skinnyminnie

I have a trip this upcoming weekend and my skin is just terrible. My mom was so kind to point out to me this morning that she's never seen my skin this bad even when I was a teenager (which imo is untrue). My chin has been constantly breaking out, now it's migrated up to my cheeks, and the part of my eyebrows closest to my nose keep breaking out with these hard, under-the-skin lumps. I actually only have a couple of active pimples, the rest are red marks, and this morning I was feeling good until my mom's comment.

 

However...my face is actually a burned mess right now. I used BP which I shouldn't have but it's the ONLY treatment that has ever kept me consistently clear. Without it I just don't know what to do. Late last year I suddenly became overly sensitive to it. I used to slather on Dan's BP morning and night and one day my face just did a 360 and acted like it's never experienced BP before. I know by the weekend, with gentle cleansing and moisturizing, the burns will fade away, but I'll definitely have a nice new outbreak of spots. I can't even spot treat with BP because the entire section of skin burns around the pimple. SOMETIMES I get lucky and there's no burn, and I basically took my chances last night...

 

I know the only thing that'll heal the burns is time. I'm curious about something though - we have 10% BP clearasil in the house, and I've spot treated with this lately, and I never burn from it. Is it worth it to buy their 2.5% BP at the store? (I've bought SO many different acne treatment products since my skin became adverse to BP...SA/BHA is the reason why I have these lumps on my forehead, I'll never touch that stuff again.) Is it just Dan's that I'm burning from?

I need to add that my mom didn't intend to be mean-spirited. She has the wrong idea though, she thinks that because I've switched cleansers I've inflamed my skin. But I told her that the cleansers I use don't have medication in them. Although I thought Purpose was a problem and last month I switched to CeraVe which after a month I again thought it was the problem...I just bought the Cetaphil gentle cleansing bar which I've used before and don't remember problems with. Plus my skin doesn't dry and flake from it. So I guess for the rest of the week I will follow the strict regime of Cetaphil and Dan's moisturizer only..

The past month and a half my skin (well, to be more specific, problem areas) has gone crazy. My chin hasn't been clear for more than a day before a new crop of red lumps spring up. And my forehead? Well, I NEVER used to break out there, but it looks like Hell. The worst thing is how stubborn each lump is. They aren't cysts. The ones on my chin are either whiteheads that grew to be swollen and tender or little pustules (besides the whiteheads and blackheads) and the ones on my forehead are either large red lumps that eventually shrink down or whiteheads/blackheads that've become inflamed, essentially hard lumps. About half of these HAVE gotten better, thank goodness...but seriously, just a few days before my forehead had healed from its previous break out!!

 

Oh I love this spot on the bridge of my nose, it was a couple blackheads that became this large, red, tender spot...it shrunk after about two weeks and lately just felt like a hard lump under the skin (flesh colored) but now it's red again!! Albeit smaller.

 

The absolute worst is how LONG it takes these spots to clear. What looks like a normal or average pimple that SHOULD be significantly reduced after like 5 days takes at LEAST 12 days to heal for me. Why is that? For example, say you see a friend or a co-worker who has a pimple. Don't you ever notice that it's gone or barely visible within 3 or 4 days? Why does my acne take so long to clear??

 

This HAS to be a hormonal problem. (At least my chin, the forehead I blame on Paula's Choice.) A couple weeks ago I was diagnosed with a very hypothyroid. Within the next few days I'll be starting medication for it. I wonder if that'll help. I'm actually banking on it helping, and if it doesn't then I'm going to hit a new level of desperate.

I forgot to mention the nice, bright red one between my nose and upper lip.

Okay so my chin is predominately whiteheads with some blackheads. Every so often though - like right now - it seems that like 3 whiteheads "meld" together (under the skin) and form a hard lump. This is better seen if I bite my lower lip, you know, pull the skin tight. The area around this hard lump is a bit red, but nothing some make-up can't hide. I actually have a smaller one below a little pustule but that feels less tender, like it's going to eventually become a pustule itself.

The one I had a month and a half ago actually THROBBED. You can still see a slight red mark...the lump itself was bigger than the one I have now and took weeks to go away. It never forms a head, it just sort of shrinks back to the skin. Is this a nodule, or am I correct in explaining it as a whitehead on crack??

My mistake last time was trying to find a head...and I only did this out of desperation because it was very painful. This time around I refuse to touch the sucker. Plus it doesn't hurt. It's just annoying. I'm positive it's not a cyst because it has a much shorter "life cycle" and it looks nothing like the cyst pictures I've googled.

Actually, I'm now wondering if this is a papule. Hmmm.

Here's hoping. Sick enough of the clogged pores on my chin, now I'm getting them (with some inflammation) around my brow line. The spot between my nose and mouth has been very clogged recently too. I've been using an aspirin mask on these areas for the past couple nights for about 45 minutes and seen great improvement in the area between nose and mouth. So that's uplifting!

I'm looking for shampoos, conditioners, and hair gels that are "safe" for acne-prone skin. I plan on going through my beauty inventory and make sure none of the products I use have skin clogging ingredients. Thanks!!!