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Dear shei ,
I™ve been following your post and wanted to reach out because it seemed you were feeling a little bit down after your last treatment.
Firstly, I wanted to thank you for posting about your journey. It™s a brave thing to do, and I want you to know that you™re helping so many people by sharing your experiences.
You have a very beautiful symmetrical face, your eyes are stunning, and the scars don™t take away any of your magic. But I want you to know and remember that even if you didn™t have any of those features, you™d still be a valuable, awesome person. Beauty is not measured in the length of you lashes, the smoothness of your skin or the size of your clothes. You will see that as you grow older.
However, your feelings are absolutely valid. Having acne scars is a hard thing to deal with, and you have every right to feel sad about it. It™s a loss that you have to grief and learn to live with. I remember in the early days the hardest thing for me was to see other beautiful brunette girls with a perfect skin because they reminded me of my old self. Someone I will never be. It changes you on a molecular level. Now I check the lighting without even realizing when I enter a room. The below pictures were taken around the same time, the only difference is in the lighting. It™s a pretty big difference, it determines the way people treat me.
I wish I could give you a concrete advice on how to feel better, but I think it™s an individual journey for all of us. Time does help a lot. I wanted to share my favourite quote that usually pulls me back when my mind begins to shift into a dark place.
œFools stand on their island of opportunities and look toward another land. There is no other land; there is no other life but this.
You were made to do hard things, I wish you to find your inner strength and be able to reach your full potential.
Finally, here are some amazing female role models who can inspire you.
Katie Piper
http://enablemagazine.co.uk/exclusive-katie-piper-foundation-rehabilitation-centre-launches/
Tarana Burke
20 hours ago, getsmart121 said:Do you think your outcome would have been different if you had done it today since you had lifted a lot of your scars.
I am trying to understand if it phenol chemobrasion results can be replicated by fully ablative erbium laser?
Possibly. At the very beginning of my scarring journey, lasers were used on my skin primarily. No subcision, no manual techniques. It wasn't until I saw Dr Lim when he combined subcision with laser resurfacing techniques. I don't think I was ready for fully ablative laser resurfacing back in 2016 and Dr Lim agreed with me - however I don't know his reasoning for this. I also don't think my dermatologist at the time was skilled enough to produce any meaningful outcome. Skilled laser dermatologists are hard to come by.
I saw an interesting quote from Dr Rullan's article published in 2004 about the phenol peel
"Carbon dioxide laser energy has water as its target, and after several passes, the tissue is desiccated and cannot be ablated more deeply no matter how many passes are done. This limits its effectiveness on deep scars and wrinkles. This limitation is compensated by combining carbon dioxide with erbium-YAG laser energy and is currently considered the gold standard."
11 hours ago, dorkab said:Dear shei ,
I™ve been following your post and wanted to reach out because it seemed you were feeling a little bit down after your last treatment.
Firstly, I wanted to thank you for posting about your journey. It™s a brave thing to do, and I want you to know that you™re helping so many people by sharing your experiences.
You have a very beautiful symmetrical face, your eyes are stunning, and the scars don™t take away any of your magic. But I want you to know and remember that even if you didn™t have any of those features, you™d still be a valuable, awesome person. Beauty is not measured in the length of you lashes, the smoothness of your skin or the size of your clothes. You will see that as you grow older.
However, your feelings are absolutely valid. Having acne scars is a hard thing to deal with, and you have every right to feel sad about it. It™s a loss that you have to grief and learn to live with. I remember in the early days the hardest thing for me was to see other beautiful brunette girls with a perfect skin because they reminded me of my old self. Someone I will never be. It changes you on a molecular level. Now I check the lighting without even realizing when I enter a room. The below pictures were taken around the same time, the only difference is in the lighting. It™s a pretty big difference, it determines the way people treat me.
I wish I could give you a concrete advice on how to feel better, but I think it™s an individual journey for all of us. Time does help a lot. I wanted to share my favourite quote that usually pulls me back when my mind begins to shift into a dark place.
œFools stand on their island of opportunities and look toward another land. There is no other land; there is no other life but this.
You were made to do hard things, I wish you to find your inner strength and be able to reach your full potential.
Finally, here are some amazing female role models who can inspire you.
Katie Piper
http://enablemagazine.co.uk/exclusive-katie-piper-foundation-rehabilitation-centre-launches/
Tarana Burke
Thank you for your kind words - a lot for me to think about. I completely agree with you, it's hard to accept that no matter how many treatments I have I will never look like my skin has been untouched by acne scars. I can't go back to a time where there were no scars and so every woman I pass who has good skin untouched by scarring I feel a sense of overwhelming jealous and heartache and sometimes it's too much to handle. As for the lighting, that's where it really hurts because you can "pass" and then look fucked up in another lighting situation. It always feels like I can't escape this. Thank you for sharing your photos, it really shows how hard we acne scar sufferers have it. We are more than our skin, that's for sure.
It always amazes me when people can live with their lives with scarring and embrace it. It makes me feel weak that I cannot do the same.
Thinking of using benzoyl peroxide on my pimples - would that be a bad idea? Breaking out a lot and kind of want to keep on top of it.
I got some 5% benzoyl on hand.
On 8/1/2021 at 5:23 AM, shei514 said:Yes I have been having that thought myself. I have attached a photo from a couple of years ago where I have filler - 2019. Although I like the effect it can make the scarring look a little strange which is my concern¦
However this has been a 4+ journey for me - are some scars forever?
Yes fully ablative erbium twice (six weeks apart). The dermatologist at the time told me I would get 50% improvement and I didn™t (obviously).The downtime was about a week and the improvement was minimal. I was super desperate and got my hopes up.
is this a recent photo? under a bad lighting? If so you are good to go. Maybe couple of rounds of TCA cross on few pits, and a filler if you feel so. I swear, most people wouldnt say anything about it. People here a fucked in the head, we see things no one in their right minds would never notice.
oh, sorry didnt notice at first that this is from 2019. You are looking even better now, so you can treat further if you want, but believe me - dont worry about your skin.
4 hours ago, Candy Says said:is this a recent photo? under a bad lighting? If so you are good to go. Maybe couple of rounds ofTCA cross on few pits, and a filler if you feel so. I swear, most people wouldnt say anything about it. People here a fucked in the head, we seethingsno one in their right minds would never notice.
oh, sorry didnt notice at first that this is from 2019. You are looking even better now, so you can treat further if you want, but believe me - dont worry about your skin.
Thank you and yes that photo is in 2019- filler may do the job for me and maybe before that a few rounds of TCA or phenol cross.
We live in a world where people overreact to a pimple or a bit of redness. Ive seen threads where people say they want to die over a couple of break outs. I always think: well then how should I feel?People in real life tell me that its nothing to worry about (my scarring) but then they are the same people who freak out over a pimple or two. I hope people arent as critical as I am about myself.I agree with you we are beyond focused on our skin. Its not healthy.
@shei514 You know I am pretty good at manipulating people, so many times I intentionally putted my self in situations and conversations where I could know what people really think about my skin. Its not like I looked them into eyes and asked them "do you think I am ugly because of my skin?'. No I took time in investigating their opinions. Id say 95% of people do not give a shit about your skin if you are dress nice, smell good, have a nice haircut and have a good manners and confidence. You do not need to be over funny or talkative even. Just be cool. Only people who said something about my skin were people who openly hate me, and even then it were just a slight roasts.
About freaking out about pimples - its like people dont care about someone being balding. I know many bald fellas and I never thought that this is bad or something, they are just... bald, and thats it. But I SURELY DONT want to be bald 
And pimples look WORSE than scars, I can guarantee that. Scars are invisible in certain angles, but acne is visible from everywhere. + i remember myself when I had acne. I was freaked out not because of acne itself but because I was exhausted by treating it.
22 hours ago, getsmart121 said:Hi shei,
How is your skin healing, is it getting better in texture ?
Here is the skin a month post op. The skin is still incredibly dry, waxy feeling. I™m not sure when the skin will feel more normal.
1 minute ago, shei514 said:Here is the skin a month post op. The skin is still incredibly dry, waxy feeling. I™m not sure when the skin will feel more normal.
The skin looks calm down and much less red. Are you using foundation or any other creams. What is point of view in terms of scar improvement?
4 hours ago, getsmart121 said:The skin looks calm down and much less red. Are you using foundation or any other creams. What is point of view in terms of scar improvement?
here are the original baseline photos taken before the phenol peel compared to the photos I uploaded before but I added text to them to make the comparison easier. Same lighting and a bit of make up in both photos.
most improvement comes with the left cheek. Boxcars on the right still present
8 minutes ago, shei514 said:
here are the original baseline photos taken before the phenol peel compared to the photos I uploaded before but I added text to them to make the comparison easier. Same lighting and a bit of make up in both photos.
most improvement comes with the left cheek. Boxcars on the right still present
Looks good. Seems like redness can be hidden with foundation. I think with foundation and a month later you can hide the redness easily about 80 percent redness reduced. Nice!
3 hours ago, getsmart121 said:Looks good. Seems like redness can be hidden with foundation. I think with foundation and a month later you can hide the redness easily about 80 percent redness reduced. Nice!
Yeah it can be hidden somewhat but some of it usually seeps in and the skin gets so dry throughout the day that it starts to seperate and look quite awful lol so I try to wear it sparingly. I definitely didnt think the skin would be like this a month post op. I dont care too muchbut just something to keep in mind.
@shei514Glad to see your skin is progressing well. Do you feel that the subcision was of any benefit in improving your tethered or boxcar scars? I keep forgetting that Rullan actually provides subcision with that treatment! Also do you feel your facial skin tone is slowly matching up with your neckline to the point where you don't need to wear foundation?
Thanks!
1 hour ago, JaysonC said:Why does Dr Rullan prescribe Accutane after the peel? For how long 6 months?
In one of the replies on realself he mentioned something related to hyperpigmentation. or something for fitpatrick 4 patients post phenol peel.
https://www.realself.com/question/california-ca-doctors-experienced-phenol-peel-hispanic-skin
4 hours ago, getsmart121 said:In one of the replies on realself he mentioned something related to hyperpigmentation. or something for fitpatrick 4 patients post phenol peel.
https://www.realself.com/question/california-ca-doctors-experienced-phenol-peel-hispanic-skin
I had no idea before that Accutane helps with hyperpigmentation.
Hi @shei514,
how are you results holding up, more improvement or about the same results as previous pic. How do you view your chemobrasion procedure did it stand your expectations so far?