Reviews of a trio of products by Adeline Skin Care.

ADELINE SKIN CARE

 

Adeline was founded by a man named Mark and his wife.  Below is their mission from their website, and then my review of their 3 products I have tested:

A Digital, Boutique Company - We have chosen to start small and focus on quality and the customer experience. We may not be the biggest but we are the best at what we do. We deliver results that deliver results that don’t contain nasty chemicals and other additives. We do this because we have our customers at the top of our mind, all the time.
Forward Thinking - We are always trying to innovate and create better products. We also try to think outside the product and think about the user of the product. How does the bottle feel in their hand? How does the bottle function? Is it easy to use it? Does the user feel educated? These  questions we constantly think about at Adeline Skin Care.
Problem Solvers - We know alot of the time skin care products end up in the skin care graveyard because they don’t deliver the results or don’t meet the expectation. We want to avoid that with education and science.
Customer Support - We pride ourselves in our “bottom of the bottle” guarantee. We love our customers and we want them to love us and love using our products. We will do whatever it takes to make you satisfied.

Organic Eye Serum

• Retails $59.95 for 0.5oz.
• About the product:
• MOISTURIZE skin around your eyes with natural ingredients to reduce the appearance of crow's feet and fine lines.
• REDUCE dark circles under your eyes caused by aging, toxins, poor sleep, pollutants, and sun damage with our organic eye serum - enjoy a healthier, more youthful glow even when you're not wearing makeup!
• ELIMINATE brown spots and discoloration, reduce inflammation, improve clarity and tone to take years off your appearance in just 60 seconds a day using the best eye serum available.
• PROTECT the skin around your eyes from dangerous and unsightly damage with antioxidant vitamins.
• How to use: Pat gel and smooth over clean eye area with special attention to wrinkle prone areas.  Use daily for best results.
• What I Thought: The only thing I didn't care for about this product was its consistency.  One full pump provided a bit too much watery serum to be applied.  Eventually I learned to control the amount I wanted for use.  It went on very wet but it did seep in rather quickly leaving a slightly shiny look underneath the eye.  If you apply makeup or concealer on top of the product it may cause a reaction that will flake off the makeup, as I noticed this with a few liquid concealers I use, but not all.  I applied it both morning an night and within a few uses I noticed how soft the skin around my eyes were and it definitely helped reduce puffiness.  Within a few weeks a few of my more noticeable wrinkles around my eyes had been diminished but not completely wiped away and it slightly (emphasis on slightly) reduced my dark circles.  I really enjoyed this product but would probably prefer it in a less watery form, maybe like a cream.
• I would buy it.

Anti-Aging Moisturizer

• Retails $59.95 for 1oz.
• About the product:
• 5 POWERFUL ANTI AGING INGREDIENTS IN ONE BOTTLE: Adeline's Anti-Aging Face Cream is formulated with 5 powerful ingredients that fight wrinkles and rejuvenate your skin: Matrixyl, Witch Hazel, Hyaluronic Acid, Vitamin C & Vitamin E. The results on your skin are fantastic! You would normally have to purchase multiple creams to attain the benefits that we pack into one of our bottles. Our customers discover they don't want or need to use any other creams on their face after using our skin cream.
• SCIENTIFICALLY PROVEN to double the amount of collagen needed to give the skin its elasticity. This means your wrinkles are going to fade and you will no longer be looking at celebrities and other women wondering how they look so young because you now know the secret. Start feeling more confident. Your search for the perfect anti-aging skin cream is over!
• GET YOUR TIME BACK: After washing in the morning and evening, it takes just 30 seconds to gently apply the cream to your face, neck and decollete. Skin appears radiant and more plump after use. Over time our customers experience visible improvements in the appearance of wrinkles, fine lines, laugh lines, dry skin and uneven skin.
• UNBEATABLE PREMIUM QUALITY: Our face creams are handmade in our FDA-Inspected facility according to strict manufactures guidelines outlined by the GMP right here in the USA. All our products are free from parabens, SLS (Sodium Lauryl Sulfate) & petrochemical derivatives. With no added fragrances and no additives or fillers we are positive you are going to love our anti-aging moisturizer from Adeline.
• How to use: Wash and pat skin dry.  Apply toner and serum if being used.  Then apply moisturizer to the skin; allow to dry.
• What I Thought: The first thing I noticed using this was the scent of peppermint that it had and I loved it, though I usually do associate peppermint with foot creams.  Like when Janis states in Mean Girls, "It's been a month, and all we've done is make Regina's face smell like a foot."  One pump of the product was enough for it to deeply moisturize my skin.  The scent didn't last long but the moisturizing did leaving my skin feeling very soft.  I started by using this twice a day and, between using their facial serum and this, the moisturizing was a bit too much for my skin which caused me to break out.  Once I started using it once daily, in the morning, it worked much more to my advantage.
• I would buy it.

Hyaluronic Acid Serum

• Retails $59.99 for 1.7oz.
• About the product:
• EASY TO USE - just apply twice daily and enjoy tighter, toned, younger looking skin in the morning. Just 60 seconds a day is all it takes to reverse the signs of aging and turn heads with your radiant, youthful skin!
• IMAGINE having a smooth, even skin tone and a glowing complexion... even when you're not wearing makeup! Age spots, fine lines, wrinkles, and blemishes fade effortlessly with just twice daily usage!
• NATURAL NUTRITION for your skin - Hyaluronic Acid Serum contains Retinol, a blend of Vitamin A for elasticity, collagen formation, and sun damage repair; Vitamin C for improved moisture, elasticity, and tone; Vitamin D to moisturize skin and promote healing; Vitamin E for anti-oxidant protection and non-greasy moisture!
• GENTLE on skin - will not sting or burn when applied! This is the best anti wrinkle and anti aging serum available on the market. Great for even sensitive skin!
• How to use: Wash and pat skin dry.  If using toner, apply toner first.  Apply a pea-sized amount of serum with fingertips to entire face and neck.  Allow to dry.  Follow with a moisturizer.  Can be used daily, morning and night.
• What I thought:  I used this twice a day after cleansing and was a bit glad it didn't dry quite as quickly as a lot of other facial serums I have used.  I didn't detect any scent to this and it applied very wet to the face.  That made it easier to apply just one pump of the product and work it into my skin.  I usually don't find serums to be very moisturizing but this one was.  I almost didn't feel the need add an additional moisturizer into my routine.  Unfortunately, like many other serums, this didn't help when my hormones went all out of whack, but when those settled down it did help get my skin back in order to the best of its ability, calming and helping heal my skin.
• I would buy it.

All these products worked amazingly well together and I'm grateful to have had the opportunity to test each one!

You can currently purchase all of these products for $35.25 each at Amazon.com!

• While there, look below each product under Special Offers and Product Promotions for additional savings opportunities!

Adeline also has a 100% NO RISK MONEY BACK GUARANTEE on all their products!

This is a sponsored post. I received these products for free via Adeline and Tomoson to try, review, and supply my honest opinion.

The not so fantastic life of autoimmune diseases.

One of the fun (sarcasm) things about having autoimmune diseases, as well as other diseases or sickness, is the fact that you can have these random and odd symptoms pop up out of no where.  If you don't document what's going on, they can be gone in a flash and then forgotten until it happens again, if it ever does happen again.  These uncommon, and sometimes odd, happenings could be a gateway to the right diagnosis and treatment.  You need to DOCUMENT EVERYTHING!

I may have mentioned before that a friend of mine had given me a journal a while back, happily titled, "I'm Going To Die."  I could really use a new one to start fresh going forward because if I do hand it to my doctor and say, "Read from this page going forward," they end up going backward looking at my chicken scratch of shit like my diet and weight loss from years prior, missing the point of the smaller, and most recent things that should be standing out.  And though it's almost always with me, it has been neglected far too much.  What I should be doing is consistently documenting it and then also placing color tabs in it showing weight, symptoms, or medication adjustments.

My brain has been absolute mush lately.  The other day I thought 2015 was 2 years ago, that we were already in May, that last week was this week and almost missed a doctor appointment if I hadn't checked my voice mail from the day prior.  Lately I've been questioning my total thyroidectomy, if it was really the right decision.  Knowing what I do now, I feel my endocrinologist at the time was adjusting my meds too quickly.  If it's so easy to regulate when you have no thyroid, and it supposedly only takes around 3 months to get the meds to even out your system, how come almost a year later, & on the same dosing, my TSH is STILL dropping making me hyperthyroid?   I should have switched endocrinologists months ago, when I told him I was feeling hyperthyroid and he started passing me off as diabetic.

'Alohi trying to comfort me.

I've become depressed again.  No one wants to be around someone who is sick all the time.  At least those who don't understand what I'm going through.  Plus you realize that people who have been with you since the start of it all still don't get it.  I also don't want to be around people who don't understand what I'm going through.  I don't want sympathy, nor empathy or suggestions to help fix me.  My idea of being strong right now is avoiding most human contact and stressful situations.  Usually by hermitting myself in my home and crying most of the day.  I've tried many times to write about my depression but have found it too difficult.

May is going to be full of changes and it can't come any sooner.  I have a new endocrinologist and rheumatologist lined up.  The last time I went to a rheumatologist was at the end of 2013, before I had gone back to work from my leave.  I was in so much pain on synthetic T4 medication and, at that time, no one was associating it with my medication or, lack of, thyroid.  I've mentioned it before, how the internal medicine doctor diagnosed me with fibromyalgia and was pushing... PUSHING... Lyrica on me.  My PA under my primary doctor had already addressed my increasing pain and recommended I see an rheumatologist.

You're probably thinking, "Well, if your other doctor told you to see a rheumatologist, how come you went to internal medicine?"  Unless it's blatantly obvious what's wrong with you, which probably 99% of the time it's not when you have thyroid (or most other) autoimmune conditions, it can sometimes (and usually does) take a month or more to set up initial appointments with new specialists.  So when your body is screaming with pain, you're going to start searching and reaching out to anyone for answers to MAKE IT STOP IMMEDIATELY!  Yet that can become a problem.  A problem of misdiagnosis and incorrect treatment.

What I did learn from that rheumatologist appointment was that I did not have RA, but I did have ANA which suggested lupus.  After a few appointments and notes that my pain was most likely due to my (lack of) thyroid, and with no further mention of lupus or ANA, AND with the pain starting to diminish with the start of NDT, I thought it was unnecessary for me to continue to go.

Fast forward to now.  

Those little hiccups in your health that you might ignore could mean something.  Googling symptoms can usually overload you with incorrect information, and WebMd Symptom Checker always points you to some sort of cancer.  Yet sometimes, just sometimes, things will stand out.  Something that has bothered me for YEARS and I just never really thought about it, was the sensitivity to sunlight that I have.

No I don't break out in hives or blisters, nor get sunburns if I'm out in the sun.  Then again, I'm rarely in the sun so I probably wouldn't know. What does happen is that I get nauseous, light headed, dizzy, and headaches that sometimes are borderline migraines.  It's been on and off for years, and when I lived in CA the constant sun was pure Hell for me!  I started noticing it again the last few weeks as it has been on and off sunny.  Even if it's cloudy, if it's bright out I want to rip my eyes out or my head off.  If the day would start off dark and gloomy I might feel fine, then the sun would come out and I'd feel like death, then it would go away again and the death feeling would go away.  Factor in other things like losing my hair again, skin rashes, burning joint pain that feels like it's in my right hip, I think something else is going on.

I reached out to a friend of mine who I knew has lupus.  Like thyroid disorders, lupus can sway in many directions as far as diagnosis, symptoms, and treatment.  There is also a lot of similarity in symptoms of lupus and thyroid diseases.  Considering I have ANA, no thyroid, and am still having all these issues, I figured it was time for some new doctors.

I just wish I was being treated right and felt better now.  I can only pray that will be soon.

"Just when I think I have learned the way to live, life changes." Hugh Prather

For those who celebrate, I hope you have a lovely Easter tomorrow, or a happy Passover.  I have already dyed eggs and am back on a hard boiled egg kick.  I used to make them all the time and I should probably start doing so again.

I really should be working on my taxes right now but it seems every other second I get sidetracked. If I get something on my mind I usually immediately lose the other thought I had. Then if I think about that other though again, I lose the newest thought I had. At work I've taken to shorthand writing when I need to remember something, yet even when I do that and have it right in front of me, I still sometimes overlook it.

I have some really exciting opportunities coming up for this blog by working with companies and testing products for reviews. I'm even hoping that eventually I'll be doing some giveaways! If you follow you may have noticed slight changes in the design. The background is softer, layout is slightly different, and I've also added links to make it easier to follow me on other social media platforms. If you're using a mobile device you may need to switch to the full site version to view them.

I've also FINALLY created a facebook page specifically for this blog! I'll still be sharing posts publicly on my personal page so you can still follow me there if you already do. If not, come follow me & and say hello on my Facebook blog page by clicking here! My other platforms (Twitter, Instagram, Pinterest) will not be changing.

~

The last time I blogged about my health was back in December.  I was concerned with my increasing anxiety and "normal" TSH of 0.42 but optimistic for the new year.  Yet once the new year came, my optimism decreased day by day, week by week.  My anti-anxiety medication was increased in dose, which helped in the beginning of the increase, yet the familiarity of other hyperthyroidism symptoms lingered.  And all the holiday parties, dinners, cookies and treats didn't keep me from losing weight either!

The last few times I saw my endocrinologist he kept treating me like a diabetic, and not the thyroid-less, hyperthyroid symptomatic patient that I really was.  I regularly checked my blood glucose in the morning, which was rarely over 100, and before my most recent appointment with him in March, my neurologist had decided to set up a 3 hour glucose test for me in addition to the A1C test he wanted me to have.  Both came back with flying colors that I was NOT diabetic.

So what the hell is wrong with me? Well I found out.  My most recent labs said my TSH dropped to 0.18.  I AM hyperthyroid!

Immediately I teared up.  I'm so pissed he didn't listen to me MONTHS ago when I was on the low end of "normal" range, feeling hyperthyroid, and having him pass me off as a possible diabetic!  I also learned just how much Big Pharma has him under their wing as he started pushing synthroid on me again.  WTF?  I was in so much pain, debilitating and excruciating at times, and insanely fatigued on that medication that there's no way in hell I would ever go back on it!  Sure it works for some people but not me!  Then he goes on to tell me that I'm one in 5% of people who do better on NDT medications!  Are you fucking serious?  I found this article which I thought was extremely interesting showing, though in 1999 and only a study of 70 patients, 49% of the patients studied preferred NDT.  Everyone needs to be treated on their own individual basis, not by how you treat the masses!  What's it going to take?  Another year after I've gained back my 30 lbs., maybe more, and my TSH at 4.4, crying that I'm feeling awful?  But wait!  He'll tell me that my TSH is in NORMAL range.  (Though I'd just be on the outskirts of being clinically hypothyroid.)

Sorry about my rant but it really gets me worked up and upset.  As a result my thyroid dosage was decreased.  He said to skip the next day completely so I did, thinking that day I would be a mess due to the fact that I've been on the same dosing schedule for almost a year.  Then, going forward, on Saturdays I go to 1/2 dose, Sunday no dose (typical of what I had been doing), then Monday through Friday back on my normal schedule.  Instead, my body felt the adjustment kick in the very next day and I was a mess.

As of right now I'm feeling pretty... perfect.  I'm praying it will last though I don't really expect it to considering I felt like absolute poo all day, no, all week.  Really, crappy the last couple of months.  I really don't want to forget this feeling and experience it more often.  It seems like since the adjustment, every other day I am having terrible anxiety, panic attacks and either headaches or migraines along with it.  Occasionally, terrible nausea also.  I can't really remember how I felt the last time it was adjusted because it was so long ago, but the symptoms are familiar.  I wish a lot of people would think I'm strong and fighting through it, though I know they can't see my struggle.  Instead I've learned many people do think of my illness as a joke.  I do put up a good front in front of others, yet the majority of the time when I'm alone, I'm crying over it.

~

So spring has sprung in WNY and I am anticipating the arrival of the spring peepers!  The birds are already annoying me at 6am with their chirping and it got up to 70ºF a few days ago, and it is currently snowing.  I normally welcome the additional spring snow showers but this winter has been quite brutal so I am ready for it to stop.

The Betties and I were also all finally together, though a small series of unfortunate events caused it to be extended.  A cold and, unexpected, snowy Thursday was spent in Rochester, NY.  You can read about it here on my dear friend Andrea's newest blog, hObsessions.  Then on Sunday we all had breakfast at Betty's then the gals and I headed to creep around Forest Lawn Cemetery and then Love Canal.  By the end of the day, which I believe was around 4pm for me, I was insanely exhausted and, after a quick dinner and bath, slept right through to Monday morning.  I think.

Though I have more to write about I'm going to leave it at that for now.  Take care everyone!