Hello,
I'm a male, now over thirty, and I've had skin problems since puberty. For the past few years, all the acne I've been getting has been in the areas that grow hair. Very little anywhere else, and nothing I can't live with. I do have oily skin, though, which is mostly on my nose and forehead.
This fall and early winter my skin was great. No new pimples for months. I was following a simple routine with a good cleanser, regular shaving and moisturizing. Then a couple of weeks ago I skipped shaving for a while, just because I got lazy. After that, I experienced a horrible breakout first below my nose, then on my lips and finally on the chin as well. I got inflamed whiteheads all over the place, first the head and soon they got red as well. I could feel a burning sensation below my nose and on my beard area.
Now, this has happened before. I've been to dermatologists, and they've always treated my condition as acne. Only lately I've started to think that maybe it's folliculitis after all. The reasons I believe this might be the case are are that initially every whitehead I got had a hair growing in the middle, and after that it kind of spread. Second point is that a dr prescribed Erythromycin out of my request, and it started working in just two days. I've noticed before that it works for me, and the inflammation started to subside in this case as well. My skin was also very itchy, and like I said everything was limited to the areas that grow hair (well, to be precise my lips don't grow hair, but they got inflamed as well).
This is a recurring and serious problem for me. Not only because it's very visible, but because it actually hurts as well. It's hard to smile when the corners of your mouth are on fire!
I guess what I would like to know is whether anybody else has had a similar problem, and if there's been a solution? Does this sound like folliculitis rather than acne, and does it even matter? Or is the basic treatment same for both? Like I said I have a rather oily skin elsewhere, but the area I get the pimples is actually quite often flaky. Could dry skin lead to these issues, and if so, what kind of moisturizer would be good?
Hi there,
I also have the exact same symptoms you describe, the only difference is I never really had terrible acne, my skin was generally okay until the past few months. I'm 29 and I used to shave weekly, but when I grew my beard over a holiday, this condition came. Now I have terrible skin, every morning I'll wake up with one or two or more white spots when my skin felt fine the night before. Also the painful part I can completly agree with, I've had a few on the sides of my lips which hurt. The spots from months ago have also left small scarring.
I've seen a doctor three times now and have been prescribed the same thing just, a week's worth of flucloxacillin and a 2% cream.
When the condition came back for the 4th time and I saw the same doctor a few weeks ago, he told me the condition would pass and to just cleanse/moisturize and be patient. I'm not too confident of this as I feel the bacteria will just keep spreading and won't be under control.
Anyway, to answer your question yes, I have a similar problem but no I don't have a solution. If anyone else has any ideas, would love to know!