October 9, 2006
I woke up this morning and started to make my boiled egg and fruit breakfast with tea when I decided to turn on our T.V. - we just got our cable hooked up yesterday - and I came across an interesting morning news bit on adult acne. Truly, it wasn’t the most enlightening thing I’ve seen on acne but they did have a few tips you might find interesting -
1. The sun makes you acne worse by damaging skin and also by darking blemishes and scars, making them more noticeable. Always use an SPF of 15 or higher (right now my sunscreen comes in two forms - my Boscia Oil Free Moisturizer with SPF 15 and my Bare Minerals Foundation with SPF 15). If you live in Canada, as I did once upon a time, I suggest the Neostrata Oil-Free Facial Sunblock, SPF 30. Expensive but very good.
2. If you have noticed your acne is getting worse lately, your laundry detergent may be to blame! Irritating ingredients will aggravate acne - I use Tide Free or you could try an natural detergent from you local health food store. This is actually something I hadn’t thought of before and it has inspired me to stop using my Bounce scented dryer sheets.
3. Look after your overall health (this is the most duh! tip they gave), by eating well, exercising and drinking tons of water. I must admit, I still have some problem drinking a lot of water, but I try to force myself.
As for me, no new blemishes today but otherwise my skin looks pretty much the same as yesterday, so far so good.
October 9, 2006
Today I just want to provide you with a few hints I have learned over the years for improving your complexion, whether you have acne or not.
Number 1 - Wash your face for 60 seconds to make sure all the dirt and grime is completely gone.
Number 2 - Don’t ever pick at your blemishes or blackheads. I know you have heard this a million times but it really does make them worse and cause scarring - trust me, been there and done that!
Number 3 - If you are going to splurge on something, buy expensive skin care products and cosmetics that are non-comedogenic. Great skin will make you much happier then a designer purse. Unfortunately, finding a good skin care line is not as easy as picking the priciest brand - read ingredients and do your research.
Number 4 - When you get a blemish, ice it down for about 60 seconds to reduce swelling/redness.
So now that my tips are out of the way, on to how my skin is doing - the old blemishes around my chin and jaw-line are still there but I can see that my skin is looking healthier. I can see from using Boscia[/url] that the dryness has disappeared but will this make my skin have fewer blemishes? Well, that remains to be seen. After all, they say a zit takes about 60 days to develop - whew!
For now I’m using the Boscia Green Tea Blotting Linens, by far the best oil absorbing sheets I’ve tried, by the fistful. It looks like all this moisturizing hasn’t halted the never-ending stream of oil that springs from my pores.
As for eating and living well, so far so good. Tons of organic fruits, veggies and salmon (ever heard of the Perricone Perscription? - more on that later). I have also been exercising and maybe today I will find time for a little meditation. I will keep you posted.
Once again, hope your own fight against acne is going well.
October 9, 2006
Last night I did something I have tried to do on many prior occasions - I slept on my back. Another thing that I learned from Acne Rx that friction and rubbing can exacerbate your acne. I have noticed as of late that the side of my face I sleep on generally gets a few more blemishes then the other. Hence, my goal is to sleep on my back from now on - something that, for me at least is more easily said then done.
It is now day two using the Boscia skin care line and so far I have noticed my skin is much less “tight” after I wash it (you know, that feeling of intense dryness after you wash your skin with harsh cleansers). Also, the flakiness around my chin has almost completely disappeared. Well, so far so good, but will it help with my acne? I hope that the most important thing is that I really believe that it will.
I just want to take a minute here to note a very important aspect of acne that many of us might overlook (or at least try to forget about), and that is stress and the mind-body connection. I have believed for some time that you are what you think about all day. If I’m stressed from work or school and/or my general mental state isn’t great it will be reflected on my face. Want to know how my week is going? Just count those blemishes (am I the only one here that hates the word ‘zit’?). However, knowing what is the root of your problem is not going to fix it, you have to proactive. So, in conjunction with my new, more gentle approach to skin care, I will be gentle with my body too. That means no alcohol, no chemically processed foods (like chips, candy bars, sodas (both diet and non), etc.), regular exercise and, most importantly, meditation. Now, don’t get me wrong, I am not one of those people that can just give up all these things at the drop of a hat. I fully intend on minor (okay, and major) slip-ups. Also, in order to be happy, you can’t completely eliminate these things from your life so an occasional treat is fine. I hope you all will be with me, encouraging me to keep it up.
Meditation is something that I have been attempting for many years now (at least 6!), off and on, with no luck. You see, I’m great at thinking. I can over-think anything and I find it so hard to turn off this ceaseless process I can barely pay attention to conversations with others! That is why meditation has always been so appealing. The ability to ‘turn-off’ one’s brain and drift into tranquility... aaaaaaaaaaaahh, sounds like heaven. Perhaps, in prior attempts, I have pushed myself too much. I struggled for 20 minute intervals, hoping to pay attention to my breathing for at least two cycles before I was sucked back into my own thoughts. This time I’ll start with 5 minutes per day and I will use a mantra (which I have yet to come up with) and hopefully I will succeed!
I’ll keep you all up to date on my progress. Good luck with your own endeavors!
October 9, 2006
My first pimple, at the age of 13, was quickly followed by my first acne treatment - a tiny tube of Oxy 10, 5% benzoyl peroxide Spot Treatment. As the weeks past, and my acne continued to get worse, I bought my first foundation to cover my face and allow me just enough confidence to show my face at school - it was Cover Girl Fresh Look in Ivory. I smeared it all over my face and followed that with a generous coating of powder to control the shine and I hung my head low each day as I walked through the halls. I wouldn’t learn until years later that that foundation was highly comedogenic - containing isopropyl myristrate, a very harsh chemical - it was probably making my skin much much worse. For years I struggled, hoping that I would soon grow out of it.
How did I find out about comedogenic ingredients? Well I started to try to understand my acne at age 17 - when I gave up on the idea that I would grow out of it. I wanted to know exactly what it was and what was causing me to break out. I wanted to know the best treatments available and what my options were. My first resource was Acne Rx by James Fulton, M.D., it was very enlightening. I learned, for the first time, what was really causing those tiny red dots of inflammation (too much oil isn’t the real culprit) and why (thanks mom and dad for the bad genes). You can pretty much find all I learned on AcneInformation.org.
My skin did improve using Dr.Fulton’s skin-peeling program, in which you pretty much slather on so much benzoyl peroxide and sulfur that you can until your skin dries out and starts to peel. This is a good thing, according to him, but it pretty much looks just as bad as the acne itself. Of course, once you stop the acne simply returns, so what was the point of all that peeling anyway?
I have to admit though, I have been stuck in a cycle. First, I dry out my skin using Proactiv with no moisturizer until the acne clears and then I ease back on the program a bit, using in only once a day instead of twice. This usually causes the blemishes to return and thus I start the cycle over again.
As far as foundation and concealer go, I have been searching for a good one since the age of 13 but to no avail. I have been through them all, from cheap to expensive, from powder foundations to tinted moisturizers and all of them have failed one test or another (color match?, good coverage?, zero oil/comedogenic ingredients?). One other thing I learned from Dr.Fulton was the oil migration test, in which you smear some of your foundation onto a sheet of white paper and wait for the oil to migrate out (you will see a ring of oil around the smear a couple of hours later). And, of all the liquid foundations I’ve bought that claim to be oil-free, not a single one actually was! Go figure.
So, after getting my first facial last week, I have decided to take the advice of my Aesthetician and stop over-drying my skin! I bought a Boscia skin-care kit from Sephora, a gentle system with natural botanicals (ooooh). And, after years of protesting that I don’t need one, I will use a moisturizer, both morning and night. Here is my (new) arsenal (I was using the Proactiv system for the last year but so far the results have been mediocre at best):
Boscia Purifying Cleansing Gel, Boscia Balancing Facial Tonic, Boscia Oil-Free Daily Hydration SPF 15, and Boscia Recharging Night Moisture
Oh, and I will of course add in a bit of Proactiv benzoyl peroxide cream and some weekly masks to give myself a little piece of mind.
I have also switched to Bare Minerals Foundations, wondering if this so-called “makeup you can sleep in” is all they claim (I have my doubts, but it sounds pretty good).
I will keep you up to date on how treating my skin with kid gloves is working and how I’m coping. Best of luck in your own endeavors.
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