Benefits of Shea Butter

If you’re a human being living in Canada, you likely experience dry skin. You might be familiar with classic one-two shake of your yoga pants to get the ‘leg dandruff’ off. Or you’ve armed yourself with multiple lip butters for your car, your home and workplace so you’re never caught without one! While dry skin is a fact of life, there’s an ingredient that can help you combat it like a champ.

Shea butter is like a secret superfood for our skin. For centuries, this nutrient powerhouse has been boosting the health, energy and integrity of our skin with its moisturizing, anti-inflammatory, and anti-aging properties.

Shea butter comes from the shea fruit that grows naturally in parts of Africa. Fruit that’s left on the tree eventually falls and animals eat it, leaving the pit and its nut inside for shea butter making. Collected pits are dried in the hot sun. Once dry, the pits are cracked and the nut inside is harvested.

Next comes roasting, a second grind then it is whipped into a rich butter. A lot of work goes into making this decadently moisturizing, antioxidant rich butter that has multiple benefits for the skin.

1. Moisturizing:  Shea butter is loaded with vitamins A and E, minerals, and essential fatty acids that give it the ability to soothe, hydrate and balance your beautiful skin.  If you live in the Canadian tundra like we do, shea butter should be your skin's new best friend as it also helps to seal in moisture and prevent water loss. It's renowned for being an effective moisturizer for dry skin, eczema, and even chapped lips. Shea butter can even help to soften that cracked, dry skin on your heels, elbows and knees. Ah yes, sweet relief.

2. Anti-inflammatory: Shea butter has natural anti-inflammatory properties that help reduce skin inflammation and heal scrapes, cuts and burns; relieve sunburn and rashes; take the sting out of insect bites; and ease the pain from muscle fatigue and arthritis. And let's not forget, in a 2010 study, researchers concluded that “shea nuts and shea fat (shea butter) constitute a significant source of anti-inflammatory and anti-tumour promoting compounds". We'll take some more of that, won't we?

3. Collagen Boosting Properties: Shea butter has been used for centuries to help reduce signs of wrinkles. The essential fatty acids found in shea butter help support your skin’s natural collagen production, restoring its firmness and elasticity. The American Shea Butter Institute even claims that the application of shea butter will diminish the appearance of wrinkles in as little as four to six weeks. Hurrah!

Now that you've discovered this secret superfood for your skin, look for it in the ingredients list of the products that you put on your skin knowing it will help protect and restore your skin.

 

Take Me to Everything with Shea!