, too. High-quality serums are formulated with peptides, skin-enhancing vitamins, and hyaluronic acid, which help keep skin youthful and elastic.

Add Silicone Fusion™ Technology to Your Beauty Regimen. Silicone Fusion™ Treatments are key if you want to reduce the appearance of stretch marks. Medical grade silicone pads create a micro-environment that facilitates optimal hydration, allowing the fragile skin cells responsible for your stretch marks to become moisturized and more pliable. The pads gently pull the puckered skin back into a taut position while providing nourishing moisture that allows the nutrients in the skin serums to go to work.

Dermaclara Beauty offers a full line of skincare products that are specially formulated to treat weight gain stretch marks. From our hydrating cream cleanser claraprep, to our peptide-infused serum claraline , to our Silicone Fusion™ Treatment products, we've got you covered! Please feel free to browse our site at Dermaclara.com, and contact us if you have any questions.