I had fairly bad skin during my teens-mid 80's to early 90's. I used the medicated washes, but I knew nothing about salicylic acid or anything like that. I managed to keep the spots under control (just). But, I was also aware that I was developing terrible blackheads. As a guy I hadn't a clue about blackhead extractors, so I kept washing my nose with the anti-bacterial gel. Of course in hindsight I realise that this had no effect upon blackhead formation. Anyway, my spots started to lessen when I was 19-20 but I still had the blackheads and by this stage I had hundreds, it was so bad you could say I had a black nose.
As for people saying they go away, they don't. If you get up close to people in their 30's or 40's you will see that many of them have clear skin but deeply embeded blackheads. My sister was a beautician at that stage and she tried to extract one with an extractor-she managed to get one out, but she told me I had the worst blackheads she had ever see. I had the extractor now so I decided to try to get them out myself. At first I tried her technique, simply pressing down with the extractor-didn't work and it hurt like hell-and I bruised my nose.
Over time I developed my own technique-this is where it gets disgusting, but people are suffering so I'll be blunt. The key in blackhead extraction is to get traction, therefore the nasal flap must be anchored.
1. Place your thumb inside your nostril, this provides the traction.
2. Use you index finger to slightly stretch your skin over the effected area-when you do it, it will fell like the most natural thing in the world. It creates a type of tension which again improves traction.
3. Press down GENTLY with a sterile blackhead extractor.
4. The blackhead should come right out-DON'T force it-just stop and leave it alone if it's not coming out.
5. Dab the unclogged pore with some kind of medicated agent, then dunk your face in a basin of ice cold water-it should help to close the pore.
6. Only aim to remove two or three blackheads every second or third night on areas of the nose that are far apart. This lessens the stress on any one part of the nose and gives it time to recover.
6. Use a wash with salicylic acid to keep the newly unclogged pore clean.
My blackheads were huge and embeded but over time I got them out.
I think Ill try this oatmeal-thing, because we dont eat oats anymore and I hate to waste food, even if its unhealthy:D OCM has has worked well for me, It has eliminated quite a lot of black-heads, but half of them are still alive. I also sometimes (probably not often enough, I sometimes forget to keep track) do soda scrubs and honey-cinnamon-nutmeg-lemon scrubs.