My battle against acne, my cure and my trauma.

My Battle Against Acne: 

My Cure and My Trauma 

This is my first blog post... It's a sensitive topic for me but I'm going to try and be as informative, honest and candid as possible.

Preparing to write this I collected together the many photos I took of my skin as I made my battle against acne. Looking at the photos made me feel quite emotional, my skin was bad but my self esteem was worse. I don't think that anyone who hasn't had acne can quite understand how those spots can make you feel. 

I'd never take it back though: I learned so much during my journey with acne. That's why I decided to start a blog. 

To put things into context, here is my skin during my fight. I never took a photo of my skin at its worst but I am forever grateful that I recorded every bit of my experience through treating it! 

2010 - taking antibiotics

And here is my skin today

October 2012 - no make up

The main aim of this post is to share my experiences in the hope that it might give hope to maybe someone. I relied on the internet, especially acne.org for advice and support so hopefully I can give something back. 


My story: 

I had clear skin throughout puberty, I had a crappy cleansing routine, would frequently sleep in my makeup, never drank enough water or had enough sleep and I still had clear skin. 

At about 19 I started getting a few spots around my mouth. It was while I was living in Australia, and I wasn't super bothered about it at the time. I was drinking a lot of beer and living a completely unhealthy life style so I wasn't too surprised.
When I came home to the UK my skin went insane. I had already begun to be much more vigilant with my skin care and it just got worse and worse. Eventually I ended up with 15-20 active spots on my chin, cheeks and sometimes forehead at all times along with giant cycts.  My skin was so messed up. 

Towards the end I'd only have four or five active spots, but the red scars looked nearly as bad in my eyes

Having really big sore spots made it hurt to smile and laugh. Not that I felt like doing that often anyway

What I Tried

• At first I figured that my weight loss had triggered it (I gained two stone whilst living in Aus and lost three stone in two months very quickly on my return). So I gained weight. This didn't work. 
• My friend's mom who is a doctor gave me some sample tubes of Duac which I used without result. 
• I stopped wearing makeup. 
• I drank 1.5 gallons of water a day
• I went to my GP who prescribed me Duac again. And it didn't work. AGAIN!
• My housemate used to have acne and had a massive stash of oxytetracycline which he gave me. I took this religiously, waiting the two hours before and after food etc. These didn't work either. 
• Birth control- GP prescribed Dianette, despite me saying that I wanted Yasmin. I was only on Dianette for 2 weeks when I found it unbarable; I was an emotional wreck!
• I decided that if my acne was hormonal, I'd better try and rid my body of any unnecessary hormones. I needed birth control so opted for the copper IUD coil. This made my periods very heavy and eventually my body rejected the coil. I was put on Yasmin which is fine ; it didn't clear my acne but it didn't cause it either. 
• I used a range of supplements and holistic remedies after reading stories on the org: 
• Vitamin A, B3 Niacin, B5, C, D3, E, evening primrose oil, zinc, clear skin tablets. My pill box was massive. But I didn't actually notice a difference in my skin. Just my bank balance. I was spending an unreasonable about on supplements! 
• Holistic; egg white masks, lemon juice, ACV, asprin mask, honey mask, meditation!
• Diet; I don't think that diet affects my acne. I went 6 months eating for my skin; no dairy, no sugar, no wheat or gluten, extra protein and fruit and veg, would eat avodacos, carrots, oily fish!¦ Lovely things but I found myself getting obsessive, I was afraid to eat dinner in restaurants, embarrassed to eat with other people. My weight was dropping again. 
• I used teatree oil, teatree cream, witch hazel, hydrogen peroxide, sudocrem
• High End Products; After some research online, I decided to buy Clinique's 3 Step Anti Blemish Solutions Regimen (CABS I'll call it for short). This was a moisturiser, a foaming cleanser, clarifying lotion, moisturiser and a spot treatment. Also bought the foundation. I used this to the letter for around 2 months but found no results. The clarifying lotion was very strong, the moisturiser was not moisturizing, the spot treatment was no better than a cheap brand products. I was disappointed. I switched to the bar soap to see if I had better results with that. 
• Actually I have sent most of my Clinique things back; they reimbursed me the full amount! Very kind of them. From now on I will be more wary of the Clinique ladies; a lab coat does not a doctor make!

Makeup
Just a quick note about makeup; a lot of people are surprised when I say that I didn't really wear cosmetics the entire time I had spots. My reasoning for this is that I felt makeup would clog my pores and make matters worse (despite my derm reassuring me it wouldn't affect me). I also felt like makeup looked so bad over my ruined skin I thought I may as well not even try. 

It wasn't such a hard step though, I'd been living in Australia for over a year and didn't really wear make up even for a night out. You might think that's strange but I loved how laid back that was! 

Dermatologist
I went to my GP and said that I needed to see a dermatologist. There didn’t seem to be an end in sight. It took 6 weeks to get an appointment and another month for that to happen!
My dermatologist is absolutely lovely. I broke down in tears when I was telling her about my struggles and she couldn’t have been kinder.

She prescribed Epiduo and Cetaphil moisturiser.
I went back for a second appointment with my photo skin diary and a list of questions, she said that Clinique products are too strong, that I need to treat my skin gently, not attack it. She recommended Simple products.

She also prescribed Tetralysal Lymecycline antibiotics. They taste like shit. After taste is awful, like old old shoes. 

Epiduo: started on June 24th

My derm told me to use this once a day, preferably at night.
I thought that I knew best and that using it twice a day would double my recovery time.
I was SOOOO wrong! My skin went insane. I was expecting some flaking but it just ruined my skin. It was bright red, unstoppably flakey ; if I tried to exfoliate it off it would become red raw and painful and flake all over again. It hurt to smile.
I stopped being an idiot and used as prescribed. It has been amazing. It took about 2 weeks of proper use to see results and around four mouths to get 100% clear. 

I've been using Epiduo for EXACTLY a year now! I couldn't recommend it enough, it's changed my life. I will probably use it every day for ever. 

The epiduo made my skin red raw... literally

Epiduo caused my skin to peel, scab and crack. Hottie

Emotional
Over the past three years I’ve been at breaking point. I’ve shed many tears about my skin; literally looking in the mirror and sobbing.

Fighting acne is truly exhausting, it’s nothing you’ve done, it’s not your fault... And that makes it so much worse. If it’s not something I’m doing, then I can’t change it and it’s out of my control.
I’ve spent so much money on skin products; I prioritise my skin in my budget over having fun.

I used to sit in front of the mirror, painstakingly applying make up to cover my skin, but my skin was so sore and fragile, as soon as I moved my face it would crack. I'd cry and sob and end up cancelling. That would happen all the time. 
If I ever made it out, I'd constantly be checking my reflection to make sure my foundation wasn't flaking away... and if it was, I'd start peeling it off so I could put yet more on. Obviously it would look truly shit. My throat would contract, my breathing quickened and I felt like I'd have a panic attack. Thank god for gin :)

I used to select which side of people I would sit according to which side of my face was the best
It was ALWAYS on my mind, all consuming.

I wrote at the time: Over the last few months I have learnt not to look in the mirror so much, and when I do, I train my eyes not to go straight for the spots and scars and focus on my eyes. It really helps. Taking deep breaths can work wonders as well!

Summary

I am thankful every time I look in the mirror that my skin is now acne free. I actually quite enjoy showing off my before pictures in a weird way... 

I do still break out sometimes, it's usually when I go on holiday which I'll attribute to a change of routine, water and stress. I don't let it get me down though, I trust my epiduo to deal with it!

I'm not an expert so I can't give any real advice other than what I found personally helped me.

Everyone’s skin is different; what helps one person might not help another. It’s taken me quite a while to find something that works for me!

A website that was a great help to me was www.acne.org. I had a lot of support from fellow acne sufferers, learnt a great deal about treatments and remedies and made some good friends. Having people with you who understand what you're going through when it comes to acne is really important.

My skin November 2011

And just a couple more of my skin now (October 2012)

If anyone has any questions about the things I’ve tried then please leave a comment and I'll get back to you. If anyone would like to share their experiences I'd love to hear about them!