What Causes Dry Skin on Your Cheeks During Winter
The cold, brisk air of winter can leave your cheeks feeling raw and irritated. Frigid temperatures, whipping winds, and lower humidity levels create the perfect storm for exacerbating dry facial skin.
Understanding the root causes of winter-induced dry cheeks enables you to take targeted action to protect and restore moisture. With some simple adjustments to your daily skin care regimen, you can fend off peeling, cracking, redness, and roughness.
Lower Humidity Dries Your Cheeks
One of the biggest culprits behind dry cheek skin in winter is the drop in atmospheric moisture levels. Indoor heat further reduces humidity inside your home or office. This parches your skin by accelerating water loss from its outermost layers.
Your cheeks end up directly exposed to cold, moisture-zapping air each time you head outside. The skin barrier weakens without sufficient hydration, allowing irritation to set in quickly.
Frigid Temperatures Disrupt Skin Function
Freezing winter air doesn’t just dry your skin—it disrupts normal function. Prolonged exposure to cold constricts underlying blood vessels, reducing blood flow to your face.
When blood circulation slows, nutrient and oxygen delivery to your cheeks’ cells declines. Waste product removal also suffers. Your skin’s natural renewal processes starve without vital transports, compromising its health.
Wind Chafes Delicate Facial Skin
The blustery winds of winter deliver a harsh one-two punch alongside lower temperatures. Not only does wind chill accelerate heat loss from exposed skin, it literally causes physical wear and tear.
Your cheeks endure friction as gusts blow snow, sleet, dirt, and debris against them. The abrasive effects disrupt your skin’s protective barrier, laying the foundation for moisture loss and infection.
Winter Sun Exposes Sensitive Skin
Believe it or not, cheeks often remain vulnerable to sun damage even in winter. Light reflects intensely off snow, nearly doubling UV exposure compared to walking on grass.
The low angle of the winter sun means its rays readily bypass hats, directly striking delicate facial skin. Too much sun rapidly drains moisture while inflicting free radical damage.
Tackling 5 Common Causes of Dry Winter Cheeks
Understanding why your cheeks grow flaky and irritated in cold weather is only half the battle. Effectively treating the problem involves tailoring skin care routines to reverse moisture loss and repair skin’s protective barrier.
1. Switch to a More Hydrating Cleanser
Harsher soaps and cleansers strip away facial oils in winter when skin already trends drier. Tipping the scales further out of balance irritates and tightens delicate cheek skin.
Instead, switch to a rich, creamy cleanser packed with skin-soothing ingredients like glycerin, hyaluronic acid and ceramides. Avoid products with irritants like added fragrance and alcohol.
2. Upgrade to a Heavier Moisturizer
Lightweight lotions fail to seal in moisture once humidity plummets. Seek out a richer cold weather formula containing ceramides, fatty acids and humectants to nourish winter skin on a deeper level.
Look for moisturizers fortified with barrier-boosting ingredients like shea butter, squalane oil and petroleum jelly. Apply liberally each morning and evening.
3. Hydrate With Facial Oils
When cheek skin turns especially dry, seal in moisture with antioxidant-rich facial oils boasting olive oil, jojoba oil or rose hip seed oil. Use alone or add a few drops to your regular moisturizer.
Facial oils reinforce your skin’s lipid barrier against moisture evaporation. Nourishing fatty acids help strengthen skin cells while restoring supple softness.
4. Exfoliate Regularly
Don’t stop exfoliating just because it's cold out! Sloughing away dead cells enables moisture to better penetrate. Try a weekly scrub with jojoba beads or a daily chemical exfoliant like glycolic acid.
Gently buffing dry cheek skin combats flakiness while smoothing rough spots. But don’t overdo it—never exfoliate skin that feels tight, tender or irritated.
5. Load Up on Barrier-Building Foods
Restore winter skin resiliency by eating foods rich in vitamins, antioxidants and healthy fats. Focus especially on produce loaded with vitamin C like citrus fruits, tomatoes and bell peppers.
Seafood, avocado, nuts, seeds and olive oil deliver skin-softening omega-3s and fatty acids. Stay hydrated with plenty of water as well.
When to Seek Help for Chronically Dry Cheeks
Implementing targeted skin care measures typically brings rapid relief from mild cheek dryness during winter. But some people battle more severe, unrelenting symptoms that fragilize skin and provoke complications.
See Your Dermatologist for Extreme Flaking and Redness
If your cheeks become inflamed with bumps, crusty patches and constant stinging despite moisturizing, you may have a deeper skin condition requiring medical attention.
Eczema, psoriasis and contact dermatitis often flare with a vengeance in winter. Other possibilities like seborrheic dermatitis also cause red, scaly skin.
Address Signs of Infection Immediately
Cracked cheek skin lays vulnerable not just to irritation, but also opportunistic infection. Signs of possible skin infection warrant urgent care:
- Oozing fluid
- Yellow crusting
- Expanding redness
- Swollen skin
- Fever or chills
When your skin’s protective barrier breaks down, bacteria can infiltrate deep into tissues leading to impetigo, cellulitis or dangerous MRSA infections.
See an Allergist if Suspecting Product Reactions
Sometimes extremely dry, irritated cheeks stem from contact allergy rather than weather factors. If symptoms flare after using certain skin care products, an allergic reaction may be to blame.
Common chemical triggers hiding in winter creams include fragrances, preservatives like parabens, emulsifiers like ceteareth-20 and ingredients derived from nuts or coconut oil.
See an allergist or dermatologist about patch testing to pin down any problematic components. Avoiding your sensitizers is key to resolving allergic cheek dermatitis.
Disclaimer: This article is for informational purposes only and does not constitute medical advice. Always consult with a healthcare professional before starting any new treatment regimen.
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