Hey fellow 'taners,

This last few months have been a rollercoaster ride of an experience.

Let me start with an intro: I'm 29 years old, and have had acne since I was 13. My acne was what you could categorize as mild to moderate. I mostly just put up with pimples until I was 26 and then decided to go on Dan's Regimen. Let me tell you, in the beginning, Dan's regimen was great. It pretty much cleared me up save for a few pustules/papules here and there. I had no real qualms the first year and a half on the regimen. The second year and a half I started getting frustrated with flakiness, redness, shininess, as well as my skin looking textured. I hated the fact that I bleached any fabric my face touched, and through all of this,I still would get pimples. Six months ago, I started getting small pimples on my cheeks that would leave small dark red marks. That freaked me out and so in May I decided to go holistic. I quit the regimen cold turkey and waited for my skin to hydrate before I started a lemon juice regimen...

..and thus began the trip on the Highway to Hell.. My skin started breaking out, first just pustules all over my chin. So I freaked and two weeks later, switched to Apple Cider Vinegar. I read if ingested as well as applied topically, Apple Cider Vinegar was great for skin. I tried it for two weeks and quit because I was worried for my tooth enamel (my teeth started getting real sensitive and I'd rather have bad skin than bad teeth). Now the nodules started showing up: something I had never dealt with before. Holy shit, do they hurt! I decided to go back on to Dan's regimen but more cystic and nodular acne came. My forehead, which never broke out, erupted full of painful bumps. My jawline and chin throbbed from the pain of large clusters of emerging cysts. Everyday that I looked in the mirror, I was greeted with more cystic acne. I became depressed and withdrawn. I hardly ate, lost 15 pounds, avoided people and hated myself. I wrecked my skin..

Okay so I decided to do something I was reluctant to do: see a dermatologist who promptly recommended Accutane. So I took the book home, cried, worried and finally decided,"Yes, I will do this."

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After I made the decision to take Accutane, I also decided to stop beating myself up and move forward. Sure my face looks awful, but it's only temporary. At first, I was scared shitless of side effects.. but as time passed and more painful lesions sprouted up, I realized that I would rather take the gamble then live how I have been for the last three months. I will clear up and look even better. I'm fortunate to have a great support system consisting of my friends, family, co-workers, and all of you on Acne.org. I would be lost without everyone who has stood by me.

Tomorrow is the day I begin my course. I'll be on 60mg from the start and will be on a 6 month course. Wish me luck, and best wishes to all of you!

This post has been edited by rede4bed: Sep 13 2009, 08:30 PM

I feel like I'm reading my own story when I read your intro.

I'm a little different than you, I have been on/off antibiotics for 10 years. But like you, I never tried to get accutane because I was worried about side effects. Then this past February my skin started breaking out exactly like you described, just completely crazy. I didn't change my routine, so I can only guess my hormones had something to do with it.

Now I have been on accutane 10 weeks and have only had dry skin/dry lips. I use cetaphil and aquaphor daily and I am not in any kind of discomfort. I can't believe I put this off for 10 years. It is the best thing that has ever happened to me.

Do be watchful for side effects, but I wouldn't lose sleep worrying about them. Good luck to you!

Hey! So glad you finally have your script. Good luck and I will be following your progress. I return to the derm at the end of the week. I hope to have mine by the weekend. Get the aquaphor ready and I hope you see fast results.

R4B,
Great to read your post...I am excited for your tomorrow. Because I have been pushed back three days to see my derm for month two, tomorrow, I will start my second full month of the accutane. I look forward to reading your posts!!!!
Red

Congrats on starting your course! It will be worth it!

I was running w/ a friend tonight, and telling her about some of the side effects, and she looked at me and asked, "Is it really worth it?". I answered w/ absolutely no hesitation, YES.

Just think how amazing we will all be feeling in just a few short months!!!

Rede4bed...I will follow your progress with intrigue!

I hear you about the sudden way that acne progresses. It can be relatively mild and livable, but then whatever happens and suddenly your face is full of pimples.

I agree with you about Dan's regimen. I think BP can really be salvation for people, and for a while, it was for me. Unfortunately, it didn't last. Even with applying A LOT of BP, I was still getting cystic breakouts on my chin, and I developed milia-type acne on my forehead and the sides of my nose.

It wasn't ideal, at all.

I wish you good luck. (I'm 7 days into my treatment.)

Hi Rede4Bed. Your story sounds a LOT like mine. I also found some help in Dan's BP regimen, but then I stopped because it was bleaching all my stuff. Then my skin went bezerk. You've been commenting on my Accutane log, so you know how Accutane has been helping me. I hope it does the same for you! I'll be keeping watch on this thread. Do you plan to post pictures?

Best of luck!

---Day One (finally)---

I just finished taking my first 30mg pill. I am taking Sotret and am hoping they didn't give me one of the recalled batches. With all the nonsense I have had to endure to get my medicine, it wouldn't surprise me. My dermatologist office has a bunch of twits working there. I was supposed to get a call back yesterday from them to give me the go ahead to answer my iPLEDGE questions but when I didn't receive any word by 4pm, I called them. The girl said they did receive my results but failed to fax them to my derm who was working another location that day. She then told me that he probably left for the day and I would have to wait until tomorrow. WTF???!!

So today I got on the horn with them and made sure that I was not waiting another day. I got the go ahead at 1pm. I answered my questions and drove to a pharmacy which told me they didn't have any in stock. So I tried another pharmacy nearby and they didn't have it either. Finally, a third try and success: they had a box in stock. However, my derm ducked up again and forgot to write something on my script so I ended up waiting for an hour just to get my Sotret.

I was a little nervous tonight with taking the first pill. Maybe since it's almost my time of the month that I'm more anxiety ridden. Ah well, keep my eyes on the prize at the end of the road!

Thanks to everyone who replied! I appreciate your support, all of you. I'm also happy to see alot of people on here my age (give or take a year). George's Sister, I will eventually put up pics but ATM I am self conscious since my pics look way worse than the recent ones I have seen so far.

My apologies if I typo; my computer is being shipped off for repair and so I have to use my iPhone for Internet.

That's all for now. Have a great night everyone!

R4B Woohoo on finally getting started! Damn that I Pledge crap, so annoying! Seriously, you kind of had the run around today, that really was frustrating, I'm sure. I would have been pissed. I have 3 kids, so I don't have a lot of time just to run around to different pharmacies.

I'm going tomorrow to get my labs done. Only 4 pills left, so I better get to it!

Congrats on getting started! I'll be starting in about a week and a half, still in the 30 day wait. Glad to see the population of "older" ladies, I've been reading a lot of the posts. Good luck and I'll be following your log to see how things are going. I'm 37 and this will be my second round. Right now I'm dealing with the stupid insurance stuff, since my insurance has an age cut off of 35 for Accutane!! Unfortunately, acne doesn't magically go away at 35 for some of us. They'll still cover it I guess, after several phone calls I've made in the last couple days, but my derm has to do a pre-authorization for it. Oh well, better to have to do this than pay full price every month.
Take care, hope all goes well and look forward to reading about your progress.

Wow, I can't believe what you had to go through just to get your first box! Hopefully things go smoother next month. Good luck starting your course! I was nervous about taking that first pill too.

I know it's pretty embarrassing to post awful pictures on the internet, but you may want to consider at least taking some photos and keeping them for yourself. Having them for comparison will really help you notice every small bit of improvement that comes along.

----Day 3----

So nothing new to report at the moment. No side affects yet but I have barely started my treatment. People at my work amuse me.. My one super today asked me all serious like if I was having side affects? How his tone was implied that I was going to be hit hard with every one out there. Other people are like, "wow, has it started working yet?" lol. I doubt that.

I have been feeling overwhelmed with having to be on this for six months. It seems so far away and I am nervous of having to make such a long journey on this powerful medicine. It's you all on the accutane logs that keep me hopeful. I just hope this acne doesn't come back; it's been a long summer with it.

Keepsgettingbetter- yeah, iPLEDGE is the biggest pain in my ass. I felt like accutane was the holy Grail that I couldn't quite grasp. I hope next month will be easier

Indygal- it's comforting to see others who are older on here. I noticed you mentioned that your acne was hormonal. My derm hinted mine might be too and I just hope the accutane keeps it from returning afterward.

George's sister- I do indeed have some pics set aside and will continue to take them for reference. Btw, your pics look great!

Lol at your co-workers.

----Day 5----

Yesterday I had the pleasure of hearing two kids talking about my face. I work at a large scale museum dedicated to local history and it's a hit among families. I usually work with the public in the guest service department and often work special events booked after hours. I love helping people out and being amidst all of the action. When my face erupted into the hideous mess it is now, people started looking at me differently: adults would look at me with examining eyes, with an expression of pity and kids being kids would giggle and make comments amongst each other with the vague notion that I could hear them. It breaks my heart because just a few months ago, a person would look at me like just another average girl. I never worried about what people thought about regarding my looks because there was nothing wrong with my appearance. Now I am one of those people who are "different." My supervisors have been accomodating and per my pleading request, they have assigned me out of the public eye, working in the back offices. It's nice, but I am a social person and just yearn for the day that my skin will be clear and I'll have people looking at me without disdain or pity. I get bummed out when I look at pics from just a few months ago when I was pretty. I just think of the promise of being clear in a few months and being out there among the people and it keeps me going.

As for my accutane experience thus far: still quiet, side effect wise. My lips feel slightly dry but nothing out of the ordinary IMO. My face is still a wreck but my forehead is pretty much dark red marks, my jawline is lined with cysts although my left side is better off than my right. My cheeks have some cystic breakouts on the sides but the front of my face and chin are pretty smooth, just red marks. I think my breakout pattern is due to how I rest my face on my pillow when I sleep. I change my pillow cases every two days and stopped using fabric softener about 2 weeks ago. Hopefully that will help alleviate my skin problems.

Oh, and my derm has me using AcZone still. Is anyone else using it on accutane? I'm not too sure about his decision on this (although I do think it helps) so I'm going to call him Tuesday

Take care everyone and best wishes to you all. We will all overcome!

Hey r4b - I hope the accutane starts working for you ASAP. As for the Aczone - I guess you need to trust your derm knows what he is doing. My PA told me I could keep with my skin routine for as long as it's comfortable. I use a salicylic wash and spot treat with BP. She didn't give me any lectures about 'stopping everything' like a lot of people on the board. As for day 3, I can tell my lips are changing and my skin feels a little tingly. Of course, I am probably going to be hypersensitive to every little symptom the entire time on this medicine.

I hope you clear soon. I am sorry it has affected your daily interactions and work. At least you are on the right track and don't have to wait any longer. Keep posting and I'll keep checking in and cheering you on!!!

I know exactly how you feel. It makes me wanting to just disappear, even though I have to pretend it is nothing. Every glance from anyone is like a sharp knife stabbing my self-respect and confidence. I got mad at my parents, because they passed their acne prone genes to me. (oh, silly me). I turned away from my friends when I was having a full blown break out. oh how acne destroyed my life, our lives. Let's get them with the help of Accutane!

So, our acne really does sound alike!

Anyways just read your post about day 5, and I know exactly how you feel also, about not feeling pretty and wanting to hide when your skin is breaking out because I am the same way, but I just try to rememeber that it's whats on the inside that matters, and even with bad skin, it doesn't make you any less pretty when it's like that, then when your skin is clear. Screw other people who comment on it or look at you weird, they are probably just jealous because they are ugly even with clear skin! Don't let it get you down, you're skin will be clear before you know it, and I'm sure you are still gorgeous with or without acne!

----Day 9---

It's been a few days and as far as Accutane goes, it's been pretty quiet. My lips are significantly drier but not to the point of discomfort. I've just been applying Aquaphor periodically. My other side a
effect is dry mouth. I have cotton mouth and keep wanting to drink more water. My skin is a little
drier and itchy at times but then again, none of these are a bother.

My derm's office never ceases to amaze me. They called this morning to tell me that my blood test came out normal. While I had them on the phone, I asked if it would be possible if I could get a Dr's note for my work to say that my sun exposure needs to be limited. The lady on the phone said it would be no problem and that my derm would be in this afternoon and would write me a note. She then said the office would call me in the afternoon to let me know when I could pick up the note. I waited until 3:30 and no call. Last week, they forgot about me so I decided to call them. Nobody seemed to know anything of the Dr's note and I got transferred three times. I finally get transferred to the nurse who was a snot to me and basically said that I didn't need a note and that I could be in the sun all day. WTF??!!! iPLEDGE and my prescription info say otherwise and I tried explaining it to her but it fell on deaf ears. I just want to slap a hoe through the phone.

I'm still without my computer and am still relying on my iPhone to access the net. Once I get my computer back, I will be sure to visit everyone and shout out on their blogs.

Take care!

Wow, that is crazy about your derm's office. How annoying! Are you feeling dry eyes at all? I just started mine (this is my 3rd day) and, maybe I'm being paranoid, but that is the only thing that I think I've felt so far. Good luck with your treatment! I hope it works out for you.

I think it's great that your co-workers are so understanding and that you feel comfortable enough to talk with them about this! I'm hoping to keep my course as quiet as possible when I start next month and am trying to save up a few personal days in case I feel like I need to hide out from everyone. Hopefully you're skin will clear soon so you can get back to working with the public! I also hope your doctor's office isn't this horrible the whole time. If it is, do you think you could switch to another dermatologist who will be more accommodating and at least friendly?

Good luck!