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So I was at school the other day and a conversation about Carmex got brought up. When I told my friend that I used it every night she about fell off her chair stating that she was told that "Carmex is like taking an eraser across tissue paper"...what?! I found out that a lot of people have heard that it's horrible for your lips and that there's a "really bad ingredient in it". So, naturally I researched this little myth because I found this very hard to believe.

In my research, I found that people think there's ground glass in it or that there's an "addicting" ingredient. Snopes found these claims to be false and if you look at the ingredient list, there's nothing that's not FDA approved. And I highly doubt there's something in it that's not listed because the company would have been in trouble a long time ago.  

However, according to The Beauty Brains, there is some truth to becoming addicted to lip balm. Not in the same sense that someone gets addicted to crack, but you can, in a sense, train your body to rely on lip balm. Your lips (and every part of your skin) has a top layer that sloughs off dead skin cells and as it does this, it tells the deeper layers of skin to send up some new cells. Well, when you have lip balm on, those deeper layers of skin don't get those signals to produce new cells anymore because the lip balm is preventing the sloughing of dead cells, so it quits. Once you quit using lip balm for a while, your body will see that it needs to quit being lazy and start bringing up new cells again. So, there's nothing to worry about- no need to join a support group or anything :)

Here's a list of the ingredients and what they do:
Camphor- Analgesic (Relief from pain)
Menthol- Anti-Itch (That's what the product says but when I look that ingredient up it says it's used in cosmetics as an anesthetic.)
Phenol- Anesthetic (I found that it's approved to be used as an antiseptic and analgesic. I couldn't find that it's used in OTC products for an anesthetic, but that's what the back of my product says...)
Beeswax- Keeps the emulsion from separating
Cetyl Esters- Wax lubricant
Flavor
Fragrance
Lanolin- Moisturizer
Mineral Oil- Skin protectant/ skin conditioning agent
Petroleum- Dissolves other substances
Salicylic Acid- Approved for use as a denaturant, exfoliant, preservative and a skin conditioner. Since it's pretty low on the list, I'm assuming it's used as a preservative in this product.
Cocoa Seed Butter- Skin protectant

See? Nothing to be afraid of, kittens. It's my favorite lip-moisturizing product and I fearlessly use it every night! Do you use Carmex? Tell me why you love it and which product you use :)

Image: Google Images
References: www.Snopes.com
                      www.TheBeautyBrains.com
                      "Can You Get Hooked on Lip Balm?"
                      www.CosmeticsInfo.org

Jeanne M
3/4/2021 04:27:06 pm

Thanks for sharing this information about carmex. My brother told me that there's something in chapstick that can cause the lips to shrink. I told him I use carmex and my lips are shrinking due to old age! My mother's lips shrank too and she didn't use much lip balm so I think it's just hereditary.

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Courtney
3/9/2021 10:04:20 am

Ha! Yeah, that is likely due to a genetic thing and not anything to do with Chapstick, Carmex, etc. Thank you for leaving a comment!

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