Reverse Skin Aging: Skin Care, Biomarkers, & Medspa Treatments
with Rachel Varga
Dr. Wendy Myers
Welcome to the Myers Detox Podcast. I’m Dr. Wendy Myers. Thanks so much for tuning in today. On this show, we talk about everything related to heavy metal and chemical toxicity and the health issues caused by these toxins. We talk about how to detox them. We talk about anti-aging, bioenergetics, and more advanced topics in biohacking and health that you won’t hear about on other podcasts. I like to do more advanced stuff, not the basics. Today, we have my good friend Rachel Varga on the show. She is an expert on skin. She’s gonna be talking about what you can do to check for biomarkers for aging in your skin so you can track that. We talk about nutrition for your skin. We talk about specific supplements for your skin, like collagen, creatine, and things like that.
We talk about med spa treatments and how that can be a landmine when you go to your dermatologist or you go to your med spa place, you got your Groupon at hand or what have you looking for a deal with your doctors. We talk about some of the issues, what things that you should do and treatments that you shouldn’t do. You can work one-on-one with Rachel as well to get a customized skin protocol. I did that. I consulted with her, and I learned so much. I was really blown away because there are so many options. There are so many lasers. There are so many treatments that you’re being sold at your doctor’s office, and it’s hard to know what’s really right for me and what’s really gonna meet my goals. So, we shed some light on that in the show today. It’s really good. And we, of course, go into skincare and what you should be doing to take care of your skin. So, it’s a great show today.
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-looking transformation and educating through her show, The School of Radiance Podcast. She’s performed over 20,000 rejuvenation procedures and is also a trainer for other practitioners on rejuvenation procedures, including medical grade skincare, laser skin rejuvenation, and injectables, including neuromodulators, dermal fillers, and slowing aging. In general, Rachel is passionate about delivering the highest standard of care with a focus on the patient’s specific work, rejuvenation goals, and a tailored approach to suit their needs, values, and lifestyles. She’s published multiple research articles on rejuvenation protocols for the eyelids, jawline, and overall skin health transformation.
She’s known for her gentle touch, natural-looking results, and for making her patients feel comfortable. She can guide you in creating your customized skin rejuvenation plan and skincare routine to achieve your goals through one-on-one sessions. Her expert seven-week seasonal skincare tutorials and the yearlong membership are the deeper layers of being beautifully radiant at her website, theschoolofradiance.com. Rachel is one of the first to blend Western approaches to skincare, rejuvenation, functional insights, and biohacking optimization strategies by blending the best of all those worlds. Again, check out her website at theschoolofradiance.com. Rachel, thanks so much for coming on the show.
Rachel Varga
Oh, it’s a pleasure to be here, Dr. Wendy Myers. I always love catching up with you and seeing what’s new in the detoxing space. I am excited to get into biomarkers of skin aging and how we can slow aging down to both look and feel our best.
Dr. Wendy Myers
This is a really hot topic, and we’re gonna be talking all about different med spa treatments that you can do. We’re gonna talk about all kinds of things related to reversing aging for your skin so you can look your best. So, why don’t you tell us a little bit about yourself and how you got into its skin so much. You’ve done a lot of research on this particular topic.
Rachel Varga
Yes, I’ve done a lot of research and a lot of treatments as well over the years and just before this wrapped up teaching a nurse practitioner in the DC area. I got into the medical aesthetic space in 2011 after doing a couple of years in peds ICU treatment care. It’s very difficult as a practitioner and a very stressful environment. When I finished nursing, I didn’t quite feel done with learning. So, then I went and did my med school prerequisites, took the mcat, considered becoming a physician myself. So, I joined the practice and wanted to see what it was like to run a practice as an aesthetics nurse. I did my training and just fell in love with it. I fell in love with the patient flow, the care, and hearing from my patients, “I have more confidence, what are we gonna do next?”
Then, in 2017, I segued into publishing research articles to elevate the standards in medical aesthetics and deliver great treatments. I started teaching, started speaking, and really my passion now is to be beautiful. It’s intricately connected to our internal landscape and to really feeling and looking our best. It comes down to reducing inflammation, addressing certain biomarkers and supporting different metabolic pathways, using topical skin products, maybe getting some rejuvenation, but it really comes down to not only doing everything from a beautification perspective to look beautiful, but actually feel and move through life in this more feminine, beautiful, peaceful, calm manner.
Dr. Wendy Myers
I’m just so happy. There are so many options and so many things you can do to rejuvenate your skin to keep it looking young and nourished. That can be really confusing. I think there’s a lot of nonsense at med spas. I get pitched for this laser and that laser and the micro frequency treatments. I’ve been very, very cautious about doing anything like that because I just wasn’t sure of its efficacy. They’re painful, they’re very expensive, and I think people can really get themselves into trouble. Less is more. We’ll get into that in a second, but why don’t we talk about the biomarkers to help us understand skin aging a bit better?
Rachel Varga
It’s taking this approach of testing instead of guessing. And we can do this by analyzing our stool. We can do this through analyzing our blood and also through analyzing our saliva and just having the knowledge that certain things do break down and shut down and need some extra support. One of the things that ages us is obviously inflammation. I know we did a previous episode talking about a research paper I wrote on oxidative stress status and its impacts on skin aging. But to speak specifically to some of the biomarkers, we have our telomere length. When our telomeres start to shorten, this correlates to slower aging, and when we support our telomeres, we support slower aging and our cellular health.
We also have the ability to actually measure our biological age through basically what’s called a Glycan age score. We can see changes in the glycosylation patterns of our bodies. We also have DNA methylation that happens in indicating biological versus chronological age. There are some really great test kits that look at even the stool, like I said, the blood and also the saliva that can compare our biological age to a chronological age. Say for example, I’m turning 39 this year. That’s my biological age, but the last time I did a couple test kits, I was nine years younger biologically. So that’s giving you an indicator that you are aging slower, and if your biological age is older than your chronological age, then there’s some work to do.
Dr. Wendy Myers
I thought you were in your early thirties, actually. I didn’t realize you were 39. I did the Glycan age test also. It’s fantastic. I’ve had podcasts coming out about that and I was six years younger, which I was super happy to hear, but I’m like, let’s do more. I wanna get a better score next time I do it.
Rachel Varga
Yeah, absolutely. One of the things that we don’t really hear enough about in the biohacking and anti-aging space is the homocysteine levels. Lower levels are also associated with reduced inflammation and better skin health. That’s why I’m such a proponent of purifying your environment, air, water, lighting, electromagnetics testing set and second-guessing what we’re eating. And then of course, where you come in is doing the detoxification. All of these things help to lower our overall inflammation, which essentially helps to preserve your skin structure. And then next, of course, we all know about blood glucose and insulin sensitivity, HbA1c and fasting insulin. Lower levels support skin elasticity and reduce glycation damage.
If we look at a diabetic skin, they tend to have this reticular look to the skin. It looks quite rough and that’s actually the glycation end products that manifest on the skin. The other thing, which a number of you probably already know, is about food pie and oxalates. Think about Kale, for example, or peppers. These foods are higher in things that cause inflammation in the body that in our grandparents’ generation probably were actually pretty good for us. But due to soil degradation, things like that, food sign oxalates create these little crystal shards in the body and they actually scratch at the endothelium of your blood vessels and then you’re not gonna get great blood flow to your skin.
Dr. Wendy Myers
I think some high oxalate foods people don’t realize are the kale, spinach, raspberries, and almonds. All these things you’re putting in your morning smoothie. Just try to think of low oxalate smoothies and game for that.
Rachel Varga
Something really easy here is to just get back to basics. I used to be that individual that used to drink a ton of almond milk many years ago until I learned about this. I do love my milk and I know my farmer. That’s all I’m gonna say about that, but really just getting back to the more pure forms of our food and cooking as much as possible. I consume a ton of protein because protein and amino acids are truly the building blocks of our DNA expressing itself, which is epigenetics. We need collagen. We need antioxidants. We need cholesterol to create healthy skin and for our hormones. Lowering oxidative stress means less collagen breakdown and better skin resilience. One of the things that I’ve noticed in my patients over the years is some people are more radiant than others.
One key quality, I’ll just paint a picture here. I’ve served thousands of patients since 2011, both in the clinic and online, but some people just have the signs of aging, but they look more beautiful. They’re a pleasure to be around, and they’ve set themselves up for a more peaceful life. They have more time in nature. They’re exercising. They have great relationships. They’re doing hobbies. They’re living their purpose. They typically have a faith, and I think all of these things really add to a greater level of resilience. But metabolically and from a cellular level, they’re more metabolically flexible. Their adrenals aren’t tanked, so their cortisol is not spiked. Then they’re not having that breakdown of collagen and elastin sooner.
Dr. Wendy Myers
One note, when you talk about blood sugar levels, I think as we age biologically and we have toxins, that will contribute to poor blood sugar control. The number one cause of diabetes is toxins. I think people don’t realize as we age, you have a harder time controlling your blood sugar. That sugar, like you said, breaks down our collagen and cuts the insides of our veins and our endothelium. So, it’s really important to eat more of a paleo type diet because you also can get gross in your skin. You get skin tags.
Rachel Varga
We call these the barnacles of life.
Dr. Wendy Myers
This is interesting. I had met someone. It was my ex-husband’s dad’s girlfriend, and she just could not eat sugar. She just couldn’t tolerate it and she was 50 years old. She looked like she was 30 years old because she just didn’t have the advanced glycation end products. She had just never eaten sugar. It was unbelievable how young she looked. I’ve never seen a specimen like that before. There’s not that many people that haven’t eaten sugar for decades. It really made a big impression on me how damaging sugar and high blood sugar is to your skin.
Rachel Varga
And then there’s also the component of fasting. I know for myself in general, I think I was doing too much fasting for too long.
Dr. Wendy Myers
I don’t have that problem for sure.
Rachel Varga
I’ve reevaluated that. So, in terms of sugar and carbohydrates that my body can access, I lift heavy, probably about five to six times a week. I work out with bodybuilders. I’m lifting heavy. One of my key goals right now is to put on as much muscle as possible and my body composition is great. My metabolism is just rolling because I exercise. I’m a speaker and do a lot of things. I wear about 13 different hats. I do need to make sure that I keep my cortisol levels down and my energy up. So, two things that I love to do is make sure that I’m having honey throughout the day. This supports our brain so that we continue to make better decisions. There’s actually a study on this that gave people a placebo water that was sweetened with something that didn’t impact sugars and a drink that had sugars and those that had sugars at every 20, 30 minutes scored better. They made better decisions. So, I have honey. I have dates throughout the day. I’m not afraid of those kinds of sugars.
Dr. Wendy Myers
Dates don’t raise your blood sugar at all. That’s really interesting and they’re so delicious too.
Rachel Varga
If you’re stressed out and you’re like, oh my gosh, I gotta pick the kids up and do all the things and all these things. I don’t think that life is particularly easy for anybody. We all go through things, peaks and valleys, and overcome obstacles. I like having that, and I love dates, especially if I’m really performing. For example, I was just teaching for two days in Vancouver. I’m on, right? You’ve heard of how many calories Tony Robbins burns when he’s doing a presentation. So, it’s like that. We need to feel our bodies effectively, which is why I love honey and dates. It’s really the refined sugars and spikes in our glucose levels that lead to the degradation of collagen and elastin.
16:31 Ads
For anyone listening who really wants to detox their body, go to heavymetalsquiz.com. I created a quiz for you. It only takes a couple of seconds and it’s based on some lifestyle questions. You can get your toxicity score and get a free video series that answers all of your frequently asked questions about how to detox your body. Check it out at heavymetalsquiz.com.
Dr. Wendy Myers
That really adds up over time. So, the time to start is now to eat a healthier diet that’s lower in carbohydrates.
Rachel Varga
I have to say, Dr. Wendy Myers, every time I see you, you’re looking more beautiful.
Dr. Wendy Myers
Oh, thank you. Thank you. Well, you know what? I’ve earned it. I have been working since I was 13 years old. I have a skincare routine every single day. I’ve been very dedicated to that and sunscreen and saunas and detox and all that stuff. So, I’ve earned it. This is a lot of hard work. I didn’t just show up like this.
Rachel Varga
One of the good things about you is that you understand oxidative stress, inflammation, aging, detoxing, and then we also did a consultation. You had that, okay, how can we streamline your routine? How can we really optimize what you’re choosing to do in the clinic to get the results that you’re after? I’m sure we’ll talk about that later.
Dr. Wendy Myers
I love that consultation I had with you because I’m 52. I’m gonna be 53 this year, and I was like, I think I should do some lasers. I don’t really know what’s going with the med spa treatments and I’ve been offered a lot of different things and I’m like, I don’t know about that. Nothing really resonated with me, so I’d love to consult with you to just clarify what treatments are harmful and what treatments would be ideal for me based on my skincare goals. It was so invaluable to me, and I really highly recommend it for anyone who’s at the med spa and the doctor is like, hey, I bought this laser for 80 grand. Let’s do it for you. They just sell you what they have, not necessarily what it is that you need for your goals. And so, I wanted to go over some of those with you. Like, what are the really solid treatments that are available in the med spas that you give the green light for?
Rachel Varga
What’s really interesting here is obviously, I wanna talk about collagen degradation biomarkers too, in alignment with this, but there’s basically the Hyundai of lasers or the Ferrari of lasers. Just because you hear a laser doesn’t mean it’s all the same. The other component here is we all have different skin types, right? My skin type is very similar to yours, Dr. Wendy Myers, but some of us have a little bit more melanin in the skin or a little bit less, or a history of skin cancer or precancerous lesions, or those barnacles of life, especially actinic keratosis. Some of us have different goals: pigmentation, skin redness, broken capillaries, fine lines, wrinkles, pore size, laxity to the jawline to the necks, sun damage on the chest, sun damage on the arms and the hands.
So, there are lots of different things that we can address, but it also comes down to what your goals are, your budget, your lifestyle, and really maximizing those results. One of the things that really has bothered me about the medical aesthetic space, is that I have been a CANS certified aesthetic nurse after my B-S-C-N-R and designation. One of the important things that I need to do to maintain that designation is to help elevate the medical aesthetics industry. So publishing, papers, speaking, presenting, teaching, and also elevating patient-centered care. I would say in about 2017 – 2018, I was having new clients that were coming to see me in the clinic, either locally or flying in, and they were saying to me, I had a consultation at another med spa and I met with a consultant. It was a free 30-minute session and I just felt like I was being sold a package of six of skin tightening at age six of this. And it just felt very cookie cutter.
The information that I was able to relay was really customized and focused to their needs. One issue is that the med spa industry is a multi-billion-dollar industry that continues to grow. Some practitioners and clinic owners are just in it for the money, but there’s also some gems that really wanna care about just helping people look and feel better. We’re seeing this beautiful intersection now of the med spa world, the longevity world and the biohacking, and also to a capacity, the AI and tech world. So being able to measure these different biomarkers that we’ve spoken to provides aesthetic results, which you really start to see the changes when you make these internal shifts with how you live and support the different biomarkers and pathways in the body. On the flip side, if you are drinking more alcohol, you’re not getting enough sleep, you’re super stressed out, you’re not taking care of your skin, you are exposed to mold or more stress in your life, your skin will show you a couple weeks later. I would say actually first around the eyes. Redness, darkness, that’s how things will manifest.
For rejuvenation options, I do wanna actually talk about the collagen degradation biomarkers. We have pro-collagen type one and two, and then we also have something called matrix metalloproteinases. Low MMPs mean less collagen breakdown. So, this is a really cool biomarker to look at. And then we also have, of course, change in NAD levels and mitochondrial function. I’m sure you’ve heard this many times, listeners here have heard this many times, but NAD levels due decline. I love taking my NAD to help my mitochondria make more energy. We forget that when we have more energy to go through life, guess what? Our skin’s also gonna have more energy to be more healthy and radiant as well. So, those are some of the main biomarkers that we can test for now at various different clinics. And then for the skin rejuvenation options to actually help the skin to express itself in a younger way, we can actually use laser or more technically broadband light to actually tell our skin to behave younger on an epigenetic level at about 10 years younger. I don’t know about you, but that’s pretty cool.
Dr. Wendy Myers
Sign me up another 10 years younger. That’d be great.
Rachel Varga
I think that that’s an appropriate goal. That’s your realistic goal when you’re looking at, hey, I’m noticing some changes in my skin, whether that’s around perimenopause, menopause, or post menopause. You feel like your skin’s changed overnight because it has. These biomarkers do shift and go through different processes as we age. This is the aging process, so thank you to modern technologies and some of the advancements that actually can measure these biomarker changes in the skin, especially on the epigenetic. I know I’m using some big words here, but you have lots of nerds tuning into the show here. So, we’re really getting into the nitty gritty details here. But basically, we can use a bright flash of light at a specific wavelength to tell our skin cells to behave younger, because certain genes turn off as we age.
Specific wavelengths of light can tell those genes to turn back on, to then behave younger. And then, simultaneously we are getting a reduction in a breakdown of excess melanin or sun damage, sun spots, age spots, brown spots or whatever you wanna call them, collapsing some of those superficial blood vessels that we typically get to the cheeks or around our nose to provide this more clear looking complexion. You don’t need to cover it up all the time with your concealer or your makeup. We can actually use light wavelengths to do that, which is pretty cool.
Dr. Wendy Myers
Do you mean like red light therapy?
Rachel Varga
No, I’m talking about broadband light red. I’m glad that you brought up red light therapy. I use tons of research on red light therapy. I use red lights all the time. And the way I like to consider red light therapy is I don’t use the masks. If anyone in the skin and biohacking space should be talking about a red-light face mask, it would be me. But I don’t. I recommend the larger panels actually so that you are getting exposure to the benefits of red light. We have visible light on the wavelength spectrum, and then we have non-visible light, which has another application for promoted collagen, which we should definitely talk about. But the red-light wavelength we know in the research is supportive of helping reduce inflammation and also giving a little bit of this photobiomodulation for a mitochondria because the NAD levels decline. We’re inside a lot more. We’re not getting a beautiful sun exposure as much outside.
I like to use red light therapy to help me calm down and settle and get ready for sleep. I just find it helps me feel better. Some people also say that red light therapy can help to shrink fat cells. I’m not gonna make any claims about that, but that is something that I have heard a little bit more. I mean, who doesn’t want to shed a little bit? I think you’re gonna shed more with detoxing personally though.
Dr. Wendy Myers
But you’re not against the red-light mask, it’s just that the full body panels might as well do your whole body and all your mitochondria while you’re at it. I have that in my sunlight and sauna. I’ve got the red-light therapy panels in my sauna as well. I’m stacking those while I’m doing a sauna, stacking the little protocols.
Rachel Varga
I have my sunlight and sauna as well, just right next to me here.
Dr. Wendy Myers
Oh, great.
Rachel Varga
In my office recording studio is a biohacking room, with the near and far and red lights, which is fantastic. The reason I recommend the larger panels with red light technology is similar to the approach I take with applying skincare and maybe even doing some rejuvenation in the clinic. We think about our high real estate areas on our skin and what we present and expose to the world the most are our face, neck, chest, hands, arms, the top of the chest and our hands.
When I go into rejuvenation on someone, that’s where most of the sun damage actually is because people typically for years put more products, so skincare and sunscreen on their face, but they forget the top of their chest because they think, oh, I’m wearing a shirt, but it does slip through that. The same principle goes to the red-Light exposure. You wanna be targeting the high real estate areas as well, and same when you’re doing rejuvenation to not just do the face but the neck, chest and hands. After I do my whole body probably about twice a year with specific light wavelength technology just so I can enjoy the sunshine and glory days at the beach and, and kinda and do some of that sauna in the fall and winter.
Dr. Wendy Myers
Let’s talk about the broadband light. Can you talk about that? That’s something you do at a med spa with a practitioner, correct?
Rachel Varga
Yeah, and there are different forms of intense pulse light on the market. I’m not gonna say any specific brands here on the show. I do teach for a number of the different medical device companies, so I’m very familiar with all the tech, but I’m not gonna say any specific names. One of the things I wanna mention is we are in the era of the lazy laser technician. That’s why sometimes if you’ve gone to a practitioner also for a neuromodulator treatment to soften lines, then browse around the eyes, sometimes your results can be different from one practitioner to another. Some practitioners aren’t going to go as close to the eyes as they could or go to extend on the side of the neck and to the back of the neck. They’ll just do a strip down the front. I’ve actually seen this in someone who had a laser many times, and I could literally see where that practitioner stopped on the side.
Dr. Wendy Myers
There are so many Groupons and so much marketing people are doing to fill their clinics, fill their med spa clinics. It might be a doctor heading up that clinic but you’re working with someone that may or may not have very much experience or know what they’re doing, certainly as well as the doctor running the clinic.
Rachel Varga
I think really what we’re seeing now is the shift, especially with my generation, pretty sure I’m a millennial, but what we’re seeing with my generation and also your generation, Dr. Wendy Myers, are more of us are taking a more proactive and involved approach with our health, wellness, vitality, relationships, living our purpose, and being our best versions. And so sometimes people think, oh, I’m just gonna show up to a practitioner, have them work their magic, and I’m gonna magically look 10 years younger. No, you must do the heavy lifting at home. Purify your environment. Be very diligent with your skincare. I love to recommend at home dermal rolling. I teach how to do this in tutorials, not on YouTube for Bill, Bob, Doug, and Sally to do it wrong and use the wrong products.
It’s a whole thing, but it is great. And then doing some specific in clinic things to address your goals. One of the things I will say about when we are on this journey ourselves to be our best version, our partner is always watching us. Our coworkers are always noticing us, our friends and our kids, right? So, when you start to see these results of slowing aging, more energy, reducing overall inflammation, people will start to tell you this. They’re gonna say, hey, your skin looks better. What are you doing? Or your body composition looks like you may be a little bit. You look great. You have more muscle on what you are doing? We have the ability to ask and instead of guess, make informed decisions and do what feels right for us.
One of the things I will say, especially in this skin, beauty and rejuvenation industry, and also the biohacking industry, is there’s always new things coming out. The bright, shiny object that fixes everything, one thing to do all the things does not exist. It’s a couple of things that you do that give you 1 to 2% advantage or improvement that could mount up when we’re stacking, like you said, to maybe a 20, 30% reduction of inflammation overall, more energy, better metabolism, and functional better sleep.
Dr. Wendy Myers
When it comes to lasers, this particular interest to me, you had recommended me to do a BBL laser, the broadband light type of laser because that’s super effective at getting red and brown spots. It’s just more effective than some of the other lasers on the market. Maybe like the IPS which I’ve used to get rid of spots. I had a melasma, like a dark, big, large brown spot on my forehead from being on the pill and going in the sun and it removed it very successfully. There are a lot of options out there, like I mentioned before, and when I’ve gone to the doctors, the dermatologist or other places I’ve gone, I’m always pitched the Morpheus 8 for instance, and I didn’t do that because it’s really painful.
I’ve heard it’s excruciating. I’m no hero. I do not like pain. I’m like, I’d rather be just knocked out. So I never did any of those, thankfully, because I could have easily been roped in. If you’re not really living on a budget and you just want to try everything under the sun. You’re gonna go with the doctor’s recommendations or the practitioner’s recommendations. My concern with those is they can melt the fat, especially if you’re doing it like under your iPads. I’ve seen a lot of people unhappy with that because it can literally melt the fat pads, which is the last thing you want to do. Maybe it might be greater on the jaw area. Can you talk a little bit about that? Some of the other issues with the high frequency, what they call the microneedling frequency treatments?
Rachel Varga
It’s microneedling with radio frequency. This is a great example of when something new comes out and it takes time for the protocols, energy, dosing, and all sorts of stuff. It’s say, for example, Botox in the nineties. It took a while to finesse how to use that product to get results. And then other versions were then created that are a little bit cleaner. So, there are other forms of neuro modulators on the market, FYI that don’t have complexing proteins and all sorts of cool things. We see this progression and advancement in how products or technology is delivered. I’ve typically had what I like to call, a seven to eight year rule. Something’s come out, it’s been approved, and then it’s deployed on the general population. And then hey, we get to see in real life how people with maybe some forms of oxidative stress and inflammation respond.VOkay, how can we tweak it? Okay, we’re starting to see this. How can we tweak it to make it better?
So, with radiofrequency and microneedling, what we started to see was that right fat loss. That’s related to actually the depth of millimeters of the radiofrequency being delivered into the skin. This is an example of how protocols and depths have been adjusted to give us a result of the collagen and elastin that we want. Radio frequency has also been used for fat loss by heating up fat tissue to create fat cell death. We call this apoptosis. You can use hot or you can use cold to actually tell some of your fat cells to die, but when you detox those weights, your fat cells actually get smaller. So, radio frequency helps to shrink the fat cells. Then there’s also this other option on the market. It’s in the non-visible light wavelength. You actually can’t see this laser firing and it targets water. Intense pulse light BBL looks at reds and browns on the skin, a little bit of water.
Radio frequency is creating this bulk heating to the tissue to tell collagen in ELA to deform, and then we have this non-visible wavelength that’s actually looking for water in the skin. This then heats that tissue and creates a controlled injury to stimulate more collagen and elastin. It really just depends actually for recommendation, how much downtime someone has available, their pain and comfort level, what they would choose to experience, and of course budget. That’s from the non-surgical approach. And then there’s also injectables, neuromodulators, fillers, and biostimulators.
We’re seeing since about 2017, more of a shift towards skin health, which I think is positive and constructive. And then there’s also surgery. Sometimes what’s gonna take care of the upper eyelid, excess tissue, those hooded upper eyelids or lower eye bags, that is fatty deposits under the eyes. Laxity is actually gonna be a surgery, not a skincare treatment or a non-surgical energy device. It could actually be surgery that could provide the result you’re after and also give a more long lasting, durable result.
Dr. Wendy Myers
You are pro doing the microneedling with the radio frequency. I know you’ve talked about it before, it really depends on the practitioner. You really have to be careful about the practitioner you choose that they know what they’re doing.
Rachel Varga
One of the things I love also at home is dermal rolling. We can actually create these little channels of injury in the skin with tiny, tiny needles. It doesn’t hurt. It just feels a little bit warm afterwards. And that can be done at home two to five times a week. There were four doctors, one in Victoria where I’m from, one in California, one in the UK and one in South Africa that basically came up with dermal rolling decades ago to help with scarring and people that had burns and things like that. We can do mild collagen stimulation, micro injuries to the skin that doesn’t have any downtime. That costs a few hundred dollars. You just have to learn how to do it right and use the right products. But I will say that my clients that I’ve supported since 2011, that dermal roll, they have the best skin because they’re talking to the skin with their dermal rolling a couple times a week at home, and then they’re also feeding and nourishing their skin with their skincare and then what’s left over. They might do some in-clinic rejuvenation as well
Dr. Wendy Myers
Are there any other med spa treatments that you recommend to people that are safe?
Rachel Varga
Those are the main ones. Skincare, energy-based technologies, injectables and surgery. But we are seeing the shift now in the med spa industry of the intersection of biohacking and anti-aging science through testing instead of gassing. We’re also seeing more hormone capabilities to modify and modulate hormones, and we’re also seeing weight loss. Over the last couple of years, the med spas space has really changed. But if I will share one thing, it’s actually being consistent at home with your skincare is one of the best things you can do.
Dr. Wendy Myers
It definitely pays dividends. I’m doing everything I can to support collagen. I’m taking estrogen hormone replacement therapy. I wish I’d started in my late thirties doing that and adjusting my hormones there. But you lose estrogen, you lose collagen, period. So, it’s really important to do that hormone replacement therapy with someone who knows what they’re doing. I’m doing creatine. I’m taking collagen. I’m drinking plenty of bone broth, which will give me collagen and other things. Any recommendations there, like the amounts and how often?
Rachel Varga
I actually put a paper together for nutrition in the skin. I’m a huge fan of collagen, 10-12 grams of collagen a day and pro consuming one to 1.5 grams of collagen per pound of body weight a day. I do that. I love creatine, omegas, and antioxidants in general. Those are great things to add while also making sure that you are eating for your DNA and your epigenetics.
Dr. Wendy Myers
I think liver care is so important. That’s where the role of detoxification comes in and doing coffee enemas and liver flushes and liver supportive herbs, liver supportive foods, and not eating foods that destroy your liver because whatever your liver isn’t able to process, a lot of that stuff will come out through the skin. I see that in my own face. I’ve had a period, maybe a couple months, I didn’t do coffee enemas and my skin became completely clogged with blackheads in my T-zone. I thought, wow, that’s really interesting. And then I started doing them again and my face completely cleared up and, and I was like, wow, okay, I’m sold. I know that if I do coffee enemas, I’m gonna have much better skin than if I don’t. Infrared sauna does wonders on your skin as well, getting on that microcirculation to your skin. Can you expand on any of that?
Rachel Varga
The biggest thing for microcirculation is actually reduction of exposure to wireless cellular radiation or EMFs. I published this in my paper. We can look at the skin using speckle contrast photography, and when we’re on our phone for five minutes, we’re actually getting a decrease in blood flow to our skin. So, getting outside and grounding 30 to 45 minutes a day. I like to use the PEMF mat. I don’t use my technologies plugged in either. So again, living this more peaceful, grounded lifestyle has very physical and visible benefits to the skin. But yeah, if your gut’s off, your skin’s gonna show you that something’s off a couple weeks later.
Dr. Wendy Myers
I’m a big fan of the pimp mats also. I have a QRS mat and I use it religiously twice a day. It made such a huge difference in my sleep, and I just feel less stressed. It just reduces your cortisol levels, cleans off all the EMF off your cells, raises your cell voltage and increases your energy. There’s just so many benefits. I think they’re so foundational in so many ways, and it’s definitely a huge part of my health routine, for sure. Let’s talk about your skincare line. A few months ago, you came out with your own skincare line. I really love it. Why don’t we talk about what the basics are? You have four products. Can you walk us through each one, like the ingredients and why you’re incorporating those into your skincare?
Rachel Varga
Thank you so much and I’m glad to hear that you are enjoying them. I am too. Just a bit of a background, I’ve worked with some of the top practitioner grade skincare products since 2011. And because I’m very discerning about what I put on in my body, and I know the clients who I serve, and those of you who are tuning in, we care about these things, but we want our skincare to work. We want it to be preserved so it doesn’t have bacterial growth, and we want to have actives, but we also want to also feel good. We wanted to slide and have this great slip on the skin, but we don’t want to have all these extra things in them that don’t need to be there. We might not feel comfortable actually eating that product that we’ve been putting on our hair, our scalp, or our skin. So for me, I needed to create something to fit this need. This has been a huge purpose and mission and goal of mine for a number of years. I spent actually a few years in the research and development phase and worked with a few different formulations. It’s not quite where I needed to be.
And then I was able to create these products actually with colloidal silver as the preservative. We know that there is decades of research on actually some of the benefits of colloidal silver as well, which is fabulous. There’s a hyaluronic acid serum that actually has the hyaluronic acid that is the right size, so it can be absorbed transdermally to help with skin hydration also preserved with coital silver fats great as a MPM, even after dermal rolling, if you’re a little bit acne prone as well. You just want some type of light serum underneath your moisturizer. If you’re looking for a serum that has copper peptides and copper peptides act as a lytic. For the skin, they actually tell senescent cells or zombie cells to die faster. That’s actually what copper peptides can do topically on the skin and also tell the skin to make more collagen. So my copper peptide serum has obviously a copper peptide, hyaluronic acid and the colloidal silver. Two great MPM serum.
47:08 Ads
I want to thank one of our podcast sponsors Bon Charge. They have this amazing red-light mask here that I absolutely love. I’ve been using this for about a month now and I’m really blown away by the results. It’s time to step up your skincare this year with the redlight face mask by Bon Charge. I just spend like 10 minutes a day wearing this mask and it has so many different benefits. It really works. This face mask, essentially, the red LED lights penetrate really deeply into your skin. They boost collagen production, reduce inflammation, and ease the signs of aging. So, if you want plumper, younger looking skin, skin, if you want to significantly reduce or eliminate acne, blemishes, redness, and inflammation, if you want to reduce pigmentation, if you want to stimulate cellular repair and circulation, if you want to reduce puffiness and help to drain the lymphatics in your face and for you guys, you can use this advanced LED technology to revolutionize your skin care by tackling razor burn, dryness, and redness. It’s amazing and really easy to use.
I only have to wear it 10 minutes a day. So, you can do it while you’re watching TV. I just do it at the end of my day, right before I go to bed. You can do it while you’re relaxing, while you’re in your sauna, whatever you’re doing. I really like it because it’s totally portable, so I can take it with me wherever I go. You don’t have to have it plugged into anything. It’s totally portable. I’ve seen a really big improvement in the tone and texture of my skin. I really feel like it’s helped. I have a lot of sun damage just from worshipping the sun my whole life. I feel like it’s really helped reduce the appearance of the pigmentation from the sun damage. I felt like it helped with the puffiness that we can get as well. I really like the results of this mask.
Bon Charge is a red light face mask. It’s really easy to use to take care of your skin. It’s totally painless and it’s not going to heat up your skin or cause any kind of heat damage or anything like that. The red wavelength is 630 nanometers, which is used to reduce redness, inflammation, pigmentation and it prompts cellular repair and circulation. The near infrared in this is at 840 nanometers. It’s the deeper fibroblast cells stimulating new collagen and elastin production, resulting in firmer, plumper, more youthful looking skin. So trust me, you want to get one of these. Try the Bon Charge red light face mask. You can get it at boncharge.com. That’s B O N C H A R G E. com and use promo code WENDY to get 15 percent off.
Dr. Wendy Myers
I love serums personally because I have a little bit of oily skin in the T-zone, so I love serums. I love the copper peptide serum. It’s so good.
Rachel Varga
Yeah, it’s so good. And you wanna know something funny about that? This was a huge eyeopener when I made that. I noticed that the formulation was blue because of the raw copper peptide material in its precipitate form. Yes, I’m a huge nerd background in gen chem, organic chem, and biochem. Clearly it was blue and all the other copper peptides that I had sold in the past were clear. So the only conclusion that I could come to was, oh my gosh, I’ve been selling copper peptides, and they weren’t at the amount that the product is that I’ve made. I felt very proud about that. That serum’s blue, pretty cool.
Dr. Wendy Myers
I think that’s a problem with a lot of products. They have it on the ingredient list and with supplements, but they don’t have an efficacy, an amount that gives you the result that you want. You don’t have the efficacy percent because there’s not enough.
Rachel Varga
Yeah, so it’s blue. One of my favorite serums that I’ve created is actually the Carbon 60 Serum, the C60 serum. This is great if you’re looking for more hydration. You need that. You have mature skin, more fragile skin, you’d really want that extra hydration. I love the C 60 serum because for me, I’m a little bit oily, prone, and acne prone as well. I love it as a moisturizer. I’ll wash my face, put on my eye serum as well, that has some salicylic acid in it, believe it or not. That actually helps to provide tightening to the eye skin. You can even use it as a spot treatment. I use it as a spot treatment for breakout cleanse, eye serum, and C60 sunscreen makeup. But there’s also a light and heavy moisturizer. I basically named everything very plainly so that it’s easy to figure out like what it does, light moisturizer or heavy moisturizer. And so those are really lovely products too.
Dr. Wendy Myers
The moisturizer you have here just says a heavy moisturizer. What is in that one?
Rachel Varga
That’s the name of it.
Dr. Wendy Myers
What is it? Yeah, it’s very clear. Oh, what is in that one?
Rachel Varga
Yeah, the heavy moisturizer. I actually have mine right here too. One of the things I do wanna mention is that the products that I have are six times filtered water, six times deionized filtered water. Most skincare products are just tap water when it just says water. I make a point on my products to say, deionized filtered water because that is important. That is what we should be using in the chemistry lab. This one actually I love because it has this very lovely, sweet, pleasant smell to it. I’m sure that you enjoyed that as well, but what’s really great about this one is that it also has the hyaluronic acid. It has the silk amino acids and ubiquinone, which is great for brightening the skin and also colloidal silver. It’s lots of good things in there and a couple of fruit oils as well. It’s just a great formula that you can use space, snack, chest and hounds.
Dr. Wendy Myers
Yeah, it smells really, really good.
Rachel Varga
I love the smell. I really like it
Dr. Wendy Myers
It’s bright yellow, has fruit serums, and it’s really nice.
Rachel Varga
Thank you. I appreciate that.
Dr. Wendy Myers
Do you have any other products, like a face wash? Do you have any other ones?
Rachel Varga
Yeah, I also have a recovery spot serum. I like to use that one if I get a little neck or I get a little burn. Also, one of the things that I experienced last summer through forest fires, moving, making space for incredible opportunities and, and things to come into my life. When we go through things where we’re experiencing things. I actually had some redness, irritation, and flaking to my neck area and over my throat chakra. Needing to speak my truth and all of that, I actually put all my products on, including the Recovery Spa serum and went on a week. That’s specifically a product, as the name implies Recovery Spot Gel.
Dr. Wendy Myers
Okay, great. I talk a little bit about the problems with other products on the market because there are so many options. There’s so much marketing and all the magazines and the beauty brands and the department stores and they all make these anti-aging claims and they could not be more full of crap. Literally. They could not be full of more ingredients that actually age your skin and damage your hormones while they’re claiming to be anti-aging. It couldn’t be further from the truth.
Rachel Varga
I’ve seen ingredients such as BPA tin and DNA in products that are marketed to kids at the biggest beauty store there is. One of the issues with beauty marketing is that it preys on your fear of not being good enough. That’s basically beauty gimmick marketing 101. You’re not enough because you have some fine lines, wrinkles and pigmentation. Well, you are enough. That’s one thing that really irks me about the advertising space of beauty products. I’m also seeing a lot more canola oil creeping into products. One of the things that I did with my line was I did not work with a single investor. This product line development was completely self-funded by the School of Radiance community. I have full control over the formulation. I know the chemist that makes it. I know the lab that it’s in. And this is really important to me for everybody to know because I’m not about to corners because an investor says, oh, you need to start adding canola oil because that agent is too expensive.
Dr. Wendy Myers
I didn’t really think about this and start until I started really getting seed oils outta my life, but then I started noticing there was a lot of lotions or things I’d used in the past that have vegetable oil in them, or then have canola oil and those are so inflammatory and we just absorb them right through our skin and cause all kinds of inflammation in our body. I think people just have no idea.
Rachel Varga
They don’t. That’s why having someone like me to hold your hand and give you that guidance, keep you on the straight and narrow. If you see an ad or a gimmick or hear something on a podcast, for my clients, they can always reach out to me and ask me these questions. Hey Rachel, what do you think about this? Sometimes I’ll come across something that actually is worthwhile putting more time and attention on, but one of my key aims is to provide information to get the best results for what we do at home and in the clinic, and also what to focus on that’s actually gonna address some of those key needs, and being consistent and keeping you motivated and excited to care for yourself and your skin, which is the largest organ of your body.
Dr. Wendy Myers
I forgot to ask about the C60 in one of your serums. That’s something that I recommended for people to take internally. I take it internally. It’s a very effective detox molecule. How has that been?
Rachel Varga
I actually put that serum under my tongue. In my mouth. I can’t say that on the labeling, but I do.
Dr. Wendy Myers
How does that affect when you apply it topically? Topically, how does that feel?
Rachel Varga
It feels fantastic. I love it. I absolutely love it on the skin. And it’s funny, if I’ve run out of it and I have a week or two off, then I notice it and it’s convenient because I wash my face, do my eye serum, do the C60, do the sunscreen, and that’s it. That provides a really lovely level of hydration for me, and I just feel like my skin, I’m putting something on it that’s actually feeding it, not just to make it feel better, but utilizing C60, which is a super potent antioxidant. And yes, it’s been looked at internally, but I just to say, you know what? Great is a serum.
Dr. Wendy Myers
How is that benefiting your skin when you’re putting that on antioxidants?
Rachel Varga
Antioxidants help to gobble up free radical damage through heavy metals in the air, which I learned from you, that most of the body’s exposure is through heavy metals, it’s actually in the air that rests on the skin. We get the blue light damage. We get UV sun damage. That also molds, right? So that’s why washing your skin is so important. Having things on the skin like antioxidants coupled with mineral sunscreen is just a great way to keep your skin nourished.
Dr. Wendy Myers
And it makes so much sense to use something like vitamin C serums. Those tend to go bad pretty quickly. But there’s also the C60. It makes so much sense, it doesn’t degrade. It’s super effective at absorbing toxins that will land on our skin. It just totally makes sense to put that in skincare.
Rachel Varga
That’s what I thought too. It doesn’t taste the best, but there’s nothing in it to make the products taste better or smell better, with the exception of the heavy moisturizer that’s got just good things in it, that just by chance makes it smell great. But that’s also one of the other things I didn’t want to put fragrances in my products because a lot of my highly discerning clients are just sensitive to things like that. Fragrances are ballets.
Dr. Wendy Myers
Let’s talk about that for a second because every product on the market has fragrance. I almost have never seen products that just have essential oils in them. Maybe a couple health food stores and things like that, but they always have fragrance.They always have parabens, which are preservatives. They always have phthalates in one form or another. Can you talk about that, how that harms our health and our hormones? They’re cheap killer products.
Rachel Varga
Parabens actually feel good on the skin. So, for someone who has rosacea, they’re often recommended a product with parabens because it actually feels good on the skin. But we see in the research that parabens topically have a direct linkage to say breast cancer, hormone disruptors, and endocrine disruptors. So, no thank you. I’m not gonna put something on my skin that might disrupt my hormones.
Dr. Wendy Myers
When you think about women, especially me, since I was 13, I’ve been going nuts with skincare. I see my daughter, she’s 14, doing the same thing and really helping to guide her to make the best choices on skincare products but when you think about as women, the number of products we put on our body slathering our body in lotion, everyday products on the face, the makeup, this and that, over time it really wreaks havoc on your hormones. So it’s not surprising why so many people have hormone imbalance, fertility issues, women in their twenties and thirties having to do hormone replacement, it’s not just for menopause anymore. It’s sad, but people really need to be paying attention to what they’re putting on their skin and the impacts of that.
Rachel Varga
We don’t think about the cumulative effects of how we live day in and day out. These decisions that we make, so we can flip that script and make great decisions, constructive decisions, that are going to give us that one to 2% reduction of inflammation, that one to 2% of metabolic support and more energy. That one to 2% of slowing our aging, that one to 2% of stabilizing our blood sugars, right? That over time we’ll have this pretty fantastic cumulative effect. So, flip the script on that. Not the woe is me, I’m exposed to all this nonsense. Just use great products, do the right things, and get really tuned in with what makes you feel better.
Dr. Wendy Myers
Yeah. Fantastic. Well, Rachel, thank you so much for coming on the show. I love doing podcasts with you. We’ve done several before. I adore you. You can listen to those because I know my audience. They’re into their skin. They wanna look young. They want to preserve themselves as long as possible with detoxification, all the biohacking and nutrition. So, thanks for shedding light on the skincare component and the med spa component as well, which is like a landmine whenever you go into your doctor’s office. So, Rachel, thanks so much and tell us what your website is and your social media.
Rachel Varga
Well, speaking of shedding light, my whole shtick is Radiance. How can we show up and be our most beautiful, vibrant, radiant versions so that we can go out into the world, lead by example, make great decisions, have a fulfilled life, and care for ourselves and those who depend on us most in a beautiful, radiant way? So, radiance is the electromagnetic projection of you into the world of how your operating systems are running, body, mind, spirit, energy, the first four kinds of bodies. The radiant body is the 10th body in accordance with Ayurveda. So, that’s my passion. That’s why I’m here to help others find their light, get their spark back, and obviously, I get to reap all the benefits of these things myself, a lot by the way, and those who are in my life. To learn more, head over to theschoolofradiance.com.
I warmly invite each and every one of you tuning in to use promo code Dr. Wendy Myers for 15% off of a one-on-one session with me to go through your customized skin needs and goals, create a plan, and provide that ongoing support to streamline what you’re doing at home and in the clinic. I also have really fun seasonal skin tutorials where I show you exactly how to use your products, facial and product drainage, makeup, hair care, hair growth, hair styling hair for the skin on the face, and the body sunless tans, thermal rolling. I show you how to do it and then also pre-post rejuvenation recovery tips, biohacking, and heels and retinol. It’s seven weeks of just really high-level tutorials to teach you how to become your own skin pro. Of course, I’m @rachelvargaofficial on social media. I look forward to connecting with a number of you. Dr.Wendy Myers, you’re gonna be on the School of Radiance podcast again very soon, so I’m looking forward to our conversation there again.
Dr. Wendy Myers
Yeah, me too. I can’t stress enough that I highly recommend consulting with Rachel. Like I said, I got so much insight, including aftercare, like specific products to care for your skin after you do a laser and after you do a treatment. I’ve never really thought about that or had any recommendations, so I learned a lot. I know a lot about skin. I’ve been studying for a long time, and I learned a lot from Rachel. So, I really highly recommend it if you’re at that point in your life where you’re looking for some unbiased direction on how to reach your skin goals.
Again, everyone, thanks for tuning into the Myers Detox Podcast. I just love doing this show every week to give you guys tips and tricks to help you meet your health goals because you deserve to feel good. So, thanks for tuning in.
Disclaimer
The Myers Detox Podcast is created and hosted by Wendy Myers. This podcast is for information purposes only. Statements and views expressed on this podcast are not medical advice. This podcast, including Wendy Myers and the producers, disclaims responsibility for any possible adverse effects from the use of information contained herein. The opinions of guests are their own, and this podcast does not endorse or accept responsibility for statements made by guests. This podcast does not make any representations or warranties about guest qualifications or credibility. Individuals on this podcast may have a direct or indirect financial interest in products or services referred to herein. If you think you have a medical problem, consult a licensed physician.
