EPI #028 NMT and It's Skin Healing Benefits - Skin Deep Pod

There are many therapies available for healing eczema and TSW, but NMT has been a secret modality that is under spoken and under used.

In this episode on the Skin Deep Podcast, I'll be covering the uses, benefits and how to incorporate the therapy into your daily healing rituals, and what it was like for me and my skin healing journey.

Plus another condition that is very similar to NMT and how to combat it!

Thanks for tuning into the Skin Deep Podcast.

Your Guide to True Skin Health

Disclaimer:

This video is for informational purposes only and does not replace professional medical advice, diagnosis or treatment. Consult your healthcare provider for guidance on any medical issues.

* Find the Eczema Healing Hacks: https://everbella.ca/pages/eczema-guide

* Find an Everbella product: https://everbella.ca/
* Everbella Eczema 30 Day Trial Set: https://everbella.ca/products/eversoothe-trial-set
* Everbella Dry & Dehydrated 30 Day Trial Set: https://everbella.ca/products/everhydrate-trial-set
* Everbella Sensitive & Baby 30 Day Trial Set: https://everbella.ca/products/evergentle-trial-set

Connect with me!

Personal TikTok: @mekishabanks
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Mekisha Banks Bio:

Mekisha, a licensed Medical Aesthetician, Skin-Care Specialist and Educator with over 15 years of experience. Her wealth of expertise became the driving force to her career and founding Everbella. 

Everbella was born out of a personal struggle with eczema, asthma and allergies. 

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Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:00

Welcome to the Skin Deep Podcast, everyone. This is your go-to source for everything, skin health and self-care, especially when it comes to eczema, dermatitis, and other skin conditions. I'm your host, Mikisha Banks, and I am so happy that we're here for another episode today. Uh please, if you do hear a little bit of thumping in the background, it's just because the studio that I'm in, people are recording music, and I am not gonna stop myself from recording because there's a little bit of music in the background. So I hope it doesn't annoy you and I hope it doesn't actually come through, but I'm not too sure. I've just been just going with the flow with it. So, well, I am really excited about today's episode because it is a trending topic about eczema and repairing eczema or even TSW, so you know, topical steroid withdrawal. So it is a topic that is pretty popular, and I wanted to kind of cover it because I tried it myself and I want to give you my experience with that. It is called NMT. So NMT is no moisture therapy, and it's correlated to another term that is called TEWL, which is trans epidermal water loss. So I I kind of tie those two things together because they're very similar in terms of what your body's experiencing and how it can affect your healing process. So I'm excited to go into this topic today. So uh bear with me, like I said, if you do hear a little bit of music in the background, like some drums, just it's some it's the elevator music in the background of the episode. So let's get right into it. Okay, so for example, NMT was developed by a doctor named Dr. Sado, and he was dealing with a lot of different patients that had, you know, eczema or they're dealing with uh TSW, and you know, through his research and through his practice, he developed this therapy, and it has dramatically helped a lot of people when they are recovering from TSW. Because again, TSW is very different from eczema, they're very much correlated or corresponded or mistaken to be the same thing, but they're actually two different things, and I'll I'll even cover that in a different episode later on. But um, you know, TSW is pretty much worse than eczema because this is where your body has lost its function of repairing itself because the steroids have basically numbed your body from recovering naturally. So that is more so when your body is addicted to that steroid to recover and to dull down its immune system and its repair system. And eventually, when you decide that you want to stop using these steroids, your body goes through a withdrawal process. And when it does go through that withdrawal process, your body flares up in a very uniquely different way. A lot of times it's like crepey elephant skin. There is inflammation as well, but there's a very much a dry, very um core, like thick tissue that's developed because your body is almost reacting to the fact that there's not that product on the skin, and now it's trying to almost kind of um protect itself from external energies or external triggers or external elements. So it become it produces a very thick, cowlous kind of texture on the skin. And sometimes that could be the whole entire body from face all the way down to the feet. Sometimes it could just be the arms, it could be just the legs. Um, it just depends on where that breaking of in uh tissue is located on the body. So through the process of NMT, um, it's like it's helping the body recover. So, you know, there's this kind of like thing in the industry when it comes to repairing eczema or TSW. It is putting on so much creams and lotions and potions and all of those things because we want to just feel moisturized in the skin. And then, you know, a lot of people say, well, that actually causes you to have that elephant texture of skin or causes you to null down the sensory, you know, glands that produce oils and moisture and sweat that protects the skin or creates that barrier over the skin that prevents the skin from having intruders. So, you know, there's this concept that either you over-moisturize your skin to protect your skin, or the complete opposite, which is dry out the skin, which is NMT, in order to repair the skin. I truly believe in the beauty of using both of those two things to your benefit because uh again, there's a place for everything, and there's sometimes a way of doing the same healing, but maybe you're a person that doesn't like the NMT method, and maybe you want to do it with moisture and so forth. So there's no right or wrong in terms of your way of healing, it's more so trying to figure out what is your way of healing, what do you prefer? So, I'm gonna kind of go over the concept, what it is, how it works, and what I've done using both of the concepts and what worked for me, and then hopefully that kind of gives you some idea of what is you know the best method for you and what to expect. Okay, so NMT, again, no moisture therapy. It is the basis of that, which is you're not applying any moisture whatsoever to the skin, and you're even limiting your consumption of moisture, so meaning hydration like water or juices or teas or coffees or whatever, because what you're forcing um the body to do is to dry out, right? And when you're trying to dry out the body, you cannot apply any moisture, you can't even take a bath or shower, you're really limiting all different um avenues of hydration and moisture. So, yes, in terms of like not hydrating the skin, you're limiting your consumption of water and so forth. So you're really just focusing on certain foods, but you're limiting your consumption of liquids because you internally want to make sure that you're not adding that moisture to the skin through your internal glands, and externally, you're also limiting your um your availability to moisturize the skin, whether it's creams, lotions, oils, everything. Like you're literally not applying anything to the skin. And when I first started that process, um, I'm gonna be honest, it was very challenging. And the reason why it was challenging is because I'm a person that always grew up applying something to my skin. So whether when I was a baby, all throughout growing up, I've always applied something to my skin. So to go through the process of not applying something to my skin, it was like me going against a religion. It was like, what? What do you mean? Like, I don't apply anything to your my skin. Like that's unknown, that's unheard of in my culture, but also just in my overall upbringing. So by you not applying any products to your skin and also limiting the consumption of liquids into your internal body, it is making and forcing the body to trigger a natural healing process. Because when you're triggering that natural healing process, the body then wants to trigger or activate its sebaceous and pseudophorous glands. And I spoke about this in other episodes of these two critical glands and what they what is their role in our body in terms of healing or just our everyday ecosystem. And those two glands are our sebaceous gland, which is the oil glands, and the pseudophorous glands, which are sweat glands. These two glands, when they're activated and um they are functioning consistently, they create like this this thing called the acid mantle. And the acid mantle creates like a barrier over the skin, and there's other things that uh play a part in that that gland or the acid mantle. It basically is like a comectant, it is a a way, a firewall, if you call it. Your body cannot allow things to penetrate into the skin, and it also is very limited in terms of what is exuded or secreted from the skin. So through the acid mantle, it is what causes us to have beautiful glowing skin, and it makes our skin more pliable, more flexible. Our elasticity is very, very pliable as well. So through those two glands it's allowing our body to have a natural protective barrier. Now, when we are inflamed, or we have broken skin, there's intruders, there's free radicals attacking us, or we naturally broke down our skin through so much different harmful products, we break down that acid mantle, we break down that barrier. And when we break down that barrier, that's when intruders or free radicals, bacteria, these things can invade our skin and then start to cause havoc on our natural skin barrier that protects us. So the problem with that is that's how you can get eczema, that's how you can get infections, that's how you can get disorders of the skin, because that acid mantle has been broken down and eventually it's no longer protecting us from bacteria or invaders. So when we dry out the skin and dry out the body, our body's natural mechanism is to trigger those oil glands and that sebaceous glands and the pseudophorous glands to now start to produce oils and sweats in order for it to create that barrier. And when it creates that or triggers that, then our body starts to naturally start creating skin tissue. Skin tissue starts getting created. And if you ever seen a video of skin tissue being created, it's basically shifting upwards, shifting upwards to the most outer layer of our epidermis. So it goes through that process of creating new skin cells and new skin tissues that thicken up our dermis. So that whole process is happening because we went through the NMT method or therapy, which is drying up the body and naturally triggering that process to happen. And it's very unique. I think it's really awesome because if you think about when you cut yourself, for example, your body creates those platelets, they come to the surface, clog the area, or clog that area that has had that cut, it creates that scab, that scab tissue gets thicker and thicker, and eventually that scab tissue falls off, and then you see that lighter texture or lighter color of your skin, which is a different collagen type. And then eventually it gets goes through that process of you know, the skin healing process that I've talked about, where new skin cells come to the surface and then it replaces that collagen, elastin starts to get produced, and then all of a sudden you have new vibrant skin. Now, not all the time will that melanin or the color will always come back, it might be a lighter shade of it, but that process is the process of you creating new skin and creating that new pliable original skin texture again, like your normal skin texture. So that's what NMT is basically doing on a deeper internal level, and we're triggering that not through cutting yourself and having, you know, blood spill and so forth, but through the process of dehydrating the body. And whenever your body is really stiff and dry, your body starts to want to start produce oils and lipids and moisture and so forth, so it becomes pliable again. Because if it's too stiff, you can actually break the skin and cause a cut. And that sometimes is like callus at the bottom of your feet, where if it's so thick and coarse and dry, and it sometimes like is moves so shifted so much, it can cause an actual cut into the skin, and then eventually you can see blood come into your callus or into your feet or into your hands, and then you know it goes through that process of skin healing. So when we're doing NMT or in that process of NMT, that's literally what we're doing to the body. So when I give you my experience of doing that, um I hated it. I hated it, it was so painful, and it was not painful, it was just so uncomfortable that I just couldn't tolerate it. And I think it's because I've conditioned my body to like moisture or products on my skin that going to a process of not doing it, it was so uncomfortable. And I mean uncomfortable in the sense in the sense that you're so dry and you're flaking everywhere. Like it's just like I said in the last episode, like flaking is good, but excessive flaking is just like I felt dirty. I felt so dirty. And mind you, you can't really take a shower. So, what I did to make me ease into the process is I went to the hot sauna and I went to hot yoga, came home, took a shower, and didn't moisturize my skin. And when I didn't moisturize my skin, it instantaneously was like so dry right after. And that tells you, yeah, I kind of, you know, stopped my body's natural way of making, you know, moisture and oils. But um, I don't think that's 100% true because I've done it in other situations where I've never moisturized after a shower or something like that, and might I've still very moisturized and hydrated. But because this situation is where I was going through eczema and a bit of TSW, I um when I stopped, I didn't actually use the the products, like my Everbella products on top of my skin, my skin really went very, very dry and dehydrated, and it was gray and it was ashy and it was just tight, and I had that elephant skin texture on my hands. So you can actually see these pictures and some videos that I posted on our Instagram and our TikTok of me doing that process and how a seven-day process of me doing it, how it did help my skin. Um, it's on there. And I like I said, I didn't mind it, but it was very uncomfortable. So, you know, the first process is your skin will dehydrate excessively and the dryness will be there and the flaking will start to happen as well. And then through that flaking process, because now we're in stage three of the skin healing uh steps, your body is regenerating. So when it's regenerating, it's creating new skin cells, and that old skin, old dead skin is being flaked off of the body. So when it's being flaked off of the body, it's just all over the place. It's just flaking, flaking, flaking, flaking, flaking. And then eventually that new skin that's vibrant, that is pliable, that is still in the sense of like it's in the remodeling stage. So it's still relatively, you know, stiff, but it's still new skin. It's gonna be a bit tight, but it's not the damaged skin. So you'll see that difference between damaged skin or old skin, which is more gray in skin tone, and the new skin, which is more in the sense of like it's shiny, it is your original skin color, um, but it's tight. And the reason why it's tight is because elastin hasn't been built as yet. It's just the collagen that's been built, but not elastin. So you're still kind of following through of that process, and then eventually you start to feel a little bit more pliable, it's gonna flake again, but when it does, you're gonna have that very stretchy, mobile kind of skin that is there. So that process itself was about seven days on average when I did it. Um, and like I said, it was uncomfortable, but I saw that process happening and I seen my skin recover faster. So when I did that whole process for the seven days, I'm like, I'm not gonna apply any moisture, I'm not gonna do any of that. And it was okay. Like I said, it was uncomfortable, but I saw that from start to finish how much it really did help. So that is the process of NMT. It is the process of, you know, what happens to your skin when you're not applying moisture. Um, it's just now when you're kind of looking at, okay, I don't want to do that consistently. I want to maybe incorporate it, but I don't want to do that consistently. That's my approach because I thought I find I don't think I can do that consistently because it really did play a part on my mental health, just my overall joy, and even just my day-to-day emotions. It didn't feel good. Like feeling stiff and tight in my clothes and not being able to move really well. I was I almost felt like I couldn't work. Like I was at work and I'm like feeling so stiff and I just didn't feel like myself, and I didn't feel like I could really move. Like mobility was very limited. So I know there's some people that do that method and took time off of work because they can't work, like they just can't be mobile and you know they're flaking everywhere. So, you know, it's some a situation where I would say if you can take time off of work and then maybe do that um that therapy, then it might be best for you. But it isn't something that's very comfortable, so that's why I kind of alternated between NMT and then regular moisturizing um therapy, NMT and then regular moisturizing therapy. So I alternated it so that way it was easier for me to do it, but it also helped my repair process a little bit faster. Okay, so that is literally what NMT is, and that is what the process looks like. Okay, again, I hope you're not hearing the drums in the background. I am, and I feel like I should be dancing, but I'm like, goodness gracious, I am not gonna stop. Okay, so we're gonna get to the next concept now. All right, so now the next thing that's really important about NMT is how it helps your nervous system. This is why I wanted to do it a little bit more because I was going through that process of my nervous system really being up and down and chaotic and not feeling my best. Um, through NMT, it like I said, it triggers a lot of healing in your body, the natural healing process. So when you're doing NMT, it also triggers the healing process of your nervous system. It recalibrates your nervous system, it regulates your nervous system because it triggers the healing process. Even though your body is or your emotions are probably, you know, going up and down because you're just feeling uncomfortable in your body, it is underneath the surface, it's helping your body regulate and recalibrate your nervous system and healing your nervous system tissue. And that's really important because a lot of times people struggle from going through TSW and healing that and then healing their eczema, but then they're going into the stages of PTSD or emotional stress, and that's ideally what I went through. So that's where it's like it does help in that sense of your overall nervous system recalibration, it's helping you with that part. So that's where NMT is helping a lot more than just your skin layers, it's helping in your nervous system as well. So when my process of um using the NMT uh therapy and how I kind of incorporate it into my day-to-day healing is um in the beginning, or what I would suggest to somebody is if you're going through stage one of inflammation, this is the best time to do it because it's going to help kind of dry up the oozing, dry up all of that um inflammation that's happening on the skin where it feels wet or it's really inflamed. This is the best time to start doing uh the NMT. And just remember to kind of listen to your body because you don't want to have added stress to your body, you want to help ease your body into healing. But it is gonna be a good idea to dry up the skin doing this therapy, so then that way it gets rid of that inflammation, the redness, the hot tissue on your skin. So, what I would do is I would, you know, first and foremost, if you're gonna ease yourself into this process, I would take a nice warm bath with our Everbella bath salts. So then that way, when you're adding magnesium back into your skin, that's gonna help with one, your nervous system, but two, really providing you that magnesium that you need into your Your skin in terms of helping your skin heal fast or even calm down the inflammation and the itchiness and the oozing. So that's what I would do is first take a nice warm bath using Everbell uh salts. So then that way you're gonna have that Dead Sea salt magnesium deposit with the sodium that's gonna help your skin repair. After you're done the shower or the bath, then I would not apply any moisture after that. Because the good thing is after you take in that bath, it is one going to help your moisture levels reactivate, help calm the body down, calm down that inflammation activity, and then it will naturally ease you into that process of not moisturizing because you're gonna feel moisturized after the bath, but it's going to help you not feel super dry after like in a couple of hours or so. So that would be my first suggestion in going ahead and you know easing you into doing the NMT and when's the best time to do it would be in the inflammation stage. After that, um, you know, you still want to do your working out because working out also stimulates, you know, that repairs, you know, the repair system in your body. It's just trying not to do a workout where you're going to sweat a lot because you're naturally gonna want to take a shower, right? You're gonna smell, you're gonna stink. So you want to do, you know, muscle training or you know, vigorous training in terms of like um, you know, using weights or uh a band and so forth, so then that way you're not overly sweating, but you are causing the body to break down muscle tissue and rebuild muscle tissue. And through the process of rebuilding muscle tissue, it is also repairing the skin. So that's why they tell people if you have eczema, you do want to work out because working out is going to help your body repair itself naturally and not rely on any other types of methods. So that's where you want to start to incorporate working out. So then that way your body's naturally triggering those, um, that healing process. And along with you drying out your skin, it's like a double whammy. You're really encouraging the body to repair itself on a much faster basis. Okay. So again, working out would be another way of helping that process of drying out the skin and repairing that skin as well. I would also incorporate doing a sauna, uh, dry sauna more than anything, because again, it's heating up the skin, it's almost dehydrating the skin as well, but it also triggers that repair process of the skin. So those would be the first thing I would be doing in the inflammation stage and easing yourself into the NMT method. That process might be about one to two weeks, it could be longer. I usually suggest that when you're looking at each stage of the skin healing process, stage one, which is inflammation stage, or is it really technically stage two? Because the first one is homeostasis. So between stage one and stage two of inflammation, um, you're ideally looking at a four-week process because you're calming down the triggers of inflammation, you're calming down that heat inside the body. That process can take you two to four weeks because you're learning to see what's triggering your body and making you have inflammation. Um, I did the process of cutting out everything and starting from scratch when it comes to food. I literally had the same food over and over again every day, and that's what helped me get out of the inflammation stage much quicker because I knew exactly what I was eating, because I was eating the same thing for literally three months, but um actually it was like three to six months, but for three solid months or three, sorry, four solid weeks, I ate the exact same thing. So that would be an easy way for you to really see what is triggering your body and how to how to actually um control that inflammation and calm down that inflammation much quicker. And through the process of adding the NMT with that, you'll find that your body will get rid of the inflammation and the oozing and the irritation and the heat a lot faster because we're drying out the body at the same time and eating foods that are calming and cooling and soothing to the body internally, so then that way you're not um causing inflammation externally and internally. So that would be my way of incorporating NMT right away into your body's uh into your healing process or your healing journey. Okay, so now that we're going through the proliferation stage, which is basically your body remodeling or not remodeling, but rebuilding itself, creating new skin tissues. It is reorganizing, you know, a lot of things internally. This is where I would be alternating between, you know, NMT and um moisture methods because it is going to do a lot of flaking and a lot of you know um you know dryness and tightness, but it just depends on you if you can handle just being super, super dry and flaky. When I incorporated the two together just for my own research, I found that I healed a little bit differently and in a way that felt more comfortable for me. So, like I said, I did the NMT method for about seven days so that I would flake and dry out the skin, and new skin would come to the surface. And then I would go into like my moisturization stage or um process or rituals where I take a bath, I exfoliated with our dead sea salt scrubs, then I went ahead and I applied the body, body oils and body um body butters to the skin to hold in moisture, and I did that for about a seven-day process. And when I did that, that really kind of made me feel more comfortable. It was more easier on my mental health. Like I felt more emotionally, I felt better about my skin and my body, and I didn't feel very stressful when I'm at work and I couldn't function or move and so forth. So when I did that alternating kind of process, I felt better about my skin. I felt really happy because you're not to going to fake flake no matter what, even in the moisture method or therapy, you're going to flake regardless. But at least I was flaking on like on my terms. I felt I was flaking a little bit more soothing, not so much like I move my arm and it's like a whole bunch of dry flakes are all over the floor of the body or whatever. So that's where I felt a lot better about that process by alternating them together. And that process ideally is going to be close to sometimes four to eight weeks. It just depends on the severity of your skin. It depends on, you know, where where that flaking is or how much of that, you know, damage on your skin is. So, you know, depending on the severity of it, you may be able to do NMT, you know, the whole entire time because your your eczema or the TSW is only on your hands, so no big deal. Or it might be on your abdomen, it just depends on where it is. In my case, it was pretty much everywhere all over me, except for my face, um, you know, or my bum, like certain areas it was. It was just mainly on my thighs, my legs, my arms, and my neck. That's ideally where everything was. And that was in this sense where it was a little bit easier to do the TM uh and M and T option because I, you know, I wasn't very moving, like I wasn't moving as much at work. You know, I did move, but I wasn't stretching and picking up this and picking up that. So, you know, for some people it's a little bit harder to do it because they're very um, you know, mobile when they're at work. Well, for me, it was more so I was mobile with my hands than anything. So, you know, that's where it wasn't so bad of an option to do the alternating process. But then eventually, when I kind of went through the full entire proliferation stage, um, you know, everything was great. And then I was going into the remodeling stage, and that's where I am right now, where there's discoloration in my skin. And the discoloration is just mainly because you know I'll be itching on certain areas and the skin will darken because it's protecting itself, and then eventually when I stop itching that area, it starts to get lighter and lighter. So, again, that will be in a different video of that process, but this is where you know NMT is very helpful in terms of alternating between that and moisture therapy so that way it's easier on yourself of how to repair your skin. Now, the term that I wanted to talk about is TEWL, so transepidermal water loss. Why it's very similar to NMT is because I'm not sure if everyone else, but I'm quite sure everyone else has experienced this where they wake up super dry. Or with within an hour of waking up, their body just tightens up, it's really dry, it's very grayish in tone or super dry in tone color, and you just feel really tight and irritated. And that's where sometimes I find anxiety hits me in the morning because I'm just like, what's going on? Like I can't, my body's just feeling really tense and tight, and it's not because something's happening to me, it's just because TEW makes you feel anxious because the body is so tight and dehydrated, and it's because um the the process of TEWL is because overnight your body is healing itself, it's fixing itself, it's doing all the flushing, it's doing all the repairing, and it's taking up a lot of moisture in your skin. So when you wake up, there's this dehydration to your skin, and you feel like, what the heck? Am I not healing? Nope, you are healing. You're actually healing. It's just that your body used up so much moisture and hydration through the process of healing overnight that when you woke up in the morning, you saw the remnants of what happened overnight. So this is where it's so crucial to not go down the darkened tunnel of anxiety, panic, and like depression and so forth. This is where you need to either jump right into a workout so that you re-moisturize, like your body starts triggering its healing process, or you go into a take a shower, take a bath. Don't do anything else because anything else is gonna trigger more depression, anxiety, depress, um, you know, panic, and so forth, because you're just looking at your skin saying, Oh my god, there's something wrong with me when there's nothing wrong with you. It's just literally your body was healing overnight and it used a lot of the water reserves that were available. So, what you need to do is rehydrate and re-moisturize your skin and go into one of those two things that I was mentioning. So, either do a quick workout right away so that your body starts moving, and through that moving and stretching and so forth, it's triggering that healing process, which will trigger those glands to produce oil and sweat so that it can function and feel better and also heal itself, or you go into a bath or a shower to rehydrate your skin through that process of adding moisture and hydration to your skin. So those two options are there in order to ease yourself into re-moisturizing the skin in the body so that you feel more comfortable in your skin. But uh, like I said, if you're doing, you know, NMT, that morning process is going to feel very difficult because it is irritating, it is scary, you're itchy, your body is just telling you there's something wrong when there isn't anything wrong, it's just more so for the fact that your body dehydrated overnight because it was healing itself. So those are good signs, but it just doesn't feel like good signs. So if you are doing NMT, this is where I would just say, you know, you just gotta talk yourself through it, meditate, go for a walk, um, you know, or do the workout, but just don't hydrate or moisturize your skin and your body internally after, because again, you're not supposed to add any moisture. But it would be helpful to, you know, do a workout or go for a walk so that it gets your mind out of your body and into the environment to heal and calm you down. Okay, so that is what TEWL is. It is transepidermal water loss. It happens after your body was healing itself overnight, and in the morning you see your body is dry, tight, there's flakiness, there's this irritation to your skin. And the way to get over that hump that usually triggers anxiety, panic, or depression in the morning is to get yourself moving, get yourself not eating, but get yourself like activated and in, you know, triggering or you know, functioning so then that way it can null down the senses of your nervous system, feeling your skin and feeling that that tightness and that irritation. So, again, working out or walking, taking a shower, depending on which method or you're you're doing, you need to get yourself out of that funk before it comes and submerges you underneath. And I can speak to to that because there's many times, even to this day, where I wake up in the morning and all I'm doing is checking, you know, like, oh, what's going on? What am I feeling? And eventually I'm like, what the heck? I'm not healing, what's going on? I'm such a failure. And then before you know it, I am scratching and I'm in the hole in the gutter thinking about non-beneficial, non-positive things because I allowed myself to not remember that TEWL happens in the morning most of the time, and it can trigger those emotions. So, you know, my thing is to get out of the bed right away, and whether it's an NMT week or if it's a uh moisture uh ritual week, I'm taking some kind of action to get my head out of the gutter. And it takes time, it takes practice, but it is worth it. All right. So now when we're in the remodeling stage, which we also call the maturation stage, your body is basically recreating um elastin, its connectivity, your nervous system is regulated a lot better, you're not having as much panic attacks or irritations or things that are, you know, triggering you. You really want to, you know, help the body in terms of not over-moisturizing. This is why I love oils and butters because you know, they are not overly adding too much to the skin. They're just kind of re-strengthening or supporting your acid mantle in terms of the oil deposits. Um, and this is where you're just kind of naturally allowing the body to be itself, do its own thing, but you're supporting it with very minimal things, or just kind of consistently maintaining your skin and what your rituals are to help your skin maintain its health and its longevity and elasticity and luminosity. So, you know, this is where I would I would do the NMT method a couple of times just to see how your body is naturally in terms of its natural receptors for moisture and and sweat. Um, but I would also just kind of maintain having oils on your skin to help your skin heal. Internally wise, I would be eating a lot of omega-3 fatty acids. I would make sure you're having a good amount of proteins and a lot of amino acids as well to help your body just maintain the health of its flora and its microbiome internally, so that way it's producing the right amount of elements that it needs to, you know, it show on the external side of your skin to keep it protected and have that pliability and elasticity, that stretch and so forth. So, you know, in terms of the you know, maturation stage, you don't need to do the NMT method often. But if, for example, you wash your hands and you don't pull eye lotion after, this is a great way of seeing how your skin responds to dryness or responds in general when you wash it and it's naturally dry. Does it feel harsh and irritated or you know, like a sandpaper, or does it feel okay? A little bit tight, but it feels pretty okay. And if that's the case, then naturally see how long it takes for the body to make that oil and that sweat to then eventually make your skin feel hydrated again. So the remodeling stage is almost like you are really paying attention to the subtleties, the subtle signals that your body has, the cues that it makes in terms of telling you how it feels, where it's at, and so forth. And you get to decide, you know, how how do I treat it now? Do I do another round of NMT slash moisture rituals, or do I just stick to my moisture rituals, or do I stick to just NMT? No matter what, this is the time where you really want to focus on yourself and focus on your body and knowing where it's at and what it needs, and you know, not looking at it as like you suck or you failed, but more so, okay, there's still a little bit more fine-tuning for me to do so that me and my body are working together, not against each other. Like you're listening to all of those things, and that's where I'm at right now in my my journey of skin healing, and it's it's good, it's sometimes it's very hard because you you feel like you should be already ahead of the game. You know, you always want to be 10 steps ahead, never like one step ahead. You want to be 10 steps ahead, and there's no such thing because when you're 10 steps ahead, guarantee you're gonna take 15 steps back and then go five steps forward because you're you're you're jumping some critical information that you need in order to have longevity in your healing process. So, you know, take your time and really understand your body if you're at this stage and don't worry about pigment of your skin, it always will come back as long as you are not redamaging your skin over and over and over again. And there's times that I've done that, and you know, I I have to tell myself it's not about the color, it's just about the the health of my skin. It's not about, you know, it's glowing like J-Lo's legs. It's about do I have cut? Do I have bruises? Do I have, you know, is my skin moving, pliable? Am I itching at nighttime? Like I needed to have that more than glowing skin right now. I need my skin to feel comfortable, like me feel comfortable in my skin versus how it looks. Because again, we're trained to know about how we look versus how we feel. And it's time that we change that around and be like, if I feel good, then I look good. It's hand in hand, it works hand in hand. So that's where I'm at right now. And you know, this journey of learning about NMT and how it works and how it can support my journey has been great because I realize that it does help. It's just not very comfortable for me. So I didn't do the long stretch of it for five months that some people have done it. I've done it in increments and alterations, so then that way I'm, you know, I feel good mentally and also feel good in, you know, physically trying to heal my skin. So I really, really hope that this has helped you really understand what NMT is, how it works, where to implement it, what it does for your skin, and you know, the process of when to plug it in and when to take it out. I really hope that helps you out. And if you really want to understand a little bit more about, you know, NMT, I do have a blog post on my website or on everbella.ca that goes through it a little bit more in detail. If you're a person that doesn't want to watch, you just want to read it, there's more on the website there. And again, if you really are curious about where you are in your healing journey, you can take that quiz that I will have a link to it in the bio, but you can go on the website and right on that right hand side it says take the quiz so that you know exactly where you are in your skin healing journey, and you can purchase the products that are available to you that are best for your skin type or your healing journey stage. So then that way it will kind of walk you through. And I'm so proud of this system because I've developed it for this fact that some people need that guidance of you know, walking step by step or stage by stage to their next stage to understand how their body feels, but just to have the support there to know what to use on their skin in every stage. So I'm so excited uh about that. So it is again our every heal system, so you can learn more about that on our website. You can take the quiz on there so that you can see what's going on with your body. And again, if you want more support, you're always welcome to email, go on our social media, and just check out our resources that we have available. So thank you so much for being here for this episode. I can't wait to see you in the next one. And as always, this is your go-to source for everything skin health and self-care for eczema, dermatitis, or other sensitive skin conditions. And my name is Mikisha, your host and owner and CEO of Everbella, also the Skin Deep Podcast. Thank you so much. I'll see you next time. Thanks for tuning in to the Skin Deep Podcast. Don't forget to download your free guide to our 10 hacks to great skin. Just check the link in our bio. I look forward to seeing you in our next episode. Have an amazing day, everyone, and enjoy your self care Sunday.