Pretty Paws: How to Care for Your Cuticles

Manicures and pedicures are a fun way to express your personal style and they add a certain flair to your esthetic. Besides getting your nails trimmed, buffed and polished, you need to make sure that your cuticles are taken care of as well. Let’s go over how to care for your cuticles!

Most beauty experts advise that cuticles are not to be trimmed but only gently pushed back with the appropriate tool. A cuticle is a layer of non-living skin that surrounds the edges of your toenails and fingernails.

It can be easy to overlook cuticle health but they do play a very important role in preventing infections from spreading by creating a barrier between your nails and skin.

Cuticle damage can come from or be a result of numerous things. Things like using cleaning products that contain skin irritants, nail biting or even dehydration could be a factor.

The good news is that since your skin is always healing itself, treating damaged cuticles is almost always reversible.

One of the most common causes of damaged cuticles is dry skin. This can be caused by cold and/or dry weather, extreme dehydration and exposure to skin irritants, or not moisturizing the skin.

In order to combat dryness, you need to identify the source.

So if you find that your hands tend to really dry out after washing the dishes by hand, try to wear rubber gloves in order to protect your hands from the hot, soapy water.

In dry weather and extreme conditions, make sure that you're using a moisturizer rich in emollients.

This will ensure that your cuticles are protected and moisturized. Another way to combat cuticle dryness is to wear moisturizing gloves to bed at night in order to lock in moisture while you sleep.

They also have moisturizing socks!

Nail biting is a whole other situation because you are the one creating the hostile environment for your cuticles but there are remedies.

A popular treatment is to get an acrylic manicure or even wear gloves.

If fake nails or gloves aren't for you, there are a variety of nail enamels that are specially formulated to taste horrible in order to deter you from putting your nails in your mouth.

They go on clear and are harmless when ingested.