I know you have heard about collagen. Collagen peptides, the best collagen powders, liquid collagen, loss of collagen, and how it can improve skin elasticity. Collagen is SO important for your body. It essentially helps keep you young inside and out. Let’s get into the benefits of collagen, the different types of collagen and what they do, the best collagen powders and supplements, and more.
What is Collagen?
Collagen is a protein in your body and provides structure and support to your entire body. It comes from a Greek word meaning glue. So collagen literally is the glue that holds your body together. It is found in your muscle tissue, bones, tendons, blood vessels, and digestive system.
Collagen is made from gelatin that comes from the hide and bones of animals, usually cows or pigs. “Collagen cooked down becomes gelatin. Gelatin processed further (hydrolysed) becomes what’s known as Collagen Hydrolysate, also referred to as Collagen Peptides.” (source).
Collagen peptides are what we usually take as supplements. Don’t worry, I outline some of the best collagen powders to implement into your diet in this blog post.
Collagen for your skin
Collagen helps your hair, skin, and nails to stay healthy and to look youthful.
It helps the skin cells repair themselves and increases skin cell turnover to reveal beautifully soft, new, fresh skin.
Within the skin, collagen is found in the middle layer of skin aka the dermis. In the dermis, collagen proteins form together into fibroblasts which help with the new cells growth.
Baby’s skin renewal cycle happens every 2 weeks. As we age, our skin renewal happens closer to 30 days and gets even longer the more we age. You might hear skin renewal or skin cell turnover, same thing. It means getting rid of old, dead skin cells and replacing them with new, healthy skin cells.
In a study where women who took a supplement containing 2.5–5 grams of collagen for 8 weeks experienced less skin dryness and a significant increase in skin elasticity compared with those who did not take the supplement (source).
Once you hit your 20s, your collagen production drops 1% every year. The lack of collagen produced in your body naturally causes your skin to sag, become wrinkled, have large pores, and all this is because your skin is losing its elasticity. We need to improve skin elasticity to have tight, smooth, youthful skin.
Collagen for you hair
While collagen improves our skin elasticity and overall skin health, collagen is great for hair health. However, there isn’t enough scientific research to determine if collagen does in fact promote hair growth.
You might see before and after’s of people who have bald spots before taking collagen supplements and after some time they now have hair growth. Yes, that may be true but there just isn’t science backing it up.
I personally notice a positive difference in my hair when I am consistent with taking my collagen. My hair is less dry and feels fuller. My hair has always grown fast so I can’t say if it helps with my personal hair growth.
Collagen contains amino acids. Since your hair is made up of keratin protein and you need amino acids to build keratin, it is said that collagen can help create hair growth. Once again, it just doesn’t have human studies to back it up, but the theory of it makes sense.
If you really want to read more about the ‘science’ of it, you can check it out here. But just know, our body loses collagen and if you notice your hair thinning or damaged hair, add collagen to your routine, more than one part of your body will benefit from it.
Collagen for you body
Collagen not only helps you look youthful, but also feel youthful.
With age and as collagen production lessens, you can experience joint pain, stiff tendons or ligaments, and your muscles can weaken.
Ever wonder why older people have ‘stiff’ and ‘sore’ joint? It’s because their collagen production lessens and doesn’t provide enough of the rubber-like tissue that protects the joints.
Some studies have shown that athletes that take about 10 grams of collagen daily for 24 weeks experienced less joint pain while walking and rest than those who didn’t take it.
Different Types of Collagen
There are 28 different types of collagen, but there are 4 main ones and each of them has different roles in your body.
- Type I. accounts for 90% of your body’s collagen and made of densely packed fibers. It provides structure to skin, bones, tendons, fibrous cartilage, connective tissue, and teeth.
- Type II. made of more loosely packed fibers and found in elastic cartilage, which cushions your joints.
- Type III. supports the structure of muscles, organs, and arteries.
- Type IV. helps with filtration and found in the layers of your skin. (source)
What causes loss of collagen?
Age does play a big part in the decrease of collagen production but so do some other factors that you actually have control over. All of these factors can produce free radicals that break down the collagen fibers faster.
Too Much Sun Exposure & No Protection is not smart. The sun also causes premature aging and reduces collagen production.
Sugar causes the collagen protein fibers to cross-link, tangle, and interfere with collagen’s ability repair itself.
Smoking is just bad all around but smoking causing premature aging and reduces collagen production
How To Rebuild Collagen In The Face and Body
Hyaluronic Acid & Vitamin C. Vitamin C enriched foods will help increase your body to produce hyaluronic acid naturally which can increase your collagen production in your body. Without enough vitamin C, your body can’t absorb the benefits of a food containing hyaluronic acid. Therefore, your body can’t produce collagen to keep your skin, hair, nails, and joints healthy and youthful.
Bone broth is made up of bones. “Bone broth contains multiple nutrients, including naturally-occurring chondroitin sulfate, which is found in bones and cartilage, hyaluronic acid, found in the synovial fluid of joints, and nearly 20 other forms of amino acids, plus minerals such as calcium, magnesium, potassium, and phosphorus. Finally, bone broth also contains alkylglycerols- lipids that have been shown to have powerful immune-supporting properties.” (source) AKA an amazing thing to incorporate into your diet.
Collagen supplements are a great way to get collagen into your diet but you have to be consistent in taking them otherwise you won’t see the results you are looking for. Collagen peptides are made from the animal hyde/skin. Read my blog post about the best collagen powders here.
When choosing a supplement look for:
- Wide range of amino acids. We need 20 different ones to function properly. The more the better.
- Hydrolyzed Bovine Collagen. It’s the easiest for your body to absorb and the most effective and potent.
- Collagen types 1 & 3. They are the most potent. Anything more than 3 types can be less effective.
- Avoid Marine Collagen. It’s harder for your body to absorb and you never know what you are going to get. (source)
Retinol is anti-aging gold. If you don’t have retinol in your skincare routine, get it now. Retinol, also known as Vitamin A, helps you rebuild collagen in the face as it is a topical treatment to help with anti-aging, discoloration, and acne. It increases cell turnover, promoting new collagen, removing dead skin cells to reveal smoother, brighter, even-looking skin.
Retinol is over the counter and is usually a pretty low dosage. Retinoids are prescribed by a doctor in higher concentration. Retinol can be irritating and cause light sensitivity, so introduce the product slowly to build up a tolerance to it. And only use it at night.
Red light therapy sends concentrated wavelengths of natural light into your skin and stimulates collagen and elasticity. It also boosts circulation and brings more oxygen and nutrients to your cells and tissue. More about RLT here.
Protect from the Sun. If we aren’t protecting our skin from the sun, you are exposing yourself to more issues than just the sun emitting UV rays breaking down collagen in our skin. Use an SPF of at least 30 every day. UVA rays (aging rays that are around 24/7) penetrate through your skin to the dermis layer. This causes damage to the enzymes used to rebuild collagen and they begin to degrade.
Are you convinced yet? Do you take collagen supplements? If so, have you noticed these benefits?
XO, Annie
