A few months ago I had a baby, and sometime in the eleventh or twelfth month of my seemingly-endless pregnancy, I suddenly (seriously, like overnight) developed the worst chapped lips I’ve ever experienced. We’re talking scaling, flaking skin that could be tamed by no balm. If I tried to wear lipstick, I looked like an Impressionist painting.

After I had the baby in August, all the other miseries of pregnancy disappeared almost instantaneously. Food aversions, nerve pain, nausea, heartburn… I don’t even remember everything. But they all ended with the delivery of my (exquisite, brilliant) daughter.

Except the lips. Weeks, months after I’d been discharged from the mother-baby unit, my mouth still ranged from looking like some sort of crusty European baked good to sporting a permanent Kool-Aid mustache.

Over the course of a few months, I tried just about everything I could think of to moisturize and de-flake my lips. And I’m happy to report that I’ve enjoyed some success with the three products below. I’m not back to 100 percent (I need to work on my consistency. Also, I need to drink more water, because as we all know, good hydration is the foundation for good skin), but I see success on the horizon.

Sugar

It’s been a while since I wrote about my favorite beauty hack, sugar as exfoliant, but I’ve certainly blogged about it at length in the past, so I’ll just say this: Superfine baker’s sugar. I do a quick sugar scrub anytime my lips start to flake up again, and it keeps things smooth and under control.

Blistex Deep Renewal 

This is actually an anti-aging product, but considering my dry, cracked hag’s lips made me look older by the minute, I figured it was worth a try. I’ve been using this during the day to stay moisturized, and I’m a fan. It has decent staying power, so I’m not constantly reapplying, and it feels nice — not greasy at all. I’ve been using this as a moisturizing layer under my lip color.

Neosporin Lip Health Overnight Renewal Therapy