Hey girl, I totally understand where you are right now. I KNOW how badly acne makes us feel. It sounds like you really are trying everything you can. On my really bad days where my acne seems overwhelming, I have to remind myself to not look in the mirror, not beat myself up, and be sure to be gentle with myself. If you haven't read some of the blogs from The Love Vitamin website, you should consider it. There are alot of blog posts about accepting yourself with acne and dealing with the depression from it. Those help me out SO much.

I am just losing it. Every single thing I do for my acne (which has been going for 7 years) screws my life/body up. Antibiotics have screwed my gut flora not to mention made my acne worse now im off them, vitamin B5 overdose has made me lose my hair, every topical fails, cant go on Accutane cos of depression and IBS. Went on an anti candida diet for acne and lost ridiculous amounts of weight- now covered in cellulite and stretch marks.

 

 

 

Please help me, i am at breaking point.

First of all, please relax and calm down. Stressing out about acne only makes things worse - I've been there so many times.

What is the cause of your acne? Maybe if you write down your symptoms and/or suspected causes (hormonal/ allergies/ other) we can offer some suggestions. Definitely go for the non-prescription route...why mess up your body to fix your acne?

Also, anti-candida diets are not right for everyone. You have to figure out the right nutrition for your body. Megadosing on vitamins won't work long term either.

As a starting point, I would recommend checking your vitamin D levels, which are linked to depression. If you are low on vitamin D, supplementing and/or getting daily sunlight will put you on the right track.

Thanks guys nice of you to try and help. I'm on vitamin D3 as it is another supposed cure lol and when I say no Accutane because of depression all I mean is I am highly prone to it so its not a wise option.

Today I am beginning taking lemon juice and hot water in the morning as this is apparently a wonder cure (as all of them supposedly are lolz) and also attempting a not too strict yet relatively low inflammation diet. Its all I can think to do really :/ wish me luck xx

I think you're smart to take care of yourself and say no to accutane. Keep your chin up and don't give up on this!

Avoid the lemon juice. Try honey & yogurt masks instead. Lemon can be too acidic.

Look into a low histamine diet.

hundreds of reviews on here say that morning and nightly lemon juice with hot water cleared their acne. I feel like trying it :/ nobody said it didn't work on the reviews.

Thanks guys nice of you to try and help. I'm on vitamin D3 as it is another supposed cure lol and when I say no Accutane because of depression all I mean is I am highly prone to it so its not a wise option.

 

Today I am beginning taking lemon juice and hot water in the morning as this is apparently a wonder cure (as all of them supposedly are lolz) and also attempting a not too strict yet relatively low inflammation diet. Its all I can think to do really :/ wish me luck xx

Hi! Not to encourage you towards accutane or anything, but I have a diagnosed depressive disorder, accutane did not aggravate it. In fact, I am markedly less depressed now than before taking accutane. I would speak to a psychiatrist before taking accutane completely out of the running. There are other reasons not to take it ofcourse (and it's your personal choice). But I just wanted you to know that.

Hi megatree thanks for your advice. to be honest I think a doctor would put me on antibiotics before they put me on Accutane as my acne is moderate. I took antibiotics with successover a year ago but it is not a long term solution and I hated pumping chemicals that screw with gut flora which is so important. I am trying desperately to find a natural cure, alas I haven't found one yet x

Hi megatree thanks for your advice. to be honest I think a doctor would put me on antibiotics before they put me on Accutane as my acne is moderate. I took antibiotics with successover a year ago but it is not a long term solution and I hated pumping chemicals that screw with gut flora which is so important. I am trying desperately to find a natural cure, alas I haven't found one yet x

understandable, typically dermatologists want you to be on an antibiotic for 3 months without improvement before they prescribe accutane, and I completely understand your reticence about antibiotics. They never really helped me, and they wreaked havoc with body's flora.

There are people out there who believe we have permanently screwed our body's cycle by going on antibiotics for 6 months or so. It freaks me out. Plus I had the worst break out of my life when I came off of them last September with literally black patches of skin where there was blood underneath. Awful. Then I took B5 pills and my hair has been falling badly since then (9 months ago) nightmare acne treatments... and I hear Accutane is even scarier! Blah. x

There are people out there who believe we have permanently screwed our body's cycle by going on antibiotics for 6 months or so. It freaks me out. Plus I had the worst break out of my life when I came off of them last September with literally black patches of skin where there was blood underneath. Awful. Then I took B5 pills and my hair has been falling badly since then (9 months ago) nightmare acne treatments... and I hear Accutane is even scarier! Blah. x

I was afraid of accutane too, but the severity of side effects I dealt with on antibiotics were so much worse than my side effects on accutane. Lots of people have positive experiences on accutane. I also realize that plenty have had negative experiences as well, but I wasn't one of them. Have you looked into hormonal treatments, i.e. spironolactone or the pill?

Could you explain what spironolactone is? I have no major fluctuations in skin throughout my cycle so I'm not sure if it is hormonal or not. And I hve read a million reviews for birth control most of which scare me to death lol like depression, anger, cancer, blood clots, generally being pumped with artificial hormones cant be a good thing. And also many accounts of women's acne getting spectacularly worse sometimes. I did go on dianette once, it was the first thing my doctor put me on, but it made me c-razy. I cried all the time and it instantly stopped when I went off of it.

Could you explain what spironolactone is? I have no major fluctuations in skin throughout my cycle so I'm not sure if it is hormonal or not. And I hve read a million reviews for birth control most of which scare me to death lol like depression, anger, cancer, blood clots, generally being pumped with artificial hormones cant be a good thing. And also many accounts of women's acne getting spectacularly worse sometimes. I did go on dianette once, it was the first thing my doctor put me on, but it made me c-razy. I cried all the time and it instantly stopped when I went off of it.

HI! There are some BCP's which can definitely make acne worse, and there are some which are known to improve acne somewhat. Most dermatologists I have been with recommend using birth control on top of some other prescription, as birth control alone doesn't really help improve anything above mild cyclical acne. I mentioned spironolactone because your pattern of acne (lower half of the face, concentrated around the jaw and chin area) suggests hormones may be at play. Sprironolactone is actually prescribed as a blood pressure medication and it's used for people who hold on to access fluid, it's know as a potassium sparing diuretic. It is prescribed off label for hormonal acne as it contains an ingredient (similar to the ingredient in yaz) that is antiandrogen.

Here is an article on its use for acne if you are interested, and there are also alot of reviews on it here on this site: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3315877/

Spiro takes a long time to work for most people, and to be honest - it didn't work for me (my acne wasn't really hormonal though).

are you in the UK? doctors have never mentioned this as an option, I wonder if its frequently used here? xx

I am in the US - not sure how the UK system works with off-label drugs. Then again, it's off label according to our federal drug agency, excuse my US-centrism! Next time you see a dermatologist, maybe you can ask him/her?

For me, BCP made my skin worse in my opinion. I was on it for over 7 years (I'm 22 now), and went off of it a little over a year ago and my periods JUST started getting regular. After I went off, my acne went haywire. It has just started to calm down, and hopefully it will only get better as my body continues to re-regulate after BCP. So for me, I would suggest not taking BCP if you can.

For reference I was on Alesse for the first 5 years, then switched to Diane-35, and it did nothing to improve skin.