Don't lick your lips: Whether or not you wear lipstick, licking your lips isn't a good habit. It dries them out and chaps them more. If you wear lip gloss, you are basically ingesting it which will lead to a vicious circle of reapplying it every few hours.
It can dry out your lips
If you suffer from dry skin, especially in the winter, lipstick may not be your friend. The chemicals in many lipsticks can pull moisture from your sensitive lips, leaving them chapped.
They aren't meant to be swallowed some lipsticks contain heavy metal compounds which can be harmful, and it is more likely to cause allergies over the lip and depigmentation if your skin rejects the lipstick. There is no proof of cancer as such but the metallic compounds when consumed can cause a problem later on.
Licking your lips when they're chapped will not make them better. In fact, according to the Dermatology Clinic at UAMS, licking your lips can actually make things worse. Chapped lips are caused by a number of factors. For most people, the weather is the main cause of chapped lips.
Does licking my lips often make it pink? No. Saliva contains many enzymes. Licking your lips more often would make your lips dry, so try not to lick your lips and apply a good moisturizer instead.
When you lick your lips, you're coating them in saliva. Not only does it evaporate very quickly to leave lips drier than before, your saliva is also full of enzymes that are too harsh for the delicate lip skin. These enzymes can remain on the lips and cause them to feel dry and uncomfortable.
A 2015 article that examined the health effects of heavy metals like lead, cadmium, and chromium in lipsticks revealed that there were no significant non-carcinogenic health risks through lipstick consumption for the prolonged exposure of 35 years. So an occasional kiss shouldn't be a cause for worry for men.
Many name brand lipsticks contain lead, a proven neurotoxin that accumulates in the body because the body does not exhibit chemical processes necessary to break down and assimilate any amounts of lead. Abnormally high levels of lead have been correlated to miscarriages, infertility and cognitive issues.
“Women who wear lipsticks daily, retouch it more than 10 times a day, should be very careful. Some amount of those harmful metals does get absorbed over a period of time and leads to lead accumulation in the system. Even small amounts going in for a long period of time can be a cause for concern.”
Normal, healthy lip color varies, depending on skin color and other factors, but should fall in the reddish-pink-to-brown range.
Science suggests the lips on the left are more attractive than the lips on the right. They also determined that an increase of 53.5% in the total lip surface area with a “linear dimension” equal to 9.6% of the lower face, together with the 1:2 upper to lower lip ratio, makes for the most attractive white lady pout.
Using lip cosmetics like lipsticks, gloss and balms may do more bad than good. Lipsticks may contain some chemicals that you may be allergic to. These chemicals may be responsible for causing hyperpigmentation on your lips.
Likewise, licking your lips before applying balm can lock in saliva, leading to skin breakdown, he says. Another reason balm gets a bad rap is that most people misunderstand how these products work. While some have mild moisturizing properties, lip balms aren't meant to absorb into your skin like a body lotion.
The wrong color may spoil your mood, but the risk of a lipstick or lip-gloss formula spoiling (or growing bacteria) is low since they don't contain water, says Hammer. But since they're repeatedly exposed to the mouth area, he suggests replacing lip products after a year — or if you've recently been sick.
In 2012 the FDA conducted a study on 400 different types of lipstick and found that 61% of them contained a dangerous level of lead and other toxic heavy metals. L'Oreal, Maybelline, Revlon, Cover Girl, Avon, NARS and Mac were the worst of culprits.
Chronic lip biting can cause swelling, rawness and sores. Repeatedly biting the same area can even cause fibromas to develop.
Although human saliva contains some compounds that aid in healing, the mouth is also home to a host of bacteria that are perfectly safe in the oral cavity, but may be dangerous if introduced into a deep wound through saliva. The principal risk of licking wounds is infection, especially in immunocompromised patients.
However, it is essential to kick this habit because it can result in painful sores, redness of the lips and sometimes even bleeding. Constant lip-biting can also make your lips lose its natural colour and appear darker over time. More often than not, it also appears uneven and chapped.
Licking your lips is a detrimental habit that makes your lips and the area around your mouth darker. Saliva contains enzymes that help break down food, and when you repeatedly lick lips, it can irritate the thin, delicate skin, causing it to become darker in colour.