Feed: Acne.org Message Boards Community Blog List - AggScore: 75.4

hello, i am on day five now..my skin has cleared up kinda alot , like alot of the marks on my face have faded away...im getting little spots on my lower cheeks..but they go away and come back, other than that ,things are going alriight..so far. my lips are stiff if i dont put aquaphor..so yepyep.

oh i have a tip for dry body skin

once you get out of the shower, put johnsons baby oil on wet skin..than pat dry with towel.
works better than lotion! ..im totally going to avoid dry body skin by doing this.


<3

i cant wait for the day i get to wake up, and wash my face to clear skin. =)

Hello there. So the swelling is much better! The crust is gone except in two tiny scabby parts but the rest is really smooth. Can't comment yet on the scarring. Or I'd just rather not until the swelling is all gone. If you're reading this you're probably thinking "get to how the scars look already!" lol But I want to hold off on commenting on those until I'm closer to almost all heeled and can really gauge the difference. But the skin quality is (although red) just beautiful. It feels almost too smooth. I have a few tiny white heads but most of them slide off when I wash my face.

I'm so sick of this processed food allergy! I have to eat processed food to see if I have a bad reaction. WHY? Because if I'm out and I can't get a natural meal or eat something for my hypoglycemia I need processed food alternatives. There are processed foods that I can eat but its such a hard road to take when if you ave a bad reaction your screwed for the next few hours or even the rest of the day. I ate 3 oreo cookies and now I'm suffering from a huge headache and some confusion. THREE COOKIES!!!! UGH. I need to lay down and calm down cause I'm getting pissed off at the dogs and at this shitty body plagued with illness.

It is amazing to me that just knowing that I will be starting Accutane has miraculously cleared up most of my skin. Could it be that stress is really that big of a trigger? Just one lone zit mocking me... I hope the derm doesn't take a look at me in two weeks and change her mind. Or maybe it is just the sheer joy of having one week off work for Thanksgiving break!

So I guess I was hoping for a vast improvement.

So far my skin texture has changed but I am still getting HUGE bumps and puss busting nasties on my neck and face. I will be trying on gowns in one month and all I really want is to be slightly clear by then. I go back to the DERM on the 14th so I am hoping after he sees that there is no improvement we can really get on this!!

Some days I feel so ugly =/ Sad part is I cannot tan right now so with my pale skin it looks even worse. I do not understand how we can treat cancer but there is no quick fix for acne. Doesn't make sense.


BLAH

I'm at week four of my first month! WOO. I go to get my blood work on Monday, November 23 and I have my first dermatologist appointment since I started Accutane on November 30. The updates that I have are that washing my hair every other day is doing wonders for my dry scalp, and the best part: my hair DOES NOT get oily! I love it. Also, I have not blotted oil off my face in over 2 weeks which is also awesome! My chin has been mostly re-moisturized thank god! I have a few pretty dry, flaky spots on my chin still but much better than what it was on Tuesday. I have a painful spot in the right corner of my mouth. I think it may just be really dry skin that cracked open so I caked on the vaseline and we'll see how that moisturizes throughout the night. I am just so excited that I'm on week 4, mostly because I have successfully taken every single pill that I have except one time I missed it and it was too close to squeeze it in before my night time dose. I am curious to know what my dermatologist will think of my progress so far... I wrote a list of questions and side effects I have to discuss with him. I am going to ask him if he's going to up my dose or not and a few things that I've read about that have helped people to see if they'd be right for me. I do not want to start taking vitamins and using products that I read about other people using before checking with him to make sure that they don't mix in the wrong way or whatever. Here is my list to take to my dermatologist appointment on Monday:
side effects:
1.dry scalp (started during beginning of week 3)
2.back pain (started during week 3)
3. knee/joint pain (sporadic, not real concerned about it)
4. rash on the back of my hand (this occurred during 1/2 week and went away)
5. blood when i blow my nose (this started during week 3)
products that other people have used:
1. emu oil for acne scars
2. can i exfoliate or is my skin too sensitive?
3. will black heads clear up (i can already see a pretty big improvement on this)
4. taking vitamin E to combat dryness
5. taking vitamin D for joint pain
6. taking vitamin B to help prevent hair loss
various questions:
1. will you be upping my dose?
2. how long will I be on it?

I believe that that is all that I have to update on. Will post again in a few days

<3

Day five and although I haven't noticed any changes to my acne yet, the nausea after taking the pill in the mornings is really getting to me. Very annoying! Today I had to eat about an hour afterwards, as I felt so nauseous. Really hope this symptom lessens soon as I don't want to give up on the medication.

I still have the two spots on my cheek, they're slightly bigger but other than that no change to my spots. The only change in my face is that it is A LOT oilier than usual during the day. Tonight I've left out the jojoba, to see if that makes any difference. My face is currently like an oil slick, very unattractive, and blotting papers don't really sort out the problem.

I hope the antibiotic kicks in soon!

So Yesterday I had the morning smoothie which I wrote about but then later on I had another one. This one I added soy milk. Bad Idea. I'm a true believer in the glorious taste of FULL FAT milk. The soy added this nasty health drink taste/vibe that I didn't like. I also tried applying Apple Cider Vinegar to my skin after washing it around 5pm. It stung like I knew it would. It smelled at first to which is an automatic given. At around 11 I washed my face again applying a neutrogenea spot treatment gel.

Which brings me to a message I received on here asking me what I use. So heres the list...

First and foremost I take Tetracycline everyday twice a day. Its $4 for a months supply. Its a prescription only pill which helps by reducing my acne about 40%. There was a topical cream she also gave me but I've run out and don't remember its name. it helped another 10-20%. For the topical over the counter front...

I use neutrogena :

1: Rapid clear oil eliminating foaming cleanser
2: Acne stress control power clear scrub
3: Oil free acne wash daily scrub
4: Oil free acne stress control power foam wash
5: The wave with deep clean pads
6: Rapid clear acne elimiating spot gel
7: Advanced solutions acne mark fading peel

Plus I also have clean and clear

8: Advantage 3 in 1 exfoliating cleanser
9: Advantage oil free acne moisturizer

Now I'm not using all of these at the same time but I like to use something different everyday for the most part. I've found that my skin reacts better to different cleansers rather than just one. I'm going to toss out whats left of 2... Don't buy it people its not very good. It doesn't feel nice it doesn't clean very well and I never saw results with it. Also number 1 doesn't do anything really. It just reduces the oil a little. I wouldn't buy that one either. Number 7 should only be used on closed nicer skin. If you need to use it like I do only apply it to acne free areas. Its not good to put it on open acne spots. Number 9 is nice but I prefer the neutrogenea moisturizer because its lighter and yet it still treats skin.

If you were to only try one thing on here I would recommend 5 or 6 both do a nice job with visible results within the first day to first few days.

Moving back to yesterday. I liked what the Apple Cider Vinegar did for my skin. If you read my previous blog you would know that I tried Lemon juice just the day before. Both are worth trying on the home remedy front in my opinion. My skin is defiantly nicer since starting this blog three days ago. Another thing is last night I swapped out my usual milk for soy milk in my nightly cereal. I'm not sure about soy. There are people out there who have bad acne reactions to it and those who have great results. I might have to keep and eye out considering all the denominators have going on right now.

ONE LAST THING: Stress is a big factor. Even if the stress itself doesn't have a negative effect on your skin the things you do when stressed will. You tend to eat more comfort foods, more easy meals (fast food) you also care less about things being perfect so you might do things like skip washing your face or spend more time picking because your agitated or worried. I think that people give chocolate a bad wrap when it comes to acne because when your stressed or emotional you tend to eat more of it. Anyways I'm glad that some of you a reading and happy that I'm getting profile and album views.

So today the swelling is a little down but still there. The redness is slightly faded but not much. Now my cheeks are crusted and the crust is broken. I'm not picking at it and just waiting for the crust to come off as I wash it. There is a little burning now on the skin under the crust and its very smooth. A little bit of white heads are still on my cheeks but again I'm not picking at those either. Just letting them come out as I wash. I contemplated going outside today but it's very sunny and the moisturizer plus sunscreen made my cheeks burn yesterday. So I'm staying in again. More later if anything changes. Oh, I can't recall if I've mentioned this before in this blog but since the beginning I've had slight nerve-like shocks to my face when I've gotten excited, sneezed or have gotten scared (like when I was watching a scary movie the other day.) The nurse said that the needles were not deep enough to injure nerves. But I think that since my face is swollen and kind of raw, the skin itself gets a slight shock from the blood rushing to my face at excitement/fright moments. Ok an update later if necessary.

Later in the day:
It's night time now and the swelling has really decreased. The nurse called me today and told me to apply Bacitracin over the Vitamin C oil for the crusting. When I washed my face midday the crust and flakes came off easily with the water and the skin underneath is so soft! It's like baby skin, almost too smooth that I'm scared to touch it. It's still red though. But I'm so happy that the tightness has lessened and the crusting is falling off easily. Yay for less swelling!