Puffy Face, Cortisol Face, Stress Face, or Face Swelling are the most common names for that potato face you see in the mirror.
The best way to diagnose your bloated face is to look at your older pics. These pictures can be even 5 or 10 years old because we never know how and when it will become a normal face.
Only your old pictures can tell you how sculpted your face has been and God knows what filled under those cheekbones in your 30s.
I know all this because I am battling with this and getting good results with the remedies that I am following. This is why I am sharing tips for treating a puffy face at home that worked for me and will work for you too.
Table of Contents
Reasons Behind a Puffy Face
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- Lack of Sleep (Your late-night shenanigans are to be blamed for)
- Excess Salt (Ditch that chip right now!)
- Stress (who doesn’t have it )
- Bad Sleeping Posture (Stop sleeping like a cat, pillow height matters. A lot.)
- Alcohol (well, one word is enough!)
- Allergies/Infection (gluten/dairy/fried heavy food, The food that makes you bloated is likely bloating your face too.)
- Hormonal Disturbances (let’s face it, our hormones are nose-diving, we need to do something about it)
- Steroids (check any medications you have been taking for too long)
- Stress-Eating (when life throws lemons at us, we don’t just make lemonade, we accompany it with chips, icecreams and whatnot)
- Falling Asleep with Makeup (You are never too tired for a makeup wipe)
- Thyroid Disorder, especially hypothyroid ( A by-product of stress and sedentary lifestyle in most cases)
How to Depuff Your Puffy Face at Home – Remedies that Really Work
1. Face Massage
You need to move the fluid towards your ears and then towards the base of your neck (collarbone).
There are lymph nodes in your whole body that act as an outlet to drain the excess fluid and capture any toxic substances like a sieve.
So to move the fluid a face massage or as we call it in Ayurved, Abhyanga is all you need. This abhyanga can be done at home or you can get a facial from the parlour to get things started.
These are the strokes of a face massage –
Remember to clean and moisturize your face before a face massage, use gua-sha or a jade roller, a kansa wand or your hands for it.
Make sure the massage tool is clean as it can give you acne if it’s not.
Do it every day with firm pressure. Take a before picture and take another picture after a month, you will see a difference in your face shape.
This process will be a lot faster if you do a few other things mentioned below that will stop the fluid from coming back to your face so read on, please.
2. Cold Compress for instant relief
Something that gave me almost instant results is cold water. Me being the lazy person I am, prefer the easiest method ever for everything that I do.
You just need a small bowl of ice for it, put it in a bathing mug and fill it with some normal-temperature water to keep things a little bearable here.
Now wash your face with that icey cold water, and you will get that frozen feeling, your face will turn red due to immediate constriction of blood vessels.
But keep doing it, so that you can enjoy the pink glow later on with a much sculpted face than before.
Do it twice a day, followed by the face massage and you will debloat your face within a month or less. You can also buy this ice face pack if you are not happy with the ice-cold facewash.
3. Sleep with Your Head Elevated
If You sleep on the thinnest pillow, you have the culprit of a puffy face right here.
When the head is on the level of the heart then the fluid won’t go towards it easily. You need to have a pillow with a better height.
A good guide is just above the level of your chest when you lie on it.
When you do this, the fluid won’t get accumulated in your face and you won’t wake up with a puffy potato face every day.
4. Healthy Food Choices
Yes, they make a difference and I will tell you why and how.
If you consume more salt, it will attract water and it will lead to more water retention in your body & face of course.
Consume protective and anti-inflammatory food such as berries, citrus fruits, green leafy veggies, walnuts, nuts and seeds etc. Taking magnesium supplements has also been helpful.
Stay hydrated, it will go a long way.
5. Facial Exercises
Yes, you can exercise your face by doing all facial movements possible, such as trying to touch your nose by the tip of your tongue, air in your mouth, eye movements, making fish faces with your lips, making silly faces, tongue out-tongue in and whistle etc.
Don’t do all these exercises in public, you will be considered a fool.
Eating Chewing gum is also a good way to move the fluid as it moves all the mastication muscles well. Just two chewing gums per day will be enough.
Walking, jogging, pranayam and meditation, all help in maintaining your youth and depuff your face by moving the fluid and managing stress respectively.
6. Right Skincare
You knew it! How can I let an article slip away without talking about skincare?
Anyways, it’s super important to do the right kind of skincare to depuff your face. I have been following Dr Idris on YouTube and she has launched a face depuffer. You can try that but I have not tried it and I am not vouching for it.
It is just something that I came across and you can use it if you like.
A good way to debloat your face is using the Caffeine masks, as caffeine is very effective for that. You can use tea bags, and coffee sheet masks at home.
You can also mix coffee powder with aloe vera gel and apply it on your face for about 20 minutes before washing off. Aloe vera also has an anti-edema effect that has been proven.
Do it on a weekend, you can also do it twice a week.
7. Buccal Massage
A revolutionary massage that gives great results almost instantly.
It is performed inside the mouth so only you or a trained buccal massage therapist can do it.
You just need to push your cheeks outward, as in away from your teeth with a clean finger. For more details, read this article – how to perform buccal massage at home.
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