OK so here's what's happening.

I turn 26 this week and I am still breaking out once a week with one to three big swollen pimples. I believe they are deep blackheads that are getting infected. Normally they swell up to a huge red bump, then slowly fade away after a week or two.

Here's what I'm doing.

My skin was extremely clear about 1.5 years ago, leading me to neglect it. After a while I noticed a ton of my pores were black and I was breaking out again. Fast forward to about 6-8 months ago and I was getting pretty bad breakouts again. The dermatologist put me on Retin-A 0.025% and Clindamycin 0.1%, which I used for about 4 months. My skin got really clear, with an occasional whitehead here and there. About 2.5-3 months ago, I started breaking out again with the big zits. I went to my dermatologist and she bumped my Retin-A up to 0.05%. I've been using the 0.05% for about 2 months now, but I am STILL breaking out once a week. I chalked this up to the initial Retin-A purge (which I didn't get with the 0.025%) and changing the dosage. She now has bumped me up to 0.1%, but I haven't started using it for fear of making my breakouts even worse.

Here's my routine

*Wash face 2x daily with small amounts of salicylic acid 2% and BP 5%

*Retin-A 0.05% twice daily

*Cerave lotion in the morning

*AHA 10% lotion at night

*Occasional BP spot treatment for big zits, sometimes I use Mario Badescu stuff but it doesn't seem to do anything for me most of the time.

* Let face air dry after shower.

* Workout 4x a week, play hockey 1-2x a week.

Here's my diet.

*Most of my diet is lean chicken, fish, quinoa, brown rice, sweet potatoes.

*Little to no dairy.

*No junk food or sugary drinks.

*Nuts daily.

*1-2 cups of coffee a day, normally 1 sugar free energy drink.

*Don't drink or smoke.

*Daily multivitamin, probiotics, and omega 3/6/7/9 supplement.

*No gluten apart from what's in my protein shakes and bars.

So what the hell can I change to help? Am I just going through a purge? Should I bump it up to the 0.1% and hang on for dear life? My acne is still pretty mild, but I feel like after using Retin-A for 6 months and taking such good care of myself, that I should NOT be dealing with acne at all. I can handle a white head here and there, but right now I have this big monster on my cheek that I know is going to linger for 2 weeks and leave a dark mark for 2 months, and another one sprouting up right next to it. WTF. Help me. Please.