Beauty Advice: Gel Nail Polish Help

This week’s Ask the Pro beauty advice answers a reader’s question that loves gel nail polish, but doesn’t like how her nails look and feel after the polish is removed.

Dear Deirdre,

I love gel nail polish and purchased a DIY kit, but I don’t like how my nails look and feel after I take off the polish. I even purchased the recommended gel nail polish removal kit, but my nails look dry, and feel brittle and weak after I take it off! Help! How can I make my nails as strong as they used to be? My nails grow when I have the gel nail polish on, but peel when I take it off, inevitabley breaking and splitting.

Sincerely,

Bummed nails in Babylon!

Great question Bummed! I am sorry for your gel nail polish dilemma! I actually have the same problem. Years ago, pre children, my nails were long and strong, even when my hands spent days in water doing hair. I never used acrylics or tips-hated it. I would only do my own manicures and touch up my polish every other day using a hardener like “Develop 10”. (Wow—I just aged myself)

I began using gel nail polish last year, about this time. I received a sample kit from a new manufacturer. Once I got the hang of it, my nails looked splendid. But in talking to other gel nail polish users, we all had the same issues and we all loved to peel the polish off with our teeth—BAD!

Unless you can afford to redo your gel nail polish manicure every two weeks in the salon, your nails will become brittle and break. And that is not the primary goal of the DIY kit, but for those of us who actually do our nails at home, it is rare that we take the gel polish off and redo our nails immediately, leaving our fingernails looking God-awful!

My beauty advice for your gel nail polish dilemma is this, and this is my advice for many beauty questions: Less is more. In other words, we need to give our nails a beauty rest. Just like professional actors who are in full makeup all week long give the skin a break going makeup less on the weekends, so too do we need to go gel nail polish less to rejuvenate our broken nails.

We shouldn’t use heat to our hair every day, nor should we shampoo it daily and the same concept applies to our manicures, even tips; we need to give our nails time to heal.

Make sure you eat a balanced, healthy diet full of vitamins and minerals. Weak nails can benefit from extra gelatin, such as adding Knox Gelatine to drinks or shakes to strengthen them. This also works to create strong hair as well.

It is imperative to keep those nails out of the mouth, so keep a nail file on hand when splits or cracks occur. After the gel nail polish is removed, use a cuticle oil to nourish the nails, then move on to a clear nail hardening formula, offered by Nailtiques, specifically to correct nails after artificial treatments.

Once the nails feel strong again, then continue with the gel nail polish, but as anything, always use products in moderation. I do hope this beauty advice helped. If you have a question for me that you would like to see answered on Wednesday’s beauty advice day, feel free to email me at DeirdreaHaggerty@gmail.com.