Hello I am new to this forum but my name is Garrick. I was perviously on accutane and thought I would share my experience with you all so other people on accutane or thinking about it know they are not alone. This is actually my script from a YouTube video I made but as I am new to this forum I am not sure on the rules of posting links to other sites. If you would like to watch the video instead of reading you can l watch it here.

I'm going to break this up into sections the first I'm going to talk about my dose how long I was on and when I started seeing improvements, then into side effects, products I used while on accutane, and then just my overall thoughts post accutane.

DOSE

My course was originally suppose to be for 5 months and I ended up going 1 extra month to have 6 months overall. I started day 1 talking 2 40 milagrams pills twice a day. So 80 milagrams overall and I think that's the highest dosage they prescribe. My dosage never changed threw out the 6 months. I started on June 21st and ended in December.

The beginning of my cycle I had a face full of pimples, zits, white heads it hurt to touch and it looked painful. There wasn't a spot on my face that didn't have a pimple on it. About 10 days in I got the initial break out and with it came more acne I got cystic acne all around my jaw line and become really painful even to clean my face and dry it off with a towel. And over the next two months nothing really improved I was still getting new active acne probably on a daily bases. Around the 3rd month I was on it new acne stopped forming. The mace u had started to heal and clear but as my face cleared I started get acne on my neck and my back. The time the 4th month came my face was almost all clear but there was still acne on my back and neck. My neck acne was cystic and red but started to clear and by month 5 my derm and I decided I would do another month. In that last month my back cleared completely as my neck and I finished my cycle out.

SIDE EFFECTS

Besides being completely dried out in my face. While on accutane the first side effect i had was dry lips which happened within the second week which is very usual and happens in almost everyone it sucks but it's one of the easiest to deal with. About a month in my face started becoming red every once all the acne was gone my face stayed red it looked like I had been sunburned all the time but only in my face. Even now a month after accutane my face still is alittle red and slowly going back to normal. A month in my back felt like it had dried out working out and running would hurt and even laying wrong would cause me to be in pain. I also around month 2 got horrible dry skin on my arms almost like a rash or egsama and was irritating when my clothes would rub against it. The last side effect I had only happened in my last month and that was nosebleeds I think it was a combination of the weather changing and becoming colder and the accutane drying me out but I got about 5 nosebleeds overall. I also forget to mention in the video my face got progressively more and more red as I was on accutane almost looking like a bad sunburn.

PRODUCTS

So with all my side effects I found relief for most of them in some products.

First for my lips I used Aquaphor. This stuff is life changing and while it is more expensive then most chap-sticks it's worth it. Instead of putting Chapstick on every 5 mins it could put on Aquaphor probably every 45 mins. And it makes your lips feel amazing like they aren't even chapped when your wearing it.

When my back started to hurt I started researching what to do and found the fish oil pills would help. Not only did they help my back for hurting but I think they helped me be less dried out over all. Now this didn't 100% cure my back pains but it helped a lot and was really they only thing I could do for it. I think fish oil is amazing and will still use it.

To moisturize my face I just used a walmart brand moisturizer it's really a knock off cetaphil moisturizer but it does the job.

To wash my face I started off using cetaphil and about a month in I didn't like how it was making my face feel so I started looking for something new and I found a company called CeraVe which makes tons on great products they are made by dermatologist. This face wash is a hydrating cleanser and it really would leave my face feeling better. It felt almost as the face wash was moisturizing my skin as well. And this was great while bring on accutane because it didn't irritate my skin which was the goal because when your on accutane your washing your face more just to get dead skin off and any products that were on your face throughout the day not to fight acne that's what the medicines for and this is something I would recommend to everyone as we'll. and this bottle was about $10

When my arms started to get dry I also did some research and found that CeraVe makes a cream called Renewing SA Cream and it's super thick but will moisturize the hell out of your body. It's super thick so you don't need a lot and I would out this on my arms at night and in the morning when I showed I could feel it still on my skin like silk. If my arms got really dry once I out this on them by the next night you couldn't even tell they were. It is pricy I think this container was $25-$30 but I bought this in my 2 nod month on accutane and still have some left.

OVERALL THOUGHTS POST ACCUTANE

Now that I'm finished with accutane I can say the journey being on it was living hell but have the skin I do now it was worth it and I would recommend it to anyone whose has bad acne and has tried everything and feels like nothing's ever going to work. I did get some scaring on my checks but my derm thinks that over time and with some treatments of some other products they will be unnoticeable. If my acne had ever reached the point where it was again I would redo accutane in a heartbeat.

I've been off for little more then a month now. I will get alittle zit when I stay up really late,drink a lot, or get stressed but they are nothing like the pimples I use to get they are literally just a little red dot the size of a pin tip and they go away within about 24 hours.

I'm going to post a picture of my face before and after and also a close of of my check with my ance so you can see side by side how my face looked when I started and how it looks now.