The dangers of nanoparticles in cosmetics on your brain.

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I am a teen girl who loves to wear makeup. However, I recently came across some worrisome information that I saw repeated multiple times in different internet articles on the neurotoxic effects of things such as eyeshadow, blush, and powder, all of which I wear regularly.

Essentially, the fear is that the nanoparticles used in the coloration of the makeup can and will be absorbed by your skin and find itself in your bloodstream, (I've heard of this happening with ink before), then build up around your brain without being small enough to actually get to your brain, thus causing stress and harming your post-mitotic brain cells. This leads to things such as Alzheimer's later on.

My question is, if I find it recreationally satisfying to wear makeup, how harmful can it be? Especially if makeup is such a wide phenomenon, but cognitive degeneration from wearing has never actually been studied or observed.

I've debated making sure to be good to my intellectual health in other ways while continuing to wear makeup as a guilty pleasure, like eating lots of sweets, until I can find safer alternatives.

What is your advice?

This is an internal debate I have with myself a lot because I also enjoy wearing makeup, and it can be really hard to find stuff without petrochemicals/nanometric silver and other nanoparticles that is affordable. The availability and selection can be slim locally, and it's annoying and time consuming having to order one's cosmetics online (because it can be mostly trial and error if you're ordering from companies you've not bought from before, and it can be hard to gauge colours from images on a computer screen).

I could probably do more research on the subject but at the same time I'm sort of afraid what I might find out because I really wouldn't want to have to completely give up wearing makeup, but at the same time I am very concerned about the safety of what I put on my body as well as what I put in my body (I try to eat healthy and organic food whenever I can afford to do so).

I have noticed a change for the better in the health of my skin, though (I used to have trouble with eczema and severe dry skin), since I switched all my soap/shampoos/conditioners to plant-based, petrochemical-/paraben-free products. And I try to always remember to wear sunscreen (especially on my face) when I go out (usually I will use a facial moisturiser or a light foundation with an SPF factor). Also I eat lots of fresh produce and drink lots of water throughout the day. There are other things you can do for your skin's health to help protect it against the effects of things like makeup.

I also tend to struggle with finding a balance of the right amount of attention to give to things like the health of my skin and my body, because I want to be conscientious and take good care of my body while I have it, but I also have an obsessive tendency to fixate on things in unnecessarily minute detail. Probably that is due to being on the spectrum, but generally I struggle with balance in such things as attention and focus.

Sorry if that was a bit rambling. Anyway those are my thoughts, not sure if they will help.

I hadn't heard that makeup has nanoparticles--yuck! Nanoparticles are considered hazardous because they can go right through the cell membrane, bypassing your body's natural defenses. This is such a concern that industrialists consider them a hazardous substance. I heard somewhere that someone has come up with a method of making them less hazardous by having long molecules attach to the surface of the particles, making them too big to go through cell membranes.

I have too much of an allergic reaction to wear makeup, especially eye makeup.

I don't know if this solves the nanoparticle problem, but over the past year I have switched entirely over to natural makeup and skincare products - it helped solve some skin problems for me, and I figured it must be healthier than regular makeup. Sometimes it doesn't perform quite as well as regular makeup at the store, but it's good enough for me, as I don't wear a lot to begin with, and I am fine with the results. Maybe you could go to a health food store and try some on your skin? It is pricey, but it's less expensive than the make up brands I had been using anyway. For makeup I like Mineral Fusion and Honeybee Gardens, for skin care and perfume I like Pacifica.

In a word: no.

http://www.paulaschoice.com/expert-advi ... -sunscreen

I don't wear makeup. So I don't care.

You'd probably look better without it. That's my advice.

Many products in the cosmetics department or aisle are evil. Not inherently, but because of the way the makeup industry has wrangled exclusions from any sort of safety regulations.

"The 1938 Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act brought the cosmetic industry under the regulatory jurisdiction of the FDA. However, the confluence of federal administrative budgetary constraints, historical conditions of the cosmetic industry’s development, and pragmatic policy considerations has fostered a unique regulatory regime. The FDA has come to rely heavily on the cosmetic industry to regulate itself in order to ensure consumer safety."

(from the first hit I found that sufficiently summarized the problem: https://dash.harvard.edu/bitstream/hand ... sequence=2 )

It is the extreme of irony when say, Avon or Maybelline heavily promotes a Pinkwashed walk-a-thon to cure breast cancer; their products legally contain massive amounts of known carcinogens as do most cosmetics.

Nanoparticles are just another nasty ingredient they are allowed to "self-regulate" in terms of assessing safety vs profits. I tend to go light on makeup & do at least basic research into which brands or products are safest, but mildly obsessive research is a trait of mine anyway. There have been far too many cases of real harm being done to women over the years that wasn't revealed until it was decades too late.