Why I'm Not Letting My Daughter Raid My Drunk Elephant

Elaine Roth
·5 min read

My daughter asked for three things for Chanukah this year: clothes, books, and skincare — and yes, a skincare fridge to keep said skincare in. The clothes and books were an easy “yes” — they were totally appropriate requests for a 13-year-old girl. But the skincare … something about the products she asked for and the reason she was asking for those products made me uneasy.

She wanted products from Drunk Elephant, Glow Recipe, and other trendy brands that line the walls of Sephora’s shelves — and also take up space in my bathroom cabinet. She wanted them to make her skin brighter and smoother, to tone her skin, hydrate it, and keep it young.

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The glaring problem? Her skin is already bright and smooth. Her skin is already hydrated and young. The products she wanted are full of ingredients — many of which I didn’t recognize and couldn’t pronounce — that promised to address issues her youthful skin didn’t have. And if the products weren’t actually addressing issues, they were either doing nothing (in which case, why spend so money on those expensive products?) or they were causing harm.

Brooke Jeffy, MD, a board-certified dermatologist and founder of youth skincare brand BTWN, confirmed my assumption. In an email to SheKnows, she noted that most of the currently trending products are aimed for problems kids don’t have — like sunspots and wrinkles. “This leads to a situation of all risk with no benefit when kids use products for adults. Our skin is an organ, not a wall, and what we apply to it influences its functions and may actually cause more problems with skin allergy and sun damage in the future.”

Specifically, she noted that products whose active ingredients include retinol, vitamin C, and exfoliating acids are not appropriate for young skin, which tends to be more sensitive. According to Dr. Jeffy, “Use of inappropriate products that are too harsh for younger skin damages the skin’s ability to do its jobs of keeping moisture in, infections out, and protecting us from environmental damage like ultraviolet light exposure.”

My daughter balked when I told her I had reservations, that I thought the products were a waste of money or not appropriate for her. After all, everyone was using these products. All her friends were allowed to use these products. Why was I being so unfair?

The questions led me to the other reason I hesitated to say yes to her skincare wish list. I didn’t want her to buy into an expensive trend just because she saw something on social media. I didn’t want her to make decisions about her body, her skin — the largest organ in her body — based on a “Get Ready With Me” (GRWM) video filmed by other kids, often celebrity kids. Filmed by kids who were mimicking the GRWM videos filmed by adults.

You only get one body, and I don’t want her to think it’s okay to make choices about what she puts on or in her body based exclusively on what “everyone” is doing or what social media tells her is trendy. Or because she’s buying into the idea that something about her needs fixing, that somehow these products will help her reach some unrealistic and unattainable standard pushed by the beauty industry, which is trying to turn a profit from a new consumer base.

Nicholette Leanza, psychotherapist, LPCC-S, of LifeStance Health, told SheKnows that the recent skincare craze among tweens and teens probably stems from the beauty industry, “which perpetuates unrealistic beauty standards” and is motivated, no doubt, by the idea of turning a profit from a brand new customer base.

A customer base that they can easily reach, for the first time ever, thanks to social media. Twenty-ish years ago (okay, maybe more) I remember flipping through teen magazines and wondering why I didn’t look like the girls on the pages, and believing that I could look like that if I had whatever product on the ad page. That feeling must be amplified by a thousand for our kids. They are the “first generation that’s really grown up in this digital age where TikTok and Youtube have replaced linear TV. So they’re getting all this information because media agencies can target them easily,” board-certified dermatologist Dr. Marnie Nussbaum noted on The Today Show.

More information, more ads, more pressure to look a certain way. It’s a lot for a young teen/tween; actually, it’s a lot for adults, too. And it’s hard enough to be a teen girl that I didn’t want my daughter to be alienated if everyone was going to Sephora — emphasis hers, not mine. I also know that if she really wants skincare, she’ll find a way to get it. I did when I was her age and sneakily applying my mom’s blush before school.

Which is why we opted for a compromise. No, she can’t raid my Drunk Elephant and she can’t go into Sephora and buy whatever product she saw on TikTok (have you seen some of these adolescent skincare and makeup hauls?! Outrageous!). But she can develop a healthy skincare regimen, one based on products she actually needs: specifically a cleanser, a moisturizer, and something for sun protection, all made for normal to sensitive skin. And she can go into Sephora and shop and enjoy the experience, while holding onto the truth that happiness isn’t going to be found in a serum — and her self-worth can’t be defined by a lotion.

As for the skincare fridge, well … as with almost everything when it comes to parenting, there’s a balance—and when it’s harmless, it’s fun to just say yes.

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