My meanderings Archives - Dan's Blog at Acne.org

I’m always on the lookout for ways to combat stress. Stress can wreak havoc with hormone levels and, especially in women, can aggravate breakouts. This is because stress activates the adrenal gland. The adrenal gland is where we produce adrenaline, which the body pumps out in response to stress. Well, it just so happens that women make much of their testosterone in the adrenal gland as well. So, that means stress can alter testosterone levels in women more radically and inconsistently than in men. Voila…breakouts. Even though the stress/acne issue may be a larger issue for women than for men, I heavily suspect it is also of real concern for men.

So on comes Oprah talking about how she’s done with endless dieting and declares that her war with food is over. My interest was piqued, partly because I have so many women in my life with food issues (don’t we all…), and partly because I had a sneaking suspicion that the food/stress psychology that Oprah says was liberating her might be of interest to all of us, regardless of our stressors.

So I bought the book she was speaking about, Women, Food and God by Geneen Roth, and read it. At first I read it just keeping in mind women whom I care about who have food issues, and it rang true. Then I read it again, trying to imagine that Ms. Roth was speaking about stress in general. It made good sense again.

In a nutshell: Stress, and its subsequent outgrowths of overeating, overworking, overthinking, overdrinking, drug use, etc. is precipitated by “leaving ourselves” many times a day. She means this quite literally. We become so afraid that our emotions in our bodies will “kill us” that we escape into our chosen method of flight from what is happening inside our bodies. The remedy is to stay with whatever we’re feeling in our body, bringing curiosity to it, and giving it the time to expand and unwind. Feelings, Ms. Roth contends, simply want the attention and room to dissolve on their own. She urges the reader to practice living a new, embodied life in the moment through eating guidelines, and a process she calls “Inquiry”.

If you guys read this, let me know if it affects your stress levels. Thanks!

There’s a paint-your-own-pottery store in my neighborhood called Terra Mia, and we go down there from time to time just to have fun. Well, guess who got design of the week!? Truth be told, I kinda asked the owner if I could be design of the week. I know, that’s totally cheating. Oh well. I still got it! Here’s my bowl:

Are you proud of me?

Hey you guys. I’ve been spending today researching oral contraceptives and acne. It’s interesting stuff. However, I ran out of time before I got to a daily video again! I’ll be sure to get one up tomorrow.

In the meantime, if you are jonesin’ for a good video, might I suggest the one from 2 days ago titled “Dental health does not take a holiday”? We had a lot of fun doing that one and worked all day on it so you guys have to watch it

Have a great evening everybody!

Dan

Hi you guys. I didn’t have time for a video today. I’ve been researching women & acne for the last few hours. It’s a fascinating topic, yet somewhat frustrating. We do know that hormone fluctuations tend to cause breakouts, and hormones fluctuate more widely in women. However, the exact mechanism of this is highly complex and oftentimes we don’t know exactly what causes the fluctuations. I feel like I keep saying, “the bottom line is we just don’t know”, about a bunch of acne related topics, and women & acne is no exception. But still, there is interesting research going on, and we do have effective ways of clearing acne even if we don’t fully understand why it occurs.

While researching cosmetics and acne, I read a particularly interesting study. The Journal of the American Academy of Dermatology concluded that just because finished products might contain comedogenic ingredients doesn’t necessarily mean the product itself is comedogenic. I have always suspected and stated that we can’t fully trust comedogenic lists. Lots of us here have had success with products which contain some of the “bad” ingredients on these lists. In my opinion, we need to take those lists with a grain of salt, while remaining vigilant and sharing our personal success or failures with certain products.

Paul and Joel and I have been working on redoing the web site to make it more collaborative. Picture this…Anyone can post their own regimen on Acne.org, complete with videos and product suggestions. Then the rest of us can try their regimen and rate it. The best regimens will naturally float to the top. We can then program the Acne.org homepage to automatically update to show the community’s favorite regimens right there when people log in.

Is your mind blown? Mine is I am so excited about the opportunity the Internet affords us to share our experience with each other and really boil down what works and what doesn’t.

We’re also working on a product suggestion page where you guys can suggest products to be made, at what percentages, and including what ingredients. Again, the rest of us can get in there and suggest changes to the product until we come to a consensus, or something approaching that. Then I can either make the products for us, or we can ask other manufacturers to get on it!

We also have a doctor-listing page on the back burner where everyone can recommend their dermatologist or plastic surgeon (scars). We’ll probably wiki this page only in a positive direction. For instance, you can send a doctor a thumbs up, but probably not a thumbs down. It feels better to stay positive with the doctors ratings.

I just wanted to muse for a moment on my next intention insofar as acne is concerned. Yes, the Regimen works well at clearing and preventing acne, but wouldn’t it be nice if we could come up with a natural, holistic way to clear the skin? There is something deeply satisfying about getting to the root of an issue and addressing it from there.

To this end I am simply pledging to do my very best to explore options to get us to a place of understanding the root of acne. Scientists and researchers know quite a bit about how acne is formed and how medications can combat the process. Now it’s time to take it to the next level and develop a clear understanding of why this process begins and is perpetuated. I can’t wait to figure it out. I am also going to be opening up Acne.org pretty soon so that we can all collaborate on this issue much more efficiently. Acne better watch out

When I came out with the benzoyl peroxide pretty much everyone loved it. Then you guys gave me the feedback that you wanted non-paraben preservatives. I changed to non-paraben preservatives and pretty much all of us have been happy clams ever since.

Then I came out with the cleanser and pretty much everyone loved it. But then a few people gave feedback that they wanted it more moisturizing, so I added 10% more moisturization and pretty much all of us have been happy clams ever since.

Recently I released a moisturizer as well. Again, at first most people loved it. But now a few people have been letting me know that the current moisturizer is giving them some flakiness after a few weeks of use. I’ve also gotten other complaints about the moisturizer. So I had a talk with our manufacturer today and we are going to do two things to the moisturizer. (1) We’re going to swap out stearic acid for another ingredient. Stearic acid is most likely the culprit as far as the delayed flakes go. (2) We’re going to sap out bisabolol for licochalcone, an even better anti-inflammatory which is beneficial in the lipase process and thus beneficial for acne.

What’s my point? Just that I appreciate your feedback. We’re in this together and together we are going to keep making the best acne treatment products on the planet. To this end, Joel and I are making a form that we’ll put on the web site soon so that more and more of you can let me know exactly what you like and what you want changed. I’ll keep you posted on that.

Thanks everybody!!

I had a total brainstorm moment at the gym today with a friend. I’ve been redesigning the products and they are a little blah–see the attached pic for a rough mock-up of how they’ll look. I like them because it’s handwritten now, but it is bordering on generic. So I was thinking, “how can we get people involved and how can we incorporate a little color?”

And then it came to me. What if I asked you guys to submit “what do Acne.org products mean to you?” artwork. I want to leave the parameters pretty wide. It’s not so much, “make an icon for a cleanser” or “make an icon for a moisturizer”, but rather, “what do the regimen and acne.org products mean to you?” Any kind of artwork is welcomed, but here is what we need so we can print it:

max size: 1.5″ X 1.5″
300dpi or greater
any amount of color is fine
hand drawn/painted and scanned is absolutely acceptable

I’ll be choosing 3 designs for now. One for each product. I can offer the makers of the winning designs a year of free product (12 cleansers, 12 BPs, and 12 moisturizers, and a body buddy if you want one). Sound fair? If you’d like to submit artwork, I need it fast–like in the next two days would be preferable because these are going to print soon. You can email them to dan@acne.org. Looking forward to it!

After being off of BP for a few weeks and starting to see imperfections arising, last night I put on a very generous amount of BP and applied it gently. I woke up this morning and looked almost completely clear. BP is truly amazing. I’m sitting here wondering if I should put BP on again during the day today and I think I probably will. By tomorrow I should be back to completely spotless at which time I’ll go back to my Sal Acid samples in the morning and BP at night. That combo kept me incredibly clear for many weeks and I think it’s how I’d like to proceed into the future. That is, until I can figure out a holistic way to clear acne from the inside. That might be the next project!

Still trying my SA product in the mornings: I hardly even want to say it just in case I jinx it, but after an initial 3 non-inflamed comedones my skin has gone back to clear and quite frankly is looking really good. It feels healthy and I’m perfectly clear of anything active whatsoever. (Fingers crossed that I don’t wake up tomorrow with a zit! lol)

Another thing that’s interesting is my skin is quite flaky, but in a different way from benzoyl peroxide. Salicylic acid is keratolytic–meaning it removes the top layers of skin cells. At first I thought the medication itself was balling up, and I still think it is to some degree, but I now think much of the continued flaking I’m experiencing is simply my top layer of skin goin’ bye-bye. It is a distinctly different feeling from the flakiness I get with benzoyl peroxide. It makes sense that if this peeling is also occuring on follicle walls that the walls of the follicle will have a tougher time becoming stuck together and leading to a microcomedone in the first place.

Wikinomics: I am still reading this incredible book. I am bursting with excitement with how we can bring collaborative Web technology to Acne.org and allow all of us to pool our intelligence. Wow. Great stuff.

Category Archives: My meanderings

Combating stress: Women, Food and God

Big news, um, except totally not ;-)

Researching oral contraceptives and acne

Workin’ on women & acne pages

AcneWiki. We can all collaborate much better soon.

A natural, holistic way to clear skin–it’s on its way.

Please keep helping to evolve our products – I’m listening

Submit your artwork for use on products – free 1-year supply of products

Wow, I had forgotten how awesome BP is.

Is my skin looking as good as I think it is?