K.Marney ~ Branded By Style: Skin Emergency

I've been mostly makeup free for several weeks now. That's pretty significant. If you were to ask me the two items I could not live without in my beauty routine, I would say mascara and eyeliner...not the heavy black kind, just a soft plum or navy liner to highlight my eyes and make up for my light colored lashes. I wasn't blessed with big, bold eyes so I've felt that they need emphasis.

For most of my makeup wearing decades, I've had no trouble with allergies until a few weeks ago when my eyelids began to itchy, raw and painful. Not fun and definitely not pretty. As I had not purchased any new brands, there was no easy way to determine the culprit. I had bought several new bottles of my reliable products, so no easy fix again. I went through the process of elimination with eyeliner and mascara. (Red dyes are usually the first culprit when developing an eye problem.) It would get better then I'd try a different liner in brownish black or black. Same issue.

After that, I'm thinking it has to be my eye makeup and I'm doomed to having a nude face forever. But the problem didn't completely subside. Could it be my moisturizer? My eye serum? My cleanser? While I don't need heavy moisturizer, I do need a little something. Everything had to go except the cleansing bar by Mary Kay (that had not been replaced) and my Renee Rouleau Sheer Moisture with A,C and E.

I"m of the belief that my makeup remover or cleanser is the culprits. So after a sudden revelation, I thought why not try the age-old, tried and true Pond's Cold Cream? The store was out of the product but they had the cleansing wipes which I've been using for 4 days with no problem. Success! I knew there had to be something inexpensive and fabulous lurking on the shelves of Target!

When If you develop a reaction to makeup, it's incredibly tough to figure out the culprit. A dermatologist will give you a steroid cream to heal the problem, but you can only use it a few days since it shouldn't be used around your eyes. If the problem persists, they will want to do uncomfortable and expensive skin prick testing. These least expensive method is to eliminate everything and start adding one product at a time. Today is the first day I'm testing out eyeliner. Wish me luck!

Here are some products that I truly love. You can tell by the cracked lids and low volume that they are actually mine and well-used.

My quad of Renee Rouleau: Sheer Moisture with Vitamins A,C & E for normal to oily skin. The perfect lightweight mosture. Intensive Firming Serum for skin that is starting to lose it's tone (turkeyneck!) Vitamin C Eye Serum is a great refresher for the eyes and Anti-Cyst Treatment that was amazing for reducing & eliminating a few bumps that had developed on temples.