Recently, I interviewed aesthetic nurse specialist Rachel Varga. In this episode we discussed how toxins, EMFs, and inflammation impact aging and shares practical strategies to protect and rejuvenate your skin, hair, and overall well-being. From skincare essentials to cutting-edge therapies, this episode is packed with expert tips for achieving a radiant, youthful glow, and more. If you would prefer to listen to the interview you can access it by Clicking Here.
Dr. Eric Osansky:
I am very excited to be chatting with Rachel Varga. We are going to discuss how to get radiant skin naturally and go beyond that. We will also be talking about healthy hair, healthy eyes. This will be an excellent conversation. Let me dive into Rachel’s bio here:
Rachel Varga is a double board certified aesthetic nurse specialist. Since 2011, Rachel has been offering medical aesthetic rejuvenation in the specialty of oculoplastics and is known for providing a natural and healthy look and transformation and educating through her show The School of Radiance Podcast. Welcome, Rachel!
Rachel Varga:
Thanks so much for having me here. It’s great to connect. We had a fantastic conversation on thyroid and the skin on The School of Radiance. I’m excited to get into some natural skin radiance tips for everybody here.
Dr. Eric:
Same here. We had an amazing conversation on your show, as you said. This will be another amazing one.
For those who are not familiar with your background, could you go a little bit deeper? What made you decide to get into aesthetics and focus on helping people get radiant skin?
Rachel:
Absolutely. I did two years of peds ICU care. That was very challenging psychologically and with schedule of shift work. I thought to myself, do I want to become a doctor? I wrote the MCAT and took gen chem, organic chem, biochem.
Then I started working as an aesthetics nurse. I got training. I started offering rejuvenation. That basically encompasses skin care, lasers, and other nonsurgical rejuvenation modalities. I fell in love with it. I started to teach other doctors and nurses. I started in the industry in 2011 and started teaching in 2017/2018.
I published my first PubMed paper on eye aging recommendations: how I achieve non-surgical rejuvenation for the eyes because the eyes are the first area of the face to show signs of aging. Huge implications with thyroid health and the eyes, which I’m sure we’ll get into.
Around the same time, when I started publishing papers, I started to look at the nationwide data on what is impacting our health. I came across a statistic of autoimmune diseases: Deaths of unknown cause doubled compared to the year before. Subsequent papers have been written, one on oxidative stress, basically a biohacking paper. What can we do to clean up our environment to feel better and look better? That’s what I’m all about. I saw again that statistic: Deaths of unknown cause double.
If we want great skin, to support our thyroid and both look and feel our best, we really need to consider not just rejuvenation for looking great, but also every single thing that we’re doing throughout our day. This is where biohacking, modulating our environment, aka purifying it, with the approach I take, and published papers on it speak to, that is what is going to set the stage for reducing inflammation and slowing aging.
I also observed quite frankly in a number of my patients over the years who looked the best. Actually, who didn’t need as much rejuvenation and got faster and more powerful results. What were they doing in their lifestyle? They were living a clean lifestyle: body, mind, spirit, energy. They were drinking filtered water. They were maybe filtering the air. Getting outside in nature, so they had less exposure to EMFs. They would do regular detoxes. They also ate specifically to what their body wanted, and they didn’t follow the trends.
I basically started to take notes out of these patients’ playbooks, who I then called radiant. Why are these the substantive people? Why are they different? Why are they more beautiful, even if they have signs of aging? I started to study that and speak to that for many years now.
It’s great because you could be in your 40s, 50s, 60s, 70s, 80s, 90s and actually be looking and feeling better than maybe you did even a decade before with just a couple of simple tweaks that do take a little bit of time to learn and integrate but make us look better by reducing inflammation.
Dr. Eric:
Awesome. Your first ever paper was on eye aging. That’s pretty cool. I was going to ask you about the foundations. Can you say them again and spend a few minutes on how important it is to incorporate those foundations?
Rachel:
Absolutely. If we think about this autoimmune disease category or deaths of unknown cause, of someone passing even before having a diagnosis, we are seeing this statistic nationwide doubling. There is something happening in our environment that is impacting the way that we look and feel, to the effect that some people are dying from these things.
You might think, This Rachel Varga nurse focuses on skin, and it’s all about the superficial. If you want to look great, you have to consider what’s going on on the inside, from what I consider a toxic bucket angle. If we think about our health, and we think about the toxins that we’re exposed to, it’s the toxic bucket. This bucket can get filled up if we’re exposed to tap water or forest fire smoke or industrial pollution or heavy metals from the air or mold. EMFs, things like that. Actually get into some of the simple things that we can do.
I would say we’re in a different time than our parents or grandparents or great-grandparents. There are more things that have been modified in our food and our environment. If we want to continue to thrive and live a purposeful life, have great families, relationships, have energy to focus on what we can contribute to, in being a positive impact in the world, we do need to take a little extra care of ourselves in considering where we live and the amount of toxins we might be exposed to and then what we can do about it, which will make your skin look better. It will also probably contribute to maybe even a lessening of thyroid disease symptoms. All these things could potentially be supportive in just helping your body operate better.
Air, water, lighting, electromagnetics, eating the right foods. Decreasing the load in your body of yeast, fungi, parasites, heavy metals, and mold. That is the angle that I recommend taking.
When we think about biohacking or all these fancy gadgets and things we can buy to support our mitochondria, we will think red light. I would actually say purification first of your environment, and then living a more peaceful life, reducing the stress, slowing down the pace, being more present, psychologically and mentally, that is going to have a positive, supportive impact on how good we look and feel as well.
These things take time to learn. They take time to learn how to practice and reprogram. The way that we operate. I mentioned a couple of things that are the nitty gritty, foundational things that I recommend we start purifying first, which I wrote the paper on. How we move through life to both look and feel our best. They’re all going to work together. Of course, living a purpose-driven life. The whole thing about having beautiful, radiant skin naturally is that it might require some shifting in how you operate.
Dr. Eric:
I think a lot of people overlook the foundations, especially when thinking about healthy skin or healthy eyes. They don’t think about purifying their air, the water that they drink, let alone the impact of EMFs. Many people still aren’t aware of the negative impact they have.
Quick question about the water: What type of water do you recommend? What do you personally drink? Reverse osmosis? Spring water? I’d love to get your thoughts on that.
Rachel:
Ideally, if you can get yourself a parts per million water tester, that’s helpful. In general, we really want to stay away from tap water. The reason why is water is treated at a water treatment plant with a whole bunch of different stuff. Then the pipes that water travels through, they never get cleaned. They get laid in the ground. What can happen is in those pipes themselves, biofilms can accumulate. If you’re not filtering your water, you’re drinking those biofilms. That can inadvertently add to a toxic load.
The other thing with water is the pipes sometimes are like a plastic pipe, like a PVC pipe, which emit phthalates, which can negatively impact our hormones.
For water purification, distilled water is always going to be the best. That’s what we use in chemistry labs and biochemistry for reactions because it’s the most pure. It’s hydrogen and oxygen, which is actually a chemical. When you hear things like, “chemical-free skin care,” that’s the biggest green washing ad joke out there from anyone who knows anything about chemistry. Some chemicals are good for us, such as water. The combination of the hydrogen atom and the oxygen atom to make the H2O water chemical or compound, if you will. Distilled water is best.
What I find is more accessible is reverse osmosis. I have a page on my website at TheSchoolOfRadiance.com that is my Biohacking tab. That is where I have listed all of the different air purifiers, water purifiers, EMF mitigation fabrics, and things I personally use.
For reverse osmosis, you can do your whole home. Or you can have a countertop solution. Or something that your plumber comes and hooks up underneath your sink. A shower filter and things like that, too. Filtering your water is really important, so you’re reducing your exposure to biofilms and different chemicals that are utilized to kill things like pathogens in the water from the water treatment plants. A lot of things don’t get filtered out that are in your water now that I do care about filtering out for myself.
Dr. Eric:
Agreed. I use reverse osmosis as well. I have used distilled in the past, too. The tap water drives me crazy. And people who purchase the plastic water bottles by the case. Most people don’t know.
Rachel:
You don’t know what you don’t know. It’s all good. But you know now.
Dr. Eric:
Exactly. It’s our goal to try to educate them.
Let’s talk more about healthy skin tips. If someone has incorporated the foundations, what else can they do?
Rachel:
I do want to talk actually about air. People don’t think about air quality impacting the skin. Most of the body’s intake of heavy metals is through the air, either through inhalation or resting on the skin. When I was doing my research for this paper on oxidative stress status and the impact on skin aging, if you look up my name on PubMed, you’ll find many papers I have published over the years.
When the metals rest on the skin, it tells our keratinocyte stem cells to die faster. We don’t want that. The skin cycle already slows down as we age, which is why we want to do things like cleansing and exfoliating and retinol.
Having air purifiers in your home is great. It helps reduce that load on the skin from what actually lands on the skin. The saying “cleanliness is next to godliness,” I love that sentiment because cleansing the skin twice a day as well as the skin on the body is a great approach.
A really simple skin tip is to wash your face in the morning and in the evening, with a double cleanse in the evening. The reason why we want to do that double cleanse in the evening is the first cleanse is you wash your face with your cleanser and rinse it off. That is getting off your makeup and skin care. Your second cleanse is actually washing your face and rinsing that off thoroughly.
A big thing that people miss. It’s like textbook. Someone meets with me, and they have red, irritated eyes and red, irritated, sensitive, dry skin. I ask them, “Are you cleansing the skin twice a day? Are you doing a double cleanse in the evening?” “No, I’m using an oil cleanser to take off makeup. I’m using micellar water. I’m using a makeup remover mitt.” That, I don’t find works.
I have been doing this a really long time, since 2011. Two weeks of tweaking a skin care routine to care for the skin how it wants to be cared for can actually help reduce that skin redness, dryness, and sensitivity from caring for the largest organ of the body.
Cleansing is really foundational. Rinsing the eyelids well, so you’re keeping these meibomian glands on the eyelids clean. 50% of the population has dry eye. That’s a pretty common thing to experience. Clean eyelids are very important. That’s why I don’t like those lash extensions that became popular a number of years ago. They are a breeding ground for bacteria, not to mention the time and money it takes to install them and reinstall them. No thanks. Not for me.
I don’t even get my nails done because getting my nails done is also a degree of toxic exposure, too.
Cleansing, moisturizing, second key foundation. A moisturizer should function like a multivitamin for the skin. It’s like taking a multivitamin internally. When we are putting something on the skin, we don’t just want it to make the skin feel good. We want it to be doing something for the skin. This is where hyaluronic acid, copper peptides, antioxidants really come into play.
Of course, we want that formulation to be preserved, so it doesn’t build up bacteria in the container, which a lot of these super-clean, hippie dippie, crunchy type of skincare brands fall short. They could be not very stable from a micro perspective but also the actives not being kept stable, like Vitamin C or antioxidants. I actually use colloidal silver in my skincare line, which is pretty revolutionary.
Sunscreen is really important. Mineral sunscreen on the eyelids, the face, the neck, the chest, the hands, the high real estate area. Only mineral sunscreen. I don’t recommend chemical sunscreen filters at all, especially if we are putting products on the neck. Whether that be your skincare, your sunscreen, makeup.
Perfumes. When we are putting stuff on the neck, especially perfumes that contain phthalates, that is right over the thyroid. I’ll just use essential oil as a little bit of a fragrance, but very conscious about the products that I use.
If we’re putting stuff on our neck, it’s right next to the thyroid. The thyroid could end up picking up toxins and accumulating them, which impacts the function of the thyroid. I have worked with a lot of clients over the years who have thyroid disease, hyperthyroidism, hypothyroidism. First things first, we want to clean up the skincare routine, dial it in, and streamline it.
The fourth thing—cleanse, moisturize, sunscreen—is exfoliate. We want to be exfoliating the skin to get off that buildup of the stratum corneum, which is like corn flakes when they stack up. If you have dry skin or sensitive skin, you probably are not cleansing enough, and you are definitely not exfoliating enough.
If you start to do these four things with products that are customized to what your specific skin needs are, you should start to see some positive changes after just two weeks.
Dr. Eric:
We are going to talk a little bit later about your skincare line. Do you have your own sunscreen as well?
Rachel:
What I’ve done since 2011 is recommended products I really love. There were a couple of products that I thought the company keeps changing formulations, and I have to pull it, or it’s too hard to get, or I could make it better.
I made a number of products that have sold over the years better: cleanser, hyaluronic acid serum, copper peptide serum, light moisturizer, heavy moisturizer, an eye gel.
Sunscreen, there is a sunscreen I have that I love. It’s a great one. It’s 20% zinc. That’s from another company. It’s on my skin shop.
It’s a combination of what I recommend of things I have made, where I have made some things from the med spa industry better, and then still some really good products that are still made by other companies.
Dr. Eric:
I must admit, I don’t moisturize or exfoliate. Most guys I’m thinking probably don’t. I am guessing you would recommend it for both men and women?
Rachel:
Absolutely. Here, we get into the concept of a team-based relationship. If you listening are in a partnership, and you’re the one who is really excited about health and looking after yourself because you feel crummy if you don’t, and you know that if you take better care of yourself, you will show up as a better partner and maybe a better parent and in your workplace. This stuff is really important to you.
If your partner isn’t really on the same page, there can be potentially some conflict around that. It isn’t about if one person is super into health and wellness, and the other one is like, “Oh, is that snake oil?” Skepticism is a sign of intelligence by the way. You can slowly start to integrate these things into your lifestyle and your home, so it’s not overwhelming for your partner. Ideally, you want to be in a team-based relationship, where both of you have shared values, which includes health and wellness.
Oftentimes, my clients, probably about 70% are ladies, and 30% are gents. You’re sharing your products. You’re sharing your cleanser, your moisturizer, your eye cream, your sunscreen, your scrub. Even if you are having younger kids who are acne-prone, you are getting them set up with good products, too, so they don’t go to these big box stores and end up using products that have tin and DNA and BPA. I have seen that in products marketed to teens from some of the biggest brands out there. I go through ingredients of what products I’m using when I do one-on-one sessions globally.
For the guys, to start to do these basics is fantastic. Also, even looking at haircare. Guys usually use one bar of soap for their whole body: their face, their hair, their body. But the skin cell receptors on the face are different from the body. When I teach lasers, which I was for the last two days, at a med spa clinic, we have to change the settings when we go from the face to the body. Literally, the skin on the body is actually more sensitive than on the face. You might think it’s the opposite, but it’s not.
The scalp is essentially an extension of your skin. For having healthy, thick hair, and getting ahead of hair loss, which for sure happens with thyroid disease, is how can we care for the scalp directly with maybe when you’re shampooing, doing some better exfoliation? I can make some recommendations for products. Also using some products that can promote supporting hair growth, too.
Dr. Eric:
You’re right. A lot of people with thyroid conditions have hair loss. I find it even worse in those with hyperthyroidism. You could have it with either, but it seems like those with hyperthyroidism, it’s extreme. Balancing the thyroid hormones is important.
I get a lot of questions about what else can I do when it comes to stopping hair loss in addition to balancing thyroid hormones and growing back hair. You hear about things like biotin and other nutrients. We need healthy nutrients, healthy gut. As far as products go, I’d love for you to talk about, do some of those products actually work in helping to stimulate hair growth?
Rachel:
Oh yeah. After a couple of weeks, you will notice baby hairs. That can be annoying as a lady when you’re styling. I have to make sure that I style these little baby hairs down. But it happens pretty quick.
One of the products I use has a willow bark extract. It’s been used for decades. What I’ve found, being in the industry of helping people rejuvenate their skin, is I have really moved toward this angle of let’s support the body first. Let’s clear out the toxins, like skin redness, skin dryness, accelerated aging, hyperpigmentation, breakouts, those breakouts staying red longer, hair loss, weight shifts, the eyes showing more whites of the eyes above and below your iris, eye bulging. There is so much that our physicality can visibly show us that something is off.
With the first sign of noticing that something is off, say I’ve gone through a particularly stressful time. What I’ll notice is typically skin dryness, maybe some irritation to my gums, maybe a little bit of gut disturbance as well. Maybe some redness and irritation to the skin on my neck. Maybe irritation to the scalp.
These are my initial signs that I have learned to read in myself that it’s time to slow down. It’s time to make sure I eat super clean. Keep that 2-2.5 liters of purified water every single day up. Lots of protein. I do 1-1.5g of protein per pound of body weight. Make sure I’m exercising. Fueling my body appropriately. Not going too hard on the caffeine. Getting appropriate sleep. Making sure I am putting my oxygen mask on first. Doing all those basic foundational things.
If some things are persisting, like hair loss, and you have done the foundational work, you have done the gut testing, with what you provide guidance on, then look at supporting topically with, say, hair growth stimulating products on the scalp, skin care that will be nourishing the skin and helping with pigmentation and speeding up cell turnover, which slows down as we age. Then look at some in-clinic rejuvenation.
More often than not, when we actually take the time, energy, and sometimes resources to bolster up our daily routine, our at-home practices, we can require less in-clinic rejuvenation, or what we do in the clinic, we just get a better response from, and we don’t need to do as much. That is quite simply something I have observed in myself personally.
As an aesthetics provider, I get access to everything and anything in the industry as you can imagine. Back in 2017/2018, when I started to take this biohacking approach, I was also in a rough car accident. I had to reduce inflammation and environmental toxins and emotional/psychological stressors at every turn, so I wouldn’t be in pain. Then I noticed my skin got better.
I think that there is a huge overlap to those who are experiencing thyroid disease. A little psychological tip is not to say, “My hyperthyroidism, my thyroid disease, my hypothyroidism.” It’s like “my acne, my fine lines and wrinkles.” Don’t reinforce that into your identity. It’s simply something you’re experiencing now.
You will be making those positive, constructive shifts to overcome that. Or if you do happen to experience it, you know what to do. You’re dialed in to notice when something is off, and you’re really good at maintaining a lower level of inflammation and oxidative stress. Know that when that bucket gets full, it will tip over, and you will probably see skin, hair, eye, gum, and energy shifts.
Dr. Eric:
That was some great advice. Definitely want to talk about eye health with you. Anything else you want to say about healthy hair before we talk about the eyes?
Rachel:
Use great products. Your haircare products probably have phthalates and different chemical compounds in them. When you’re washing your hair, your body is absorbing those toxins. Parabens and phthalates are really common in fragrance. Fragrance is a known hormone disruptor. With the hair, clean up your products. I have some great recommendations from other companies that I source on My Skin Shop as well.
Even cleaning up your laundry and home cleaning products. Everything. You just want to be as clean as possible.
Dr. Eric:
Again, really eager and excited to talk to you about eye health. I know you have some great tips for having healthy eyelids, those bags under your eyes that a lot of people have questions about. A lot of people have thyroid eye disease, which you’re familiar with as well. A lot of people are often not familiar with eye health and thyroid eye disease. This is really exciting.
As far as the appearance of the eyes, for those who have dry eyes, which doesn’t really relate to appearance, but the dry eyes-
Rachel:
Yes, they do.
Dr. Eric:
I think more about how they feel, but a lot of people do appear with redness of the eyes. Those bags under the eyes. What are some things people can do for dry eyes, the bags under the eyes?
Rachel:
This is why I wrote this paper on oxidative stress, to teach other aesthetic doctors and nurses in their practices to take a good look at their patients. Do they look like they’re inflamed?
The easiest way to tell if someone is inflamed is they will be tired. Psychologically, they will be scattered and stressed out and ramped up and in this hypervigilant, nervous system state. The nervous system is ramped up. They hear a sound and are like, “What’s that?” There are also attachment style and psychological things that come with that. I love talking about that stuff because it impacts how we show up and how we can be our brightest, most radiant versions.
When we look at the eyes, the eyes can tell us so much. There is this concept of the eyes being the window into the soul. This is how we can act with eye contact, with someone we are speaking to, and being present. No one really wants to talk to someone whose eyes are darting all over the place. That can tell you quite a bit from an NLP perspective about how they are operating.
The redness and darkness and puffiness around the eyes is a late indicator or sign that there is inflammation in the body. When I have done different analyses of products on the market, companies will hire me, and I will do a study for them, using photography to see, “Does this product that you take internally make the skin look better?”
If it’s a really good antioxidant, antioxidants help to empty out the toxic bucket. They bind to free radicals and help reduce inflammation, which inflammaging is what ages us. I should be able to see reduction of redness, darkness, and puffiness around the eyes, including puffiness to the lower eyelid region, in about four weeks.
If something is happening internally, what happens is visibly, we start to see those shifts with dry skin, red skin, changes, darkness, redness, puffiness, to the eyes. Itching, even flaking, there is inflammation that has been there for a couple weeks at least. Now, you’re seeing it manifest on the eyes.
I’m a huge fan of making sure you have your foundations established. Doing that testing; eating the right foods; purifying your air, water, and lighting; reducing your exposure to EMFs; clearing out the yeast, fungi, mold, heavy metals, and parasites; potentially doing some additional things to support the eyes.
I’m a huge fan of antioxidants, like I mentioned. I take them internally to keep my toxic bucket empty. What I find with the eyes is those who are prone to seasonal allergies, I’ve had family members experience this. I take a certain antioxidant, and they don’t experience seasonal allergies that year. I think it’s because those antioxidants are keeping that toxic bucket empty.
Say you have done all that. You are doing the best you can, but there is something off with the thyroid still. Definitely working with someone like Dr. Eric is really wise to see what your thyroid levels are. Then supporting and making adjustments accordingly.
Now in particular, ophthalmology and oculoplastic surgery, which I have been an aesthetic nurse in since 2011, what we will see is that white show above and below the iris of the eye and the eye bulging. That is definitely a later sign of thyroid disease. Get on top of that.
You love to approach this from a more internal perspective, which I think is fantastic. That would be considered non-surgical. There are other non-surgical things we can also do. Say, for example, putting to the upper eyelid a lowbrow and also puffiness to the lower eyelid area. There are things we can inject around the eye to reduce the movement of the muscle.
That being said, if there is some underlying health stuff, I would say maybe doing injectables from a rejuvenation standpoint, like neuromodulators or fillers, might actually fill your toxic bucket a little bit. We might not want to do that. We might notice more brain fog after treatment. For me, I noticed once after fillers my HRV went down. It does require a little bit of recovery.
There are lasers we can apply around the eyes to help thicken the skin and promote collagen and elastin. Those are non-surgical ideas.
I really don’t think there is a skin product that exists that takes care of dark undereye bags and circles. The darkness is thin skin. You’re seeing the musculature and the blood underneath the skin, so we want to thicken that skin up. Sometimes, surgery is the option. It is what will provide more of a noticeable and robust effect.
It really depends on what someone’s experiencing and what they want to do about it. Do they want to do the lifestyle stuff? Do they want to do the in-clinic, non-surgical lasers and injectables? Do they want to do the surgery? It just depends on everyone’s individual values and budget and lifestyle.
The one thing I will say is if you have dark undereye bags, I don’t recommend doing hyaluronic acid filler in there. That is actually why I wrote my eye rejuvenation paper. I saw so many issues from that. There are other things we can do first.
Dr. Eric:
Talk about injectables. You mentioned fillers. Where does Botox fall?
Rachel:
That is a brand name. That is a neuromodulator. It modulates the message from the nerve to the muscle.
Dr. Eric:
There is a little bit of controversy in the world of thyroid health and the immune system that it could be potentially in some cases a trigger. I don’t know if you’ve heard of that.
Rachel:
That’s why I wrote my paper.
Dr. Eric:
Did you?
Rachel:
Yeah, the paper on oxidative stress status and its impact on skin aging. To prioritize the health of the individual.
Dr. Eric:
If there are signs of inflammation around the eyes, for me to get this information out there, for aesthetic providers to say, “Hey, I think there could be some underlying health stuff you might want to address,” before doing rejuvenation, how about castor oil packs?
We chatted a little bit before pressing record. I get questions about castor oil packs. A lot with the thyroid but every now and then, someone with thyroid eye disease will ask about castor oil packs. You mentioned some potential concerns.
Rachel:
I forgot to mention dermal rolling and microneedling on the skin around the eyes. If someone doesn’t want to do something in the clinic, you can do some things at home to stimulate collagen. With the right products, with the right technique.
This is something I highlight and teach in my tutorials as well. I don’t just put it out there because it’s literally microneedling at home, but it is fantastic. It’s noninvasive, cost-effective. I use clean products with it. It’s great. I’m a huge fan. I do it myself. I wanted to mention that there was one other option out there, from an at home cleaner standpoint.
Now, when it comes to castor oil packs, I love castor oil. We know that there is a lot of benefits to castor oil. Say, for example, sleeping with a castor oil pack over your liver to help to dry out toxins. There is just oodles of information about castor oil being used for millennia.
But your specific question around irritation to the eyes. I think what we have seen work the best is keep the eyes clean and warm compresses. I’m not of the position to make a blanket statement that castor oil is good for the eyes. I do have a concern of potentially the castor oil actually blocking the meibomian glands of the lids, which create lubrication. That’s why I don’t recommend oil cleansers or anything like that. We want to keep the lids clean, so those meibomian glands don’t get blocked.
I don’t have a definitive answer on that. Is it going to be beneficial or negative? I don’t have a definitive answer. What I would say is you could try things and see if it works. I’m not a huge fan of trying things. I want to do something, but I also want to know that it works. We do know that warm compresses are helpful.
I have dry eye, too. 50% of us do. What I have found helps me is getting in my sauna, red light therapy, warm compresses, washing my face in the bath or the shower with fresh running water in the morning and evening, and reducing my oxidative stress status, toxic load, and inflammation.
The other thing I will add, which I don’t hear anybody else talk about, but it makes such a difference for me, is actually sleeping with a silver threaded eye mask. You have probably seen those jelly eye masks that you can heat up and cool down and put on your eyes. But what we see in the literature on how EMFs impact the skin is it ends up messing with your red blood cells, and we get reduced blood flow.
On the skin, we can experience more redness and irritation as well as we have two eyeballs. They are very metabolically sensitive. They are actually quite sensitive to EMFs. When you are sleeping with an eye mask that is made of silver threads, which I have two brands that I really like their EMF protective clothing, they have silver threads woven into the fabric. That is on my biohacking page. One of them has an eye mask. I love that. I find it makes my eyes feel better.
The other thing for eyes is to consider wearing blue-light blocking glasses that work, not just the coating that your optometrist will put on your lenses. But stand-alone blue-light blocking glasses. I have some recommendations for those, too. I wear those all the time. The blue light actually reaches a little bit deeper into the skin than what we get outside. We are getting so much blue light. EMF exposure to these highly metabolic organs here that I think that those are actually two really great strategies.
For eyedrops, I use methylene blue eyedrops.
Dr. Eric:
Very cool. I’m familiar with methylene blue. I didn’t know there are methylene blue eyedrops though. That’s interesting.
Rachel:
To be fair, this is not medical advice. This is educational information only. Some of these things are things I do because I am a super nerdy biohacker. I get to have conversations with some of the greatest minds in this health and wellness space. I look at the published data and write papers on it.
Methylene blue is a bit new for me, but it works for me.
Dr. Eric:
With red light therapy, you’re not giving specific recommendations, telling people to go out and get a red light and use it on their eyes. For people who want to use it, where did you learn how to incorporate red light therapy on your eyes in a safe way?
Rachel:
I started a podcast. I had the opportunity to interview the CEOs and founders from lots of different companies. Then they sent me their products. I get to try them out. What’s on my biohacking page are products that I personally use.
I won’t say specific brands when I’m doing interviews because my recommendations are always subject to change. Same with skincare stuff. Different companies can tweak things, or things happen in the company that I don’t like from a personal, business, ethical perspective.
But I started to utilize red light when I entered into this biohacking world. I’m glad I did because it really helped me overcome and manage pain through my two intense car crashes. Neither were my fault. The red light is very calming. I use it in my restroom. I also have it in my bedroom and my sauna here. I like it.
There is so much literature now on red light. A lot of red-light products, like face masks or eye masks, I would just go for a panel. I think it’s more efficient. I think like an engineer, that highly thinking, analytical, what is going to be the most efficient option? I don’t think a trendy red light face mask is as good as using a large panel where you can basically do your whole upper body as opposed to wearing this face mask that makes you look like a Storm Trooper.
Dr. Eric:
Agreed. I have a panel.
Rachel:
Perfect. You can spin around and get your backside, too.
Dr. Eric:
I know you referred to your skin line and shop a few times. I want you to talk more about that. Before you do that, there is so much more I’m sure you could talk about, but anything else related to our conversation before we get into your skincare line?
Rachel:
I’m really happy and proud of each and every one of you who is taking the time to hang out with Dr. Eric Osansky and myself, to learn how to be healthier. You might have gone through different things in your life, things in your upbringing, trauma, the pace of your life now. There might be some things you’re not quite happy about. These things impact us physically.
When you’re learning, you’re on this path of discovering what makes you feel better. Take it from this approach that we’re all individuals. We’re all wonderfully and beautifully created. I think so anyway.
Taking a more individual approach is the way to go because something might not work for you but works for somebody else. It’s great to just become your own investigator or detective. Find what helps you be dialed in. Find what helps you feel great. When you feel great, the looking great will come.
If you have historically looked great, but you feel like there’s some changes in your appearance, there can be some deeper underlying reasons of maybe why you have more inflammation in your body. Why you feel like you’re aging overnight, especially in perimenopause, menopause, and postmenopause. For guys, losing testosterone, there is so many layers to beauty and optimization.
Just do the best you can at being your best version. Do one thing each month, like getting a water purifier, getting an air purifier, getting a new haircare routine, so you are not putting phthalates all over your body or parabens.
Switching up your skincare routine. Dialing in how you’re eating, your supplements. Do one thing a month, so you don’t get overly consumed with this stuff, or have it break the bank.
But know that you’re on this path to be your best version, and I’m super proud of you. You’re one of these individuals who you care for yourself, and then you’re actually going to be able to take care of others better and be of service, too.
That’s a really healthy position and framework to look at health optimization. Don’t get too stressed out. Definitely don’t fall prey to the bright, shiny objects or this new fad diet or this new fad biohacking product or this new skin gimmick.
Same thing goes with dry eye treatments in the clinic. There is a lot that are not so good and are very expensive. Same with thyroid. You’re fully aware of some of the different approaches to thyroid. You can put a Band-Aid on it, or you can get to the root cause.
Just be gentle on yourself. Consume information from speakers who don’t get you ramped up into this high beta state. Once you learn these things, don’t become that health or biohacking or wellness hose when you’re speaking to other people. Everyone is on their own journey. I’m just happy you’re here with us.
Dr. Eric:
That is some wonderful advice. Thank you so much.
Talk a little bit about your skincare line. What differentiates your products from many of the others out there?
Rachel:
It’s been a labor of love. As I mentioned, I’ve probably sold about 15 different brands over the years. But I noticed there were some ingredient shifts. There were some ingredients in them that didn’t need to be there, and I can make it better.
That’s why I’ve created my own cleanser, eye cream, hyaluronic acid serum, copper peptide serum, light moisturizer, heavy moisturizer, antioxidant serum that are as clean as possible. Super clean. Some of these products, I would even eat. I can’t say to eat it, but I would. That’s really important. What you’re putting on your skin, you want it to get the job done, but you don’t want it to be adding to your toxic bucket, which a lot of cosmetic products do.
You can head on over to TheSchoolOfRadiance.com. That’s my website. My skin shop link is there. You can check out a free 30-minute lesson, where I talk about air, water, lighting, EMFs, eating the right food, and detoxing in an easy way.
Book a one-on-one with me. You can use promo code Eric15, and that will give you 15% off a one-on-one with me. Learn how to use your products from the comfort of your own home. I mentioned dermal walling. A lot of us don’t actually learn how to apply our products and utilize them at a higher level and really dial in our home care. That’s what my tutorials do. I teach you how to become your own skin pro.
Of course, for the more personal development container, how we can both look and feel our best with a lot of things that I do, that I don’t share publicly for a couple of different reasons but really work, for myself and also those who I have served for many years, who I have observed as radiant. That’s my membership.
Everything is over on my website. Shop your skincare. If you do need some specific recommendations, you’d like me to personally streamline your routine and select a routine for you, maybe talk about some rejuvenation stuff, some biohacking stuff, and give you that ongoing support, definitely book a one-on-one. That code is Eric15. I would love to meet you.
Dr. Eric:
You also have a page for biohacks.
Rachel:
Yeah. Air purifier, water purifier, EMF protective clothing, the eye masks, bedding, all sorts of things that are going to help you set your home up for success for not only you but your partner and your whole family. Blue light blocking glasses, sauna. That’s at TheSchoolOfRadiance.com. You will see the word “Biohacking.” Click that for my recommendations.
In a one-on-one, I will go through what you might be doing now and some shifts you can make that you may not have thought about.
Dr. Eric:
All the resources they need are on the website, including a link to your podcast, I’m sure. Or they could go to your favorite platform and type in The School of Radiance.
Rachel:
Yep.
Dr. Eric:
Wonderful. Do you have social media?
Rachel:
I have Instagram. @RachelVargaOfficial. I am all about inspiring you, motivating you. If I can do this stuff, you can do it, too.
If you are also looking for another resource that’s free, if you go to SkinCareChecklist.com, you will see my great information to help you out now. I recently updated this, so it’s new.
Dr. Eric:
I will check that checklist out as well. Thank you so much, Rachel. I knew this was going to be an amazing conversation. You definitely didn’t disappoint. I found this to be valuable.
Took plenty of notes. You probably didn’t notice in the background, but I always try to take notes. This one, it was hard to keep up because you had gem after gem. A lot of information. Probably going to have to relisten to this myself. Thank you so much for sharing all this information with my listeners.
Rachel:
My absolute pleasure. I’m really curious. If you were just to take a quick snapshot at the notes that you took, what stood out for you?
Dr. Eric:
Of course, the eye care stuff is important. A lot of the people I work with have thyroid eye disease. Not everybody who has dry eyes has thyroid eye disease, but still. A lot of people have eye issues in general.
Rachel:
50% of us, yep.
Dr. Eric:
Even the skincare. My wife does everything you mentioned, like the moisturizing and the exfoliation. Do we really need to do that? Gave a really good explanation why not just women but us men should do it as well.
Not just rely on the single bar of soap. I do use shampoo and soap. I don’t condition my hair, but I do have a separate shampoo for that. I’m not just using a single bar.
The silver threaded eye mask. I use an eye mask, but I don’t think it is silver threaded. I’d probably know if it was. Things like that.
You mentioned the oxygen mask. So much information that I want to learn more about. We might have to get you back on the podcast again to discuss more of these biohacks.
Rachel:
Yes, it’s different for everybody. I’m so glad those stood out. Just to clarify what the silver threaded eye mask is for. I wear it to give my eyes a break while I sleep from EMFs and wireless cellular radiation. Looking at sleep like beauty sleep, like recovery.
There is a nuance between the ways that the gents age and the ladies age. Last time I checked, guys don’t go through perimenopause, menopause, and postmenopause. We know there are some differences with what happens in the aging process between us.
Dr. Eric:
Without question. Thank you so much again. This was great. Look forward to having you on again in the future.
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