Hi there,

Just as a foreword, I am a 25 year old male, and have extremely erratic bouts of acne. I was mostly clear in my teens, and even through college, with the occasional pimple every now and then. Strangely enough, my acne didn't kick into full gear until around 23.

The following post will be a description on my recent experimentation with a more holistic approach of diet and elimination to see how it affects the severity and frequency of acne on my face/body.

As this is my first post, I'd also like to make a list of topics that I won't necessarily discuss in this post, but would love to expand upon in this thread. If anyone sees a topic they are interested in, please go ahead and make a statement or a question, and I would love to discuss it in further detail:

- Seasonal and environmental effects on the skin

- Acne triggers and how long until manifestation

- Hormonal triggers

- Natural tolerance build-up

- Carbohydrate break-down

- Food allergies and intolerances

- Acne obsession and its impact on inflammation

- Insulin spikes and glycemic index

- Chemical Ingredients

- Stress, sexual activity, and well-being

Paleo Diet

I have been obsessed with healthy eating after finally achieving a healthy weight after graduating from college. My initial approach to dieting was simple, "Eat less and workout". In no way did I pay attention to what ingredients I was consuming. As long as I stepped on the scale, and saw the number decrease, I was happy.

Recently, I have been heavily researching the Paleo Diet/Kitavan Diet and how their selection of food is a stark contrast to the typical Western diet that is overflowing with processed foods, grains, and of course carbs (sugars/starches).

After eating a strict paleo diet for 2 weeks, I was nearly losing my mind due to the lack of taste in each meal, but decided to fight through to see what the outcome produced.

My diet consisted of: Cucumbers, carrots, green leafy vegetables, blueberries, apples, avocado, coconut oil, olive oil, sauerkraut, chicken, salmon, and almonds.

A few factors that became immediately noticeable after the first couple of days of going Paleo was:

1. An improved sense of mood and clarity

I assume this is due to a more consistent blood sugar level, and the elimination of grains which have potentially adverse affects on chemical elements in central nervous system.

2. Less oil production on face

By the end of the 2 weeks, my face had cleared quite noticeably, and my body was cleansing itself at a much more rapid pace. An example of this would be like that dreaded feeling of running your finger over your face and feeling that small hump, which is the indication of a pimple about to declare war on the next week of your self esteem. Before the Paleo diet, from the time I felt that "hump" to the time it came to a clear whitehead ready to be extracted, would usually be about 3-4 days. While on the Paleo diet, I only had two humps, and these came to a whitehead within 24 hours, and would be clear the next day.

Now this is where the diet gets interesting, because I am currently on my 3rd week of Paleo, and the results are starting to take a turn. My face is slowly regressing to its previous state of harsher, more frequent occurrence of pimples. This could of course be due to other factors such as stress, weather/seasonal changes, or even hygiene issues.

This is where I turn to all of you on the forum to ask, has your body built up a sort of tolerance towards a natural diet cleanse, that it no longer has an effect on clearing up your acne?

There is so much more I can expand upon in this post, but I have an appointment that I have to head out for, so I will continue this later on, thanks for reading my post!

To answer your question...when I cut out gluten a few years ago, my skin temporarily cleared, but then began to regress. Now I eat gluten here and there, but I stick to low histamine foods because for me that was a bigger issue. Perhaps you might have other issues too that you need to discover.

Btw, weather changes can affect oil production. Every time the weather fluctuates, my glands tend to produce more oil

I posted a topic about this a while ago, asking if anyone could explain why and didn't get a response.

But, yes, I have experienced this. I have made many diet changes over the last year attempting to help my acne, and typically get the same result - 1-3 weeks of clear skin, followed by a return to acne that never goes into remisison again no matter how long I follow the diet. It's incredibly frustrating.

On one of the acne.org pages, Dan explains that any diet will appear to work for a while as your body adapts to weight changes. That is the only somewhat satisfactory explanation I have read.

I'm following all of alernavista's advice right now, but it's just not enough for me. I have accepted it is unlikely I will ever be able to control acne entirely through diet.

I too have experienced the same as everyone here.

I'll will get clear from the diet for a couple of weeks, hit the mystery wall, then regress. And I've been experimenting with this for the last couple of years and it's still the same result every time.

But I have learned a good deal about nutrition in the process. So there's that.

How bout because you starved your body of the necessary amounts of balanced nutrients which initially caused your body to go into starvation mode thus causing weight loss which promoted your sense of well being(causing a false sense of mental clearness as you state) which led you to believe everything was alright in the neighborhood when the exact opposite is true and now your body is fighting back via stress hormones and the endocrine system? Thus producing the indirect effects resulting in skin issues?

Just my theory. I am trying to stay awake.. just thought i would add.

This diet is popular but is crap. A balanced, rounded diet is best. If a particular food group causes physical distress ie. gastric distress then minimize it or choose safe alternatives. You can combat over oiliness with nutritional supplements, drinking water, and applying topicals. I for one have found applying "Bump Control" which is an alcohol base used to prevent ingrown hairs after shaving used daily helps prevent not only that but inflammatory acne. It costs $7.99. Pretty cheap price. But it works and breaks/minimizes the cycle of acne.