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Hello. Ive been using these method and today is my 3rd day doing WATER REGIMEN only..
I wash my face in night using Cold water.. but in morning I dont wash my face.
With a healthy diet, I do exercise and I drink a lot of water. I think this methond really works for me..
My whiteheads and blackheads on the around my forehead and cheeks,Jaw line dries up.. [Edited image out]
I have flaky face right now. And I hope my face came back to normal SOON..
HAVE A CLEAR SKIN TO EVERYONE!
SMILE! It CAN CHANGE THE WORLD YOU LIVE IN.[Edited imageout]
Ok so quick backround story,
During high school I had no acne. around 20 (now 23) i began breaking out. Ive tried SA, glycolic washes, proactiv, ocm, and retin-a
I have moderate acne, not a lot but when i do get acne holy cheezuz are they huge and painful. Im at ropes end and have stumbled upon this site...I dream of clear skin just like everybody else.
so onto the current story. I've just passed my three week mark on the no wash/ water only regimen. The first two weeks no real break outs and I hadnt really let water touch my face.
The third week I splashed cold water on my face before bed and A few days later i started getting a lot of congestion on my forehead (where i never break out) and now im breaking out on my cheeks (where i usually break out)...the acne isnt very large or overly inflammed but WTF this is annoying. I took a shower last night and wiped the dead skin off my face with a soft wash cloth and when i came out of the shower my skin was blotchy, itchy, red and pissed off looking. this morning its a little bit better but my skin feels dry and of course all the acne.
I need to hear something some kind of hope for this crap because I dont know if i should keep going. I know everything i read says stick with it but I dont know if i should be splashing water on my face everyday or not letting water touch it at all, to moisturize or not to moisturize...I want words of wisdom that come from experience and not of those telling me to use some damn face wash...
Reposted from a few days ago ^^^^^
currently on day 24 i have small congestion on my forhead, one medium pimple and two smalls cycstics above my brow (never have i gotten them there), one pimple on my chin and a few small ones on my cheek.
My skin 2 days after the exfoliation is again oily and dry. im going to let the mask build up again and see what happens... Has anyone here gone the distance?
Day 3
My face...well one particular acne bump itches so much. I'm try not to irritate it or scratch it, I'm trying to ignore it.....My face is pretty oily is some spots. Today is my day three. It's actually night time right now. I'm about to go to sleep. But I'm not just doing this no face wash thing. Tomorrow I'm going to start a 10 day water and green tea no sugar, just plain green tea and water fast. Every 10 days your skin regenerates. I'm hoping with the 10 day fast plus this no washing the face thing. My face will clear up so fast I won't need to go the full 30days. I ate a lot tonight, some things I ate were oily. The oily stuff I ate instantly made my face even more oily. Yeah, it's gross, but I'm excited and will continue to post every night and let you how the fasting and no face wash/ no water thing is going. I know if I do this publicly, I will feel like a failure if I give up half way. Tomorrow is Friday, so here I go~
Day 4 morning,
I will post again at night, but I to post about this. One thing is my complexion is a lot better around my check area. Like my face is finally realizing that it needs to absorb the sebum and not just let it stay on the out side of my face. 2nd thing is I'm still full from yesterday. 3rd, i went to sleep with two scabs on my face from previous picking, they fell off. But I don't pick my pimples anymore. It's really really really bad. Your face is an organ just like any other organ. You would pick at your liver or you heart...mostly because it's inside, but you shouldn't pick at you face either. I'm learning more and more that your face can heal itself.
Hi Paolo. I don't really post here anymore (not since 2011 I believe?) but I do creep the forums sometimes and more regularly now that I'm posting my progress on my own blog with going Caveman. I was previously water-only since 2011 and I experienced congestion on my forehead and chin and dehydration. My acne cleared up but since maybe the summer my skin started getting oilier-looking and more congested on my forehead so for the last ~3 weeks I've been on no-wash. I'm not strict about it, my mantra is basically "don't wash your face on purpose" so I basically just ignore my face. Whatever water gets on it while showering (not usually a lot, more so in the form of minor splashing or sprays of water) is what constitutes a washing for me, then I pat my face down. I rubbed my face down a couple of times and it definitely did make my face oilier-looking, and made my marks look much worse for a day (in my opinion). I assume I might keep doing that as I see fit, and hopefully it will need to be done less and less. I do find that exfoliating like that results in me being more likely to break out as it definitely irritates my face.
But basically, my advice to you would be to stop over-analyzing it and to not over-think your actions. Follow your intuition, but if you are determined to stick to a product-free routine then keep those instincts within this type of routine. So I'd not say moisturize unless you feel that it really is required. But my face felt really uncomfortable when I first went water-only and it eventually settled down.
I've done Caveman off and off in 2010-11 and was water-only (rinsing once a day or less) since 2011, so I definitely have some experience with this. I have 2 zits rihgt now from picking and from using lotion on my body, but otherwise things are getting better for the most part. It's just the clogging that I have to wait out. I check back regularly enough so if you need further advice or whatever feel free to post 
Morning of day 5
My face really that one bump really really itches, and it's a pretty good sized white head right now. I'm not going to pop it. It would be so easy to though, I'm just going to let my face do it's thing. I will let it heal naturally!!
Update, that white head, I can totally tell is drying out quite well on it's own. It's a little gray in color and as long as I don't mess with it, I'm sure it will heal! I'm so glad I'm doing this!!! I hope I can finish this!
im getting big nodules and cysts (4 total) i think this is diet related and im going to cut out dair, gluten and lower my sugar intake.
i dont have small acne or a lot of it. just in different parts of my face there are big red nodules ( one on my left temple and the other on mr right jaw line and one forming on my chin a little below my lip) . Im not ready to use benzoyl peroxide,antibiotics or retin-a
adult acne isnt something you grow out of. i think its something happening internally or topically and i know for my case it isnt topically because its been a month since and kind of cleanser had touched it.
This guessing game...sucks
Today is day 7
The two bumps I had on the side of my face are almost completely flat. There were also two raise bumps on the other side of my face that area slowly going down. I'm trying not to scratch my face or touch it. The dead skin is helping to heal the skin underneath.
If any of your are having a hard time with this, just eat as healthy as possible, stay away from greasy foods and just ride it out. It's worth it in the end.
I'm almost 1/3 of the way there, I can't give up now!!
Sorry for reopening an old thread, but...
I read this thread over a year ago. I had been struggling with very bad acne for 5 years up to that point. I had tried every cleanser known to man ranging from neutrogena to johnson&johnson to LUSH products to actual lemons/potatoes/tomatoes/etc... each for ~3 months at a time.
My conclusion: Holy mother of god, this (not washing face) works I tell you. It really, really works.
Oil and dirt are GOOD, beautiful things! They're both completely natural: we are literally coded to exist in a harmony with them, so don't worry about them! They've both had a lot of contact with my face (I'm an athlete so I know a lot about that sweat/oil/dirt in my face). What we should be worried about is the unnatural environment we're putting our skin in when we touch any cleanser (natural or unnatural) to our face.
This worked for me. Thank you so much. To those still struggling: hang in there because it will get better!!! There are plenty of people out here who have been through it!
Summary: Eat raw, organic food. Drink water (nothing else). Have a good source of fermented vegetables/fruits that you can eat every day. Go outside into the sunlight. Stop fighting dirt/oil and live in harmony with it: wash it off with plain water. Watch your acne disappear permanently.
Oil and dirt are GOOD, beautiful things! They're both completely natural: we are literally coded to exist in a harmony with them, so don't worry about them! They've both had a lot of contact with my face (I'm an athlete so I know a lot about that sweat/oil/dirt in my face). What we should be worried about is the unnatural environment we're putting our skin in when we touch any cleanser (natural or unnatural) to our face.
GOOD LORD, I can't stress this enough.
Days 6, my skin has never looked better. I am going to do this for 1 mounth and see how it works. I started to realise that this IS the cure for my acne after 3-4 days where my skin changed DRAMATICLY (sorry for bad english lol) and i thought to myself. THIS is the reason why my face clears up when im at festivals! I am not washing my fucking face!
I will come back and give you guys and update after week 2 i think.
BTW: i use nothing at all. I dont wash or anything
I just want to thank everyone who contributed to this topic. I stopped washing my face, and after almost 2 months, my terrible acne is almost completely gone. My face is the same color as my neck and it never gets shiny or oily. I did modify it just a little bit to suit my needs. But anyway, THANK YOU!! 
Hi all
I have just started this about two weeks ago and thought I would share progress.
First, some background: I'm 29, male, and haven't had acne or pimples since I was around 20. When I was about 14 I started to get them and that's when I started using cleansers. I can't remember what I did before then, my skin just was just never on my mind (oh how good it was to be a kid), I probably just used water or soap.
Anyway, I never really tried to go back to just soap and I had read that using it on your face is bad anyway. So I continued using acne cleansers for years after I probably didn't need to use them. My skin then became unbearably dry about 2-3 years ago and since then I've been through different cleansers and routines numbering in the tens. Most of them didn't make my skin feel any better.
Earlier this year I thought all these chemicals were no good for me and I heard about Dr. Bronner's (DB) which I started using. It was no less drying but my skin has felt and looked better than it had in those 2-3 years. I would follow up cleansing with just the Lavender Coconut Lotion.
However, the dryness was still not something I was happy with, so that's why I have since tried doing away with everything.
I'm not trying no water yet or at all. I've been splashing my face with water daily (in the shower) and a little massage to loosen/remove any top-level grime. Two or three times when it's gotten flakey I have gently exfoliated with a wash cloth.
I think I made a mistake by not moisturising. The first few days I did but then I thought I didn't need any, so for about a week I stopped. However, my skin started to feel inflamed (hot and itchy), like there was a lot of activity going on under the surface. Some red spots started to appear too. It was only in one area, just the top of my cheeks.
I suspect the moisturising provided my skin with a barrier and it was maybe fighting off bacteria. Or maybe it was working hard to provide moisture itself, but my skin didn't feel that dry on the surface, but perhaps it was underneath. I have started applying lotion again (the DB one) and it doesn't feel as irritated. BTW the lotion's main ingredient is coconut oil. I have tried just coconut oil in the past but I don't like the smell, and even my partner had commented on it that it was strong. This lotion doesn't have that smell.
Besides that...hopefully hiccup...my skin's been really comfortable. The tone was the best it's been in years (same as neck), but it is a bit redder again, probably due to the inflammation as I mentioned. Hopefully that will repair as I continue moisturising. I think I can do away with it eventually...but I think maybe it was too much for my skin going cold turkey. We're talking 15 years here of at least cleansing and moisturising daily!
I will continue to update with my progress.
DAY 21- no water/ no nothing.
I feel like I should give back to this thread- since it has helped me. I wasn't sure anyone was still paying attention to it though.
Anyway- I'm 33 and have had mild-moderate-severe acne (varying widely) for about 16 YEARS. : / I've tried much- damn near everything I've ever heard about (accutane when I was younger, ProA off and on, BP only, oils, steaming, etc.). I ended up finally getting more 'natural' (only using a boscia cleanser twice a day- with some moisturizer when needed (which was pretty much all the time)). Then I stumbled on the 'Caveman Regime'. It seemed stupid, but it stuck in my head. After a few days I googled "Do I really need to wash my face" or something like that and ended up on this thread. I've read nearly all 67 pages of this post, desperate for this to be the answer.
I will try not to state opinions. I will try and stick to facts and try to answer any questions you guys have.
So far for me it's (roughly) gone like this:
Day 1~3: worsening- more and bigger acne.
Day 4~6: slightly improving completion overall- color more even- old acne healing- not much new acne.
Day 7~10: much worsened- not as singularly severe as first days- but many more pimples- color still good.
Day 11~16: gradual improvement- old stuff healing- fewer and fewer new smaller whiteheads- tiny bit of flaking.
Day 17~now: more flakes (unevenly, yes Islandsand)- a few whiteheads every other day (but small and gone fast).
It is scary, but had more or less given up on everything else (including life in general)- so had nothing to lose. Almostclear- I would say this doesn't totally work for hormonal acne (if you're young still). But it is a good general rule. The point is to remove all irritation (which can be too much water too) and allow the skin to build up it's natural barrier again (~27 days for the new skin cells to travel up).
I could go on and on, but for now will leave it at that.
what if your acne is non-inflammed and you get trapped oil beneath the skin?
Sorry for lagging on this. I checked every day for about a week and there was nothing.
Anyways- 2 parts, as I see it:
1. Acne is by it's nature an inflammation- even if it appears not red. I took this from wikipedia article on 'inflammation': "Inflammation is a protective attempt by the organism to remove the injurious stimuli and to initiate the healing process." Therefore as acne is a response to trapped oil and bacteria within the skin- inflammation is necessarily a part of it- and so 'non-inflammed acne' isn't a thing. I think you may mean like whiteheads though- which in my experience are a less serious (less intense) reaction.
2. What I've learned about oil and my skin is interesting. A few things first:
-Acne has 2 parts- oil (sebum) and bacteria- which mix
-Oil is always going to be present- as is bacteria (the good bacteria though helps to keep the harmful bacteria at bay (by consuming the same food and by creating a slightly acidic atmosphere through its waste (poop))
-It's very true what everyone says about dry skin produces more oil.
Before starting this (I'm about 1 1/2 months in now) my outermost layer of skin was really damaged. So the thing that I was doing was keeping the outermost layer damaged and thin + killing (twice a day) all the harmful and beneficial bacteria + causing an increase in oil production. It was the perfect storm! The harmful bacteria came anyway, mixed with the excess oil and immediately was able to get under my skin. My skin was about as bad as it has ever been.
I was a mess, but now I can say, officially, as someone who has SUFFERED (insanely suffered) with acne for about 16 years- this 'method' works. It makes sense and it works. I am, now, in the process (at 33) of wondering what to actually do with my life now that I have it. : D BTW- a 'shout out' to Waterwater- if you ever see this- the next blunts on me.
I hope this helped. Fire any more questions at me if you like. I spend a lot of time alone- and research and have tried A LOT. Peace.