I also have reactive breakouts to food (mostly sugars, starches). In my case I ended up having an enzyme deficiency and take creon. I was having other issues  besides the breakouts but I saw it helped with that too. Also, spot treating with dapsone 5% at first signs of a spot has been a game changer. It’s the only topical that’s worked for me. 

thank you for your insight, i will research creon and see if ill give it a try. i have dapsone at home but i never used it cause i thought it was like a retinoid- and im scared to use things like differin and stuff- but ill give dapsone a shot too. 

the thing with me is that before my breakout, i would eat every junk food, and a lot of it too. id eat cheese and chocolates and greasy fried things and my skin was literally perfect. after i started breaking out, i thought that i should cut out dairy and sugar so that it wouldnt aggravate it further, maybe i shouldnt have done that, because now im afraid my body has created its own sensitivity to dairy and sugars, from the 8 months that i didnt eat it. 

dairy and sugar never broke me out in the past, do you think that bodies stay the same or develop a sensitivity to things when not exposed to it for a while?

I’m paraphrasing so i might be getting it wrong but my doctor told me that it stops further inflammation bc it blocks the white cells from clustering to the spot (that creates the white puss in pimples). I haven’t seen any indentation on the spots I’ve put it on and ever since I’ve started using it I haven’t gotten an inflamed spot that would cause scarring because this stops it from getting bigger. My doctor told me to only spot treat and not put it all over my face (I believe to prevent becoming resistant to it). 

I don’t think it’s a retinoid. I personally was prescribed retina micro before and hated it. It never helped with spots and if anything made my skin too thin/prone to scarring. Everyone is different but from my experience im not using retina again until I’m aging or my active acne is 100% gone. 

To the sensitivity thing I personally believe there’s an underlying cause. For me it was SIBO, enzyme deficiency, & pcos. It was kind of a cascading effect with one causing/worsening another after it being left  untreated. 

oh, interesting. do you just keep applying it on the spot, and does it get smaller and go away if you keep applying it?

also, i gave it a try the other night, i just put a small amount on a smallish-medium zit, and when it completely dried, the dapsone had turned this rusty/ brownish bloody color. it was super weird. is this normal? do you think the one i have is expired or something

It sounds expired bc that doesn’t happen for me. Mine is a white gel and it dries clear/a slight white filmy cast. I use dapsone 5% gel (the generic of aczone). Yes, I keep applying it daily until the spot is completely gone and they go away within a week for me!