Honestly, you did the right thing by stopping it.Your skin doesn't agree with it. I would not discount Accutane because your skin is having a reaction, though. There are several factors at play that alter the way that theIsotretinoin reactswhen appliedexternallyvs how it would react when taken internally. In this situation,Isotretinoin is not the only ingredient found in Isotrex, so the other ingredient could be at fault. Also, substances are absorbed much differently through the skin vs an internal route, so a gel and a pill are not going to have the same effect. Here's my routine for clear skin:

Drink green tea at least 3x a day
Avoid artificial sugar, and dairy as much as possible,
Weekly face mask, I recommend fig and yarrow's clay mask

Wash with a gentle cleanser, I recommend the ju ju bar by Drunk Elephant or a Konjac sponge(they are around $7-$8)
Tone with alcohol-free witch hazel, I recommend Thayer's. You can also make a toner out of green tea and water, and put it in a spritzer bottle.
Moisturize with date oil(excellent for acne, infections, and inflammation), or The Wonder Seed's Facial cream

Try that routine and I'm certain you will see improvement. Everything I mentioned is natural, and good for your skin. You will notice that I didn't include any "anti-acne" products. This is because almost all of them will further irritate your skin and cause more breakouts as a result. By using simple products, you are allowing your skin to heal on its own. Btw, I did not have mild acne, it was SEVERE, and this worked for me.

Very good advice above, it looks like severe irritation to me, stop the product and let your skin relax 🙂

5 hours ago, MonroeQT said:

Honestly, you did the right thing by stopping it.Your skin doesn't agree with it. I would not discount Accutane because your skin is having a reaction, though. There are several factors at play that alter the way that theIsotretinoin reactswhen appliedexternallyvs how it would react when taken internally. In this situation,Isotretinoin is not the only ingredient found in Isotrex, so the other ingredient could be at fault. Also, substances are absorbed much differently through the skin vs an internal route, so a gel and a pill are not going to have the same effect. Here's my routine for clear skin:

Drink green tea at least 3x a day
Avoid artificial sugar, and dairy as much as possible,
Weekly face mask, I recommend fig and yarrow's clay mask

Wash with a gentle cleanser, I recommend the ju ju bar by Drunk Elephant or a Konjac sponge(they are around $7-$8)
Tone with alcohol-free witch hazel, I recommend Thayer's. You can also make a toner out of green tea and water, and put it in a spritzer bottle.
Moisturize with date oil(excellent for acne, infections, and inflammation), or The Wonder Seed's Facial cream

Try that routine and I'm certain you will see improvement. Everything I mentioned is natural, and good for your skin. You will notice that I didn't include any "anti-acne" products. This is because almost all of them will further irritate your skin and cause more breakouts as a result. By using simple products, you are allowing your skin to heal on its own. Btw, I did not have mild acne, it was SEVERE, and this worked for me.

Thanks for your advice. Do you think I should switch back to differin? I just don't know how I'm going to clear up this mess now tbh.

Yes you can if you have used it before and it helped, but I would probably give your skin a break for a week and use only micellar water and your favorite moisturizerand perhaps the Witch Hazel Monroe suggested, (the alcohol free kind). Anything is likely to irritate you now that you've had these sprung up! Let them recover for at least few days and the slowly reintroduced acne fighting agents. Witch Hazel should help with inflammation a lot, but your skin knows to do also if you don't disturb it  

Ps how do you like the Eucerin toner, is it not too drying? I use a lot of their products (micellar water is fantastic, but expensive, so is the face replenishing cream with Urea) but I was weary of the toner because of it's alcohol content.... 

That's the side effect of the medication. It gets worse before it gets better. I was on this before and it took 3 months for me to get clear but it all came back again anyway

7 hours ago, davidctino said:

That's the side effect of the medication. It gets worse before it gets better. I was on this before and it took 3 months for me to get clear but it all came back again anyway

You were on Isotrex? Tbh I've noticed my skin get well out if hand whilst using it and in honestly don't think I can handle it. Like I've never experienced this before, million of tiny bumps everywhere. Was your breakout pretty bad? How long did you use it for?

Honestly, this gets worse before it gets better is a bit of a lie. Most of the time it takes a while for topical to work and you can expect to break out as usual, or slightly more because it increases skin turnover, however sudden and unusual breakouts I.e different type of break out in a part of your face that never used to break out before is just irritation. For some people that passes when they ease off a bit and treat their skin gently but in case of a severe irritation like this it's best to stop, seriously. Once your skin calms you can try again, but use less of the product and less frequently too.

14 hours ago, MissSac17 said:

You were on Isotrex? Tbh I've noticed my skin get well out if hand whilst using it and in honestly don't think I can handle it. Like I've never experienced this before, million of tiny bumps everywhere. Was your breakout pretty bad? How long did you use it for?

Yeah I was on retin-a which is the same thing. I was getting big pinples and small ones too when I first started using it and it made my face very irritated. I stuck through it and it made my face really nice. It took about 4-6 months though. After that I started getting pimples again and eventually stopped. Went back on it again and my face was on fire after that I was not going through the initial break out again. So in my opinion retin - a is not so good if you suffer from acne because the intial break out is so bad. Right now the only thing that works for me is eating healthy and keeping carbs to 60 grams max. Stay away from processed foods and sweets.

11 hours ago, Iwikiwi said:

Honestly, this gets worse before it gets better is a bit of a lie. Most of the time it takes a while for topical to work and you can expect to break out as usual, or slightly more because it increases skin turnover, however sudden and unusual breakouts I.e different type of break out in a part of your face that never used to break out before is just irritation. For some people that passes when they ease off a bit and treat their skin gently but in case of a severe irritation like this it's best to stop, seriously. Once your skin calms you can try again, but use less of the product and less frequently too.

It's very hard to know what's "right" or "wrong" as everyone is different I suppose. I've heard many times that this a normal reaction and also that it isn't. Unfortunately it's just left me lost not knowing what to do. I'm considering going back to my doctor to talk to her about what's going on. I've recently bought Bioderma micellar water to cleanse, I use acne.org moisturiser in the morning with a bit of sweet almond oil sometimes. At night I have a BHA cleanser and usually put either a retinoid or bp on and I don't always moisturise after it which is bad. The isotrex I was using actually contained 95 % ethanol which I find extremely concerning.

I've been under a lot and I mean A TON of stress the past few weeks to a month or so which may not be helping. Do you think this might be stress related too? I just feel super horrible right now and struggle making eye contact with people. Which is ridiculous because I'm a grown woman of 25 years old almost.

Bioderma micellar water and acne moisturiser are excellent choices! Micellar waters are just the best end of. I'd probably skip that bha cleanser... Im not at all sure of bha in cleanser form will have any effect because it might not stick around your skin long enough but if you like it... As long as it doesn't make tour face dry and tight, bit to be honest I would just stick to micellar water (I'm biased I love it but it has truly rescued my skin in the past year)
Not moisturising after BP is a really really bad idea.. And then the retinol on top... You're putting your skin through too much at once.
You're routine sounds good perhaps a bit too muvh at a time tho! Cleanse with micellar water and moisturiser then put the BP on top every other day and it should calm down in no time. Then schedule and appointment with your doctor and tell her about the reaction you've had and that your concerned that the formulation is too drying and irritatinh and she might be able to perceive you a different vitamin a product, there is a lot of them on the market 🙂

I agree with Wiki in that you should probably let your skin chill out for a week. The last thing you want to do right now is irritate it more. For the next few days, focus on eating as healthy as you can, drinking green tea(if you have it), and tons of water! If I were you, and I have been you, I would try the natural gentle route as I previously suggested(you don't have to buy the exact products I mentioned, but try to use them as a guideline. Look up the ingredients if that helps you and go from there. As far as things getting worse before they get better, I don't think that notion applies to this situation. If you get an initial breakout, it should be in the SAME areas as you typically breakout. The fact that you broke out in an atypical area of your face tells me you most likely had some kind of adverse sensitivity to the product.

On May 3, 2016 at 10:46 AM, MissSac17 said:

Thanks  for your advice.  Do you think I should switch back to differin? I just don't know how I'm going to clear up this mess now tbh.

Thanks, Wiki

On May 3, 2016 at 7:18 AM, Iwikiwi said:

Very good advice above, it looks like severe irritation to me, stop the product and let your skin relax

On May 4, 2016 at 4:18 PM, MissSac17 said:

It's very hard to know what's "right" or "wrong" as everyone is different I suppose. I've heard many times that this a normal reaction and also that it isn't.  Unfortunately it's just left me lost not knowing what to do. I'm considering going back to my doctor to talk to her about what's going on. I've recently bought Bioderma micellar water to cleanse, I use acne.org moisturiser in the morning with a bit of sweet almond oil  sometimes. At night I have a BHA cleanser and usually put either a retinoid or bp on and I don't always moisturise after it which is bad. The isotrex I was using actually contained 95 % ethanol which I find extremely concerning.

I've been under a lot and I mean A TON of stress the past few weeks to a month or so which may not be helping.  Do you think this might be stress related too? I just feel super horrible right now and struggle making eye contact with people. Which is ridiculous because I'm a grown woman of 25 years old almost.   

As far as stress goes, yes stress can most definitely cause you to break out. This seems like a no-brainer, but make sure you are engaging in activities to reduce your stress. It can be anything that relaxes you. Exercise is the best method, but if you can't exercise that day, do SOMETHING relaxing. Read, color, dance, do a cross-word, have sex, meditate, etc etc. 🙂

On 3/5/2016 at 5:46 PM, MissSac17 said:

Thanks for your advice. Do you think I should switch back to differin? I just don't know how I'm going to clear up this mess now tbh.

Have you tried doing a 40% lactic acid peel? It will help alot.

Hey, btw, sorry I didn't realise Differin was also a retinoid, I thought it was a topical antibiotic solution, silly me!
How did it go when you were using Differin instead, did you also have a reaction like Isotrex? Why did you switch?

51 minutes ago, Iwikiwi said:

Hey, btw, sorry I didn't realise Differin was also a retinoid, I thought it was a topical antibiotic solution, silly me!
How did it go when you were using Differin instead, did you also have a reaction like Isotrex? Why did you switch?

I actually haven't even switched yet. I'm not using any retinoid atm , taking a week off isotrex currently to see where I'm at. Still using BP. I have ordered a soap called Noble Formula Zinc Pyrithione 2 % as well because I've read that it's great for "bumpy" rough textured skin and typical acne etc. But I was using Differin before with no problems like this for 8 months then I switched to isotrex cause I wanted something stronger.

Right I see! Did u see any improvements with differin at all? See, I think if you've used retinol before and didn't have a bad reaction like this it could well be the formulation that's causing the irritation not the retinod itself.
A break will do you good then you can either introduce it again slowly or try differin or a different brand of retinoid...
I'm sad to hear isotrex is giving you so much trouble I was thinking of trying g it as it's the easiest one to get in the UK and I was thinking of giving it a go if my skin gets worse on my current routine.
It's all such a mystery it's super frustrating.

I did see *some* improvement with Differin after a couple month and lasted for a good couple month but I was STILL unhappy. However my skin was maybe 70 % clear in February and I wanted something stronger basically because I felt differin stopped working. Then I got isotre and my skin is still a mess. Isotrex is actually formulated with ethanol.
Are you seeing a dermatologist? Tbh I think everyone will have a different experience, you could try it if you feel you maybe need to add a retinoid into your regime but if you can I'd try differin first.

Yeah sounds like ethanol could be the problem but at least now you know!
It seems like people's reactions to retinoids are very individual...

My doctor won't refer me cause I don't have inflammatory acne so it's just a cosmetic issue. Which is fair enough
. I can't afford to go private but some pharmacies can do a private perscription for reasonable money and a quick consultation to warn of the risks.
I'm considering it but like I sad I don't get inflamed so will be a last resort

But anyways, I hope it will get better for you on a break in fact I'm sure it will, seems you're on the right track 🙂