Lip balm may be making your chapped lips worse. Here’s why.

There is no feeling as refreshing as the first moments after you apply a new layer of lip balm, especially when the weather turns colder and the air begins to dry out. But it turns out, some lip balms are not helping your chapped lips. Rather, they’re making the problem worse.

The good news is, you can nip this problem in the bud by checking the ingredients list on your lip balm. Dermatologist Leslie Baumann, MD, told StyleCaster that balms including hyaluronic acid and and glycerin are the ones sucking the much-needed moisture from your lips. “These ingredients pull moisture out of the skin, especially in a dry environment, and then the water evaporates away,” she said.

These ingredients are called humectants and they only work on your lips if they’re counterbalanced by moisturizing ingredients called occlusives. Those include beeswax, shea butter, and various oils — to stop moisture loss.

You don’t need to avoid humectants; you do need to check and make sure that your lip balm also includes occlusives to round out your balm experience and keep your lips soft and round while you’re at it!

These important ingredients can be found in lip balms across all price points, so you’re as likely to find them at your local supermarket as you are behind the counter of a department store or in Sephora.

(Image via Shutterstock)