Gday,
A little background about me.
I had pretty bad acne from about 2005-2011 when I was 14-20 and decided to go on accutane which cleared me up fully. I didn't get any bad breakouts except for the occasional one here and there until a few months ago, and my skin now looks almost as bad as when I started accutane. I have bad acne scars and every pimple I get now seems to leave a pitted scar no matter what I do.
I've recently started a cocktail of vitamins to try and get rid of my acne (which was just hundreds of blackheads and some whiteheads). However I have started breaking out ridiculously into massive sore red pimples, include some cysts on my jawline/neck. Is this normal? I have also had 1 lactic acid peel aswell as 2 AHA/BHA peels in the past month.
I am currently taking daily:
Vitamin A (Retinyl Palmitate): between 10,000 and 20,000 IU
Vitamin D3 (Cholecalciferol): 2,000 IU
Vitamin E (Natural): 500 IU
Chelated Zinc: 50mg
And I sometimes take 500-1000mg of Vitamin C.
Also my regimen at the moment is:
Cleanse with Alpha-H Triple Action Cleanser morning and night
Moisturise with ASAP Moisturing Daily Defence SPF 30+ in the morning
Moisturise with Dermalogica Active Moist at night
I have been skipping using any toner as advised by my esthetician as I am getting peels every 10 days to try and help.
Please tell me that this is the purge and it will soon pass, I'm too scared to go outside I look terrible!
Hi, I'm oversensitive and / or allergic to most fruits, vegetables and berries and taking supplements always made my skin too dry, which eventually lead to rashes and more acne, so I've struggled with vitamin intake a lot over the recent years.
But, for the past 6 months I've been drinking some oat milk with added vitamin-D, -B and Calcium, as well as Oat-based yoghurts with added pea protein, and my body has reacted very well to both of them. In fact, I have never had my (nowadays) mild-acne so well under control. For some it's a lot easier to absorb vitamins through regular foods rather than supplements, it could be that you're one of them.
Accutane fails a lot of people. Typically you have two options at this point...control inflammation through diet/vitamins, or control hormones through supplements/medications.
I diligently tried the diet/vitamin route and while I think it had some benefits on my overall health, it just wasn't the right step to really clear up my skin. So if you want to look into the hormonal route (yes this applies to men as well as women) you can head on over to the Hormonal Acne board and ask questions on there.
Typically you start by controlling and reducing the most potent forms of testosterone (which stimulate acne). For some people that's all you need. Others have to also watch progesterone, insulin/glucose, or other factors of the endocrine system.
Also, you probably don't need the zinc. It is really hard to be deficient in zinc and zinc can stimulate testosterone and acne when taken in excess. And while Vitamin A is a good step, I would not take more than 10,000 IU daily maximum. Probably best to half that or only take 10,000 every other day. The maximum RDA is 10,000, and while I don't always agree with the RDA specs, in the case of vitamin A I really strongly recommend you follow those guidelines.