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What
Causes Bags Under
The Eyes
One morning my
mother-in-law looked in the mirror and,
inexplicably, there were bags under her eyes. She was mystified!
She’d been getting plenty of rest and was sleeping well. So why the bags?
Φ
an
inherited tendency to have dark circles under one’s eyes Φ
the
natural aging process Φ
lack of adequate sleep
There’s not
much you can do about the first contributor.
Some people are genetically predisposed to having circles
under their
eyes.
There’s not
much you can do about the aging process, either.
As we grow older, the skin gets thinner due
to a breakdown of the “scaffolding” formed by collagen fibers and a
weakening
of the elastic fibers that keep the skin taut.
This thinning of the skin is especially noticeable in
areas where the
skin is stretched over bony structures that don’t have thick layers of
fat and
other tissues beneath. There isn’t room
for fatty layers around the eye sockets because this would interfere
with our
ability to move our eyes and see. So the
skin around the eye sockets gets thinner as we age, allowing the blood
vessels
and dark shadows of bone to show through.
Again,
although this process is genetically controlled,
there are factors which
contribute to the condition of our skin.
One is how much exposure we get to the sun and our
exposure to smoke
(either via smoking or second-hand smoke).
Scientists
don’t understand why a lack of sleep, over which we do have control,
contributes to bags under the eyes, but they speculate that it may be
related
to skin and blood supply changes in that area.
Cosmetics, in
general, which claim to work wonders to erase circles under one’s eyes
have not
proven to be effective and can be costly.
Neither has cosmetic surgery shown any promise in
relieving individuals
of these bags. So outside of
getting enough sleep and protecting
yourself against the sun, perhaps the best way to deal with this
“problem” is
with a healthy dose...of
self-acceptance.
Source:
www.bbc.co.uk
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11/5/04-2125