Beautifinous.

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Hey guys! So it’s pretty well known by now that there are some weird and wonderful things that people can do to their bodies in the name of beauty, and as a beauty blogger I naturally love trying some of them out so I can talk about them with you all. So how about today we talk about what it’s like to stick hundreds of needles into your face over and over in the hunt to achieve smooth skin? Yep, today we’re talking about microneedling with the Derma Roller System.

So what is microneedling? Microneedling is a natural way to help the skin with a range of issues on the face, hair and body. On the face it can help with reducing acne scars, fine lines, wrinkles and hyperpigmentation. It can also help with evening out the skin tone, firming the skin and helping your skincare products to work better. On the body it can help to reduce the appearance of stretch marks and cellulite, and on the hair it can help to promote hair growth. The Derma Roller System works by rolling 200 medical-grade stainless steel needles over the area you want to treat to create tiny micro-injuries which then stimulates the natural healing process of the skin, therefore boosting collagen and elastin production. This is basically the same kind of thing that most of your skincare products are saying they will help with, but your body is already making its own, so why not simply utilise that better?

I was recently sent the Derma Roller System to try, and alongside it I have also got the DermaC+ Anti-Aging Serum and the PerfectDerm Collagen Face Mask to show you. The DermaC+ Anti-Aging Serum and the PerfectDerm Collagen Face Mask are described as being best used directly after the Derma Roller, but as well as that I have carried on using the DermaC+ Serum nightly to allow me to give some proper feedback on it alongside the roller.

The Derma Roller System comes with varying needle sizes. The size that you need to use is going to be dependant on what you need to use it for. I followed the guide on the Derma Roller System website to choose the right needle size for microneedling and settled the 1mm needle size. If you are new to it I would suggest sticking to the smaller sizes like I did as the longer needles are intended for professional use. 

The Derma Roller comes packaged up in a handy plastic travel case which is nice, but it all also comes packaged up in a box with the product info on with instructions. 

The DermaC+ Anti-Aging Serum is packed with Vitamins C and E as well as Hyaluronic Acid and is designed to minimise the appearance of wrinkles (even deep set ones), even out the skin tone, hydrate, improve skin texture, leave the skin looking and feeling smoother and firmer, restore natural glow and to help other skincare products work better.

It comes in an orange-brown glass bottle with a pipette dropper for dispensing. It holds 30ml of product and the serum is bright white and of average consistency. 

The PerfectDerm Collagen Face Mask is pretty much designed to the exact same as the DermaC+ Serum above, but it also exfoliates too. The face mask is a sheet mask which comes packaged in a white and blue sachet.

Before getting into the review, a heads up; this post is a long one. I’ve written a little TL;DR at the end of the post with some bullet points, but if you’re genuinely interested in trying out a derma roller then I do recommend reading the entire post as I talk in detail about the different steps and methods which I think could be helpful for you. 

Usage and Results: 

So if you’ve never used a Derma Roller before (this was my first time), I’ll begin by explaining the steps.

Firstly, you need to clean the face and exfoliate before drying. Next, you need to make sure your hands are clean too, and get your sterilised Derma Roller. You then need to roll the face in sections, going up and down four times, side to side four times and both diagonal directions four times each. To help to explain that, here is a picture:

When you need to move to the next area of the face, always take the roller off the skin and move it to the next part. Don’t continue to roll across the face like you would a paint roller on a wall, for example. 

After microneedling you can follow up with a face mask, or skip straight to your serum and then moisturiser. In this review I will be discussing the results of following it up with the PerfectDerm Collagen Face Mask and the DermaC+ Anti-Aging Serum.

Before I talk about the results, I’m going to talk about the methods I tried to get this treatment to work. After that I shall discuss the results of the roller as well as my thoughts on the face mask and serum respectively before talking about the whole experience collaboratively. 

Methods:

I tried three different ways of using the Derma Roller to find the best way to use it. I am not recommending that you use this more than once every 3-4 weeks (that’s for the 1mm size, but if you use a smaller size you can use it more frequently. Check out the FAQs on microneedling more info) so see this as me doing the experimenting on your behalf to bring you the best advice I can.

The first way I tried it was as it is. I did all of the pre-treatment steps as listed above and then I used the roller on the skin. 

So how was it? It hurt. A lot. If you have a high pain threshold then this may be okay for you, but I felt that using it with no form of pain relief was a bad idea for me personally. To work efficiently the needles need to penetrate the skin to create those minor injuries and I felt that using it like this didn’t allow for that to happen. It felt more like the needles were simply rolling across the skin because it hurt too much to allow them to actually dig in.

The most painful areas to use it were on and around the nose and the forehead. Using on the upper lip was also very difficult, not due to pain, but it tickled so darn much. It was genuinely really hard to roll it because I kept cringing away due to the tickling sensation. Not at all how I expected to react! Speaking of reacting, there was also a lot of sneezing and eye watering.

As I said, if you have a high pain threshold, this may be totally fine for you to do. If you don’t, however, I recommend checking out the next two methods I tried. 

Next method was to use ice to numb the area before rolling. There are some pros and cons to this method. Let’s talk pros before cons. Biggest pro is that it’s free to make and you have what you need on hand. Once ready, you simply need to put it into a bag and press it up against your skin. Leave it for a short while and then your face should begin to feel numb enough to roll. Now let’s talk cons. Firstly, you need to get your ice ready in the freezer and this is time consuming. Secondly, you actually have to put this ice against your face which isn’t the most comfortable thing to do. Thirdly, the relief it provides is only temporary. 

The third point here is the biggest thing for me. It means that you have to stop frequently to re-numb your face and this makes the whole process very time consuming. However, it did work a lot better than with no pain relief. The needles were able to penetrate the skin, but you were still able to feel it. There was still some pain, but it was more tolerable even though it was not comfortable.

Derma Roller System

The last method I tried was the clear winner for me, but it takes some forethought. I went to the pharmacy and I bought some numbing cream. The kind that I got was EMLA cream, but there are other kinds available. The tube is incredibly small though, so maybe enough for two uses. Seeing as you only need to use the roller every month or so then this works out that you need to buy a new numbing cream every couple of months which isn’t too bad (and it’s totally worth it). Along with the cream you also need a plastic covering. Some of the creams come with coverings but mine didn’t. Therefore I hit up Google and YouTube to come up with the solution of clingfilm. 

So how did this work? Well, it meant that I went through the pre-treatment process before covering my face in a thick layer of numbing cream and then I proceeded to wrap my face in clingfilm making sure to leave my eyes, nostrils and mouth uncovered. I then had to hang out this way for at least an hour. My kids were so confused and definitely laughed at me, not that I could laugh with them because y’know, numbing cream and clingfilm all over my face. 

After the hour and a bit, I removed the clingfilm and washed my face again and it’s safe to say that whilst my face wasn’t totally numb to the point where I couldn’t feel touch, I definitely couldn’t feel the pain I could before. So out came the roller and thank god, I could use it. 

You can feel the needles pressing into the skin but it doesn’t hurt. The most pain that I felt was like a scratching on the skin. If you scratch your face like you have an itch, that’s exactly how it felt. This is definitely manageable. If you have a low pain threshold, I highly, hiiiighly recommend this method. 

With all three of the above methods there is blood. Not much, but it’s highly likely that you’re going to need to wipe some away either during use or after use, so be prepared for that. 

Results:

But why are we doing this?! Is probably what you’re asking at this point. You just said it hurts and this sounds like such a lot of preparation, isn’t it just better to not bother? Oh, but it was worth it. I said I’d discuss the results after my trial and error section where I found the best way to use it, and I’m so thrilled to say that all of the experimenting and fuss was worth it. 

Immediately after use your face is left looking bright red and this lasts for a good few hours (at least it did for me, I’m not sure if this is different for each person but I can only talk from my own personal experience). When I woke up the next day my face wasn’t red, but it did redden for another hour or so after washing my face in the morning. Therefore I would recommend keeping these things in mind if you’re trying to decide the best time to use it until you know how your own skin will react.

I find it interesting because the day after you use the Derma Roller your skin looks great, but then a day or so after that it can feel a little dry and I got a little purging going on (a few very tiny white-headed spots that disappear quickly with no marks left behind) but then it gets better again and that’s when you start to see the difference. Obviously it’s going to take some time to see results over the weeks after using, but you do see some within the first few days. 

Now let’s discuss the serum and face mask.

I used the PerfectDerm face mask directly after rolling with the third method with the numbing cream as I felt that this was the treatment that actually worked as it should have.

The instructions on the back state that before use you need to wash your face and apply a softening lotion. The application of a lotion beforehand threw me off a bit because that’s not usually a step with face mask application. As I was applying this post-treatment I didn’t wash my face for a third time before applying as I’d washed it twice already before microneedling. Instead, I used a bit of water to wipe away the blood and then applied the DermaC+ Serum before resting the mask across my face. 

The mask itself was incredibly saturated so there was some dripping when removing it from the sachet and applying, but the mask is a great size and fits the face pretty well. I found that it stuck to the skin better than some others that I’ve tried in the past so there were no issues with it slipping off the face at any point. 

The first thing I noticed upon applying is how cooling it was to the skin post-treatment. It was a great way to soothe the skin after rolling needles across it. 

The sachet says to leave it on the skin for 20-30 minutes, so I left it on for 30 minutes. Upon removal the mask was still pretty wet, so I pressed the excess into the skin and wiped the rest onto my neck and chest to make some use of the leftover serum. 

My skin instantly looked refreshed although it was still red from the Derma Roller. The best results were seen the day after though when the redness had disappeared. My skin looked very plump and firm with a nice added brightness too. You couldn’t see any marks from the microneedling, just smooth, glowing skin. 

Inside the top of the bottle of the DermaC+ Serum there is a plastic bit inside the opening which allows the dropper to remove excess serum from around it as you remove it from the bottle. This is a nice touch I feel as it means no dripping from the outside of the dropper and less wastage. 

When I used the dropper I gave the end a squeeze and removed it from the bottle to see that no product had been taken into the dropper. This confused me a little, but after a few tries I worked out that you need to press the dropper slowly with this one. A lot of them you can just squeeze quickly and go, but you have to give it a slow squeeze and release from the squeeze slowly to get the product into the pipette. 

The serum is non-sticky and absorbs pretty quickly, but you have enough time to drop a few drops onto the fingers and apply it to the whole face rather than applying it in sections, although you could obviously do that if you prefer applying that way.

Over the duration of use so far, I’ve been noticing better results with this serum every day. It had a great result on the skin from the first application, leaving the skin looking firm and plump. Therefore I would say that this would make a great day serum because it has an instant visible effect. However, as you continue to use it, these effects begin to manifest on your skin anyway and aren’t just a temporary application effect, and this tells me that it’s a fab serum that does as it says on the bottle.

The best results, as stated with the product info, come after using with the roller as this really allows the serum to get to work. Therefore I can say that I love the combo. This also goes for the mask. The day after I used all three of these products in conjunction I was amazed with how great my skin looked. It was one of the best skin days of my life. 

So yes, with all the downsides I spoke about during the method trial and error section of this post, there were some major upsides from the whole process. As this post is pretty long, I’ll do a little TL;DR bullet point section to summarise:

Pros of the Derma Roller:

Cons of the Derma Roller:

Do I recommend the Derma Roller, DermaC+ Anti-Aging Serum and PerfectDerm Collagen Face Mask though? Absolutely. Both individually and especially as a group. They all work so well, but when used together they’re magical even though it’s a time consuming process.

This is a process you’re going to need to be able to set some time aside for, but it’s definitely worth that time. 

If you’d like to check out the Derma Roller System, DermaC+ Anti-Aging Serum and the PerfectDerm Collagen Face Mask, you can grab them all at Derma Roller System.

What are your thoughts on the Derma Roller System, DermaC+ Anti-Aging Serum and the PerfectDerm Collagen Face Mask? Is microneedling something you’ve ever tried or want to try?

Let me know in the comments below!