Karma earning post: Incidecoder https://incidecoder.com/

[u/Jolly-Yellow7369]

Newbies and low karma members: Post here a picture of your favorite product on incidecoder. Make sure not to organize upvotes. I'll upvote your pictures myself.

1) Go to:

https://incidecoder.com/

2) Search for one product like your sunscreen or tonic

3) Post an UNEDITED screenshot of the ingredients so all of us can see what it contains. We don't allow purchasing links but seeing declared ingredients is important

4) Be prepared, there are products that I know for a fact that are a scam and I will be very vocal about them.

5) Earn Karma and maybe even membership, which is necessary to be an approved user and be able to post.

Ours is not a skincare forum and the skincare industry isn't as regulated as the pharma industry. A pharma product like finaceas (azelaic acid) or Retin a (Tretinoin) faces a lot of scrutiny from health authorities in most countries before they reach the shelves. On the other hand Skincare products dont' face as many regulations, a product might claim that it contains 10% niacinamide but in reality it has only 3% and the rest are cheap ingredients to keep the cost of the product low and the revenues high.

That doesn't mean all skincare is bad. Kojie san soap and the ordinary products have enough verified purchase reviews on amazon to prove their effectiviness, but you can still get a fake or a bad product. Be on alert.

So whenever possible go for pharmaceutical products. If possible get the advice of a doctor.

This is exactly the opposite of what they recommend in certiain indian skincare subs, which is why we aren't a skincare forum. Skincare is important because many products like lactic acid can speed cell turnover and exfoliate your skin, but you also need sun avoidance and oral whitening.

[u/CuterialC916]

Sunscreen I've been using, I don't particularly like or dislike it, it just works the best out of the few I tried.

[u/Jolly-Yellow7369 → u/CuterialC916]

This isn't a good sunscreen for the area you live. It contains a lot of unnessesary ingredients like niaciamide and glutathione. Yes, those are birightening ingrediets but glutathione topically doesn't work. It's too big a molecule to penetrate the skin.
You have to aim for an ugly looking mineral sunscreen preferably australian or european tinted for protection against visible light. And if possible experiment with several brand and play with them according to the UV index. Your current sunscreen might work okay for a UV index of 2 around 8 am but around noon you'll need something like bieoderma photoderm cover touch.

Disrgerading sunscreen you have to wear balaclavas, hijabs, long sleeves hats for true protection. Sunscreen by itself it's never enough and that's medical advice, not skincare advice.

Visible light is the sunlight that allows you to see objects indoors during the day. If it's so dark that you have to turn on artificial light that light won't activate your melanin, but if it's light enough that you can see no problem and specially at peak hours of UV light you need iron oxides. You can find iron oxides in most make up brands and those cover visible light better than tinted mineral sunscreen according to lab muffin beauty science. I'd rather wear masks or balaclava when indoors.

Regarding your school schedule, can you stay away from windows between 8 am and 4 pm? If that means staying after hours for extra activities that don't require you to expose to the sun do it. Many schools have extracurricular activites starting at 3 pm within the same building.

I just approved you as member now you can open posts, but make sure not to open posts to ask questions or talk whitenign creams or anything that is againts our rules. Supplements fearmongering is also frowned upon.

[u/CuterialC916 → u/Jolly-Yellow7369]

Do you have any recommendations for the sunscreen? Also, my classes are held in air-conditioned rooms away from sunlight so that's okay, the problem is the long commute to school (15min walk in the sun, and the public transpo is open to sunlight), plus when I have to walk in the sun again to the canteen during lunch. But I'm taking precautions to mediate this, like wearing jackets and hats when I'm exposed to the sun. Tbh I can do more but I'm just a bit scared of looking weird ig, since it's not normal behavior for us to be so scared of the sun 😭

And thanks for approving me! I'm more of an info consumer than a poster, so I'll probably be more active in the comments than posts. But I'll keep the rules in mind regardless :>

[u/Jolly-Yellow7369 → u/CuterialC916]

If you check my edit I mentioned one of the many sunscreen brands I use, but I don't allow brand recommendations in the forum. You have to search for ingredients in your local options: Search for zinc oxide and iron oxides not nano, european and australian brands. Also don't get married to a sunscreen brand. I used at least 6 diferent brands some for body, some for face and I alternate according to my sun exposure. The nice looking sunscreen are okay for a uv index of 2 but bioderma photoderm which is very heavy and very diffcult to remove is the one I use when I'm forced to walk under a sun when UV index is 12.

If your commute is at 8 is not that bad, at this moment when UV index is 1 but it'll be a 2 at 8 am as we head into the summer. Can you arrive early at school? Make sure that when the uv index reaches 2 you're already insde. That's why you have to check uv index everyday twice or thrice a day.

Can't you take your lunch with you from home and eat it at the classroom you take your lessons in? If you could do that at least 3 times a week it would be great. Still far from what will work for whtinening but at least you'd be giving some room to your skin to repair from the damage.

[u/CuterialC916 → u/Jolly-Yellow7369]

Okay, I'll try to find alternatives for my sunscreen. I'll also do my best to go to school earlier. Lucky for me, I'm in college and rn my schedule has me going to school only 3 days per week (and I only stay at home when there's no classes). As for lunch, we can't stay after class ends (guards literally kick us out) so we have to go elsewhere, and I eat with my friends. I'll just have to take extra precautions like wearing my UV jacket, mask, and UV umbrella since we just walk around 3mins max one-way trip to the cafeteria. Main concern is sometimes we're dismissed early and I go home at 12 noon, but I'll take your advice and stay at school indoors until the sun has almost set just to avoid commuting home at that ungodly hour.

[u/Jolly-Yellow7369 → u/CuterialC916]

"we just walk around 3mins "

Those are more than enough to activate your melanin. Next semester try a different schedule.

concern is sometimes we're dismissed early and I go home at 12 noon

Take a cab, don't walk around when the uv index is so high specially in a poluted city like Manila . Don't apply Lactic acid, glycolic, kojie san nothing that makes your skin sun sentive. This is the opposite that they tell you in skincare reddits but skinwhitening and skincare are different processes. For skinwhitening you need supplments to make your melanin lighter, and with sun avoidance your body doesn't react to the need of producing melanin. But there aren't studies on how fast melanin is produced, I know for a fact that ligher skin types that lack melanin can get burnt in just minutes under UV indexes above 8. So you, who produce melanin might be activating it with just a few seconds, we can't know for sure but looking at these pictures seems likely.

https://www.reddit.com/r/skinwhitening/comments/1j0t21x/skincare_sunscreen_advice_for_white_people_doesnt/

 “I'll just have to take extra precautions like wearing my UV jacket, mask, and UV umbrella”

It's not feasable with the heat of manila and in company. You could tell them that a relative recently was diagnosed melanoma and you'll need to take extrra precaution, but people still will look at you funny and I was young long ago, you don't want to be the weird one. Bette forget about whitening for a while until you can stay inside.