Stress affects your nails, so how do you keep healthy nails during stressful times? When your body is under a lot of stress due to illness, pregnancy or workload, your body makes sure that the most important organs get the necessary nutrients. This is why it’s so important to get enough vitamins and minerals if you want healthy and beautiful nails. Proteins, vitamin B, vitamin C, zinc, iron, and silicon are very important for healthy nails. For optimal utilization, a well balanced and healthy diet is always best, but you may also want to take supplements to give your nails a boost of nutrition. Below are 10 tips that will help you get strong and healthy nails.
10 Healthy Nails Tips
- Moisturize often – Use cuticle cream, hand cream, or pure olive oil and moisturize often.
- Wear rubber gloves – When cleaning, gardening, or doing the laundry, it’s important to protect your nails by wearing rubber gloves.
- Dry thoroughly – The risk of fungus increases if your hands and feet are wet.
- Use 100% cotton – Socks made of natural materials absorbs moisture.
- Get enough zinc – An egg or a slice of whole wheat bread for breakfast every day strengthens the nails.
- Be careful with the cuticle – Pushing back cuticles too hard weakens the nail.
- Cut straight – The risk of ingrown toenails increases if you don’t cut your toenails straight across. This is particularly important for people with diabetes.
- File your nails in one direction – Don’t saw back and forth with the nail file. Always file your nails in one direction, and only file your nails when they’re completely dry.
- Apply a base coat of clear nail polish – The base coat will protect your nails, but don’t paint all the way down to the cuticle. Leave a gap so that the nail can “breathe”.
- Say no to acetone – Nail polish remover with acetone dries out your nails, so avoid acetone.
If you have brittle nails, you might first want to find out the cause of peeling fingernails. It might not always be related to stress as there could be underlying medical factors causing the condition.