24hrs with Deanne Davies: Good skin guru and mum to two.

Here at Mamamia we are doing a series of 24 hours with… amazing and inspiring women.

Today’s amazing woman is Deanne Davies. As the owner of The Clear Skin Clinic in Double Bay, Dee says her favourite part about work is changing people’s lives.

She explains that it’s about removing all the smoke and mirrors from what it takes to achieve the best skin you can. Sometimes that is about setting realistic expectations and not promising people miracles.  

When asked about her family she said they are divine.

“They are all beach babes, even my husband. They all surf. I have a daughter Maddie who is 21 and my son Pama is 18. I went back to work three weeks after one child and six week after the other, so to work and look after my husband and be a mother and work 45 plus hours a week, you have to be incredibly organised.”

Just as an FYI, you should know that this post is sponsored by Dove. But all opinions expressed by the author are 100 per cent authentic and written in their own words.

So here is how Deanne makes it through 24 hours:

An early start

I get up at around 4:30 to get prepared for the day. At 5:30 I duck down to my local gym where I do interval training. It is really important to me that I make that investment into my fitness first thing in the morning or the opportunity would vanish. Once I get home, its pretty much a case of showering and heading out the door.

I start my day every day with a green juice and my husband makes the best coffee. No need to go out when you have the best at home. I always take a packed lunch, so on Mondays (my day off) I spend half of it cooking, so in the morning I have a system that quickly puts all the salad in a container and other yummy things I’ve prepared and its out the door.

A day at work

I own a place called The Clear Skin Clinic in Double Bay. It’s a very busy clinic. Not many people in my line of work treat skin the way I do. I am an acne clinic, so my week is full of clients that are stressed and usually in a bad mindset. My initial appointments begin with detailing all the products they use on their skin. It shows the amount of products people have and the amount of money they spend on products that clearly aren’t working. I tend to take my clients back to basics; I guess it is my way of removing the superficial and mystical elements from what it takes to have a great skin.

It’s actually really simple. I spend a lot of time listening to people’s personal life stories too. I think being able to blurt out stuff that is on your mind is part of the skin-clearing process.

During the day, I always bring my own lunch in and I have it as I can in between seeing clients. I never sit and eat. I’m not a day spa, so my clients are very understanding as to how the system works. I average five to 10 new clients a week, so every minute I’m booked.

After Work

You know I still wash my own towels. So the last thing you will see me doing is hauling a couple of laundry bags of towels home to wash and dry for the night. I get home most nights by 6.30 or 7.00.

I’m very much a control freak and I wear it well because it’s one way of having a successful business-life balance. Also when you are paying a mortgage and school fees, you can’t afford to eat out, we just don’t have the money. Friends of mine were over the other night and we were all a bit snacky and I pulled out some crumbed french cutlets as leftovers out of the fridge. My friends were giving me grief about it, suggesting that was way above the normal standards of ‘leftovers’, but they soon had their mouths too full to tease me.

Dinner time

When I was younger, I didn’t always have everything, so to me the essence of a healthy, wealthy and wise life was a roof over my head and really healthy meals on the table. Even at my busiest and most stressful times in life, lots of healthy food in the fridge has always made me feel good about my worth, as I said before, if I wasn’t organised with cooking on a Monday and that means a few pre-prepared dinners, I would not be sane.

Since the kids have grown up, my husband and I share very basic meals. Food is a lot simpler; I think it’s an age thing. I’m 50 next month, so a nice piece of meat, chicken or fish with a salad or veg, and Andy and I are in heaven. I will never eat package anything, it’s all fresh, which is easy to prepare.

Ending the day

I guess by the end of the night, I don’t have too much left in the tank. I have made sure I have done everything though and getting an early night is really important for me to keep being able to do what I can do. I like trashy television and magazines, it’s another way for me to tune off and I dream of Bali a lot. I go there as often as I can. The earlier I get to bed, the better I feel. Anybody who gets up at 4.30 has to go to bed early.

Click through to see Dee’s day in pictures.

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