i have this along with other side effects of the retinoid i used which is similar to tretinoin...mine hasnt gone away for ten months, i only used it twice back in aug-sep...i know alot of other people with this symptom, if its the only one you got, id say its more likely to go away...what other side effects do you have?? are you peeling at all?? (i didnt really peel but i think i should have)..my skin is also not oily, if i touch it, it comes back bone dry yet looks like its coated in a waxy clear gel that..youd think having such a shininess would look better but god its awful..its not like a healthy glow or even over abundance of oil (at least then your skin would be getting nourished)..its just off putting and highlights all the other issues....i have not found answers yet on reversing any of the more odd and scary side effects of retinoids other than luck and time...hopefully this will be briefly lived for you...

maybe someone else has a more positive experience to share..

On 6/22/2017 at 2:49 PM, rapparino said:

I've started applying 0.05% topical tretinoin on my face for a bit more than a week now and I have a problem.
I have all the usual side effects, but one is bothering me very much.

My skin is very very shiny. NOT IN AN OILY WAY. It's very dry and shiny. It looks like plastic or wax, because it reflectsthe light
so much. Anyone had this before? Will this go away like the other irritations?

What you are experiencing sounds quite typical and may very well go away. But if you start to notice further worsening of the skin then you might want to try an alternative approach to treating your skin condition. Some people have had excellent results with retinoids while some others go through complete hell. I am one of the unlucky ones.I keep telling people to follow their gut...if it looks beyond the scope of normal side effects and is causing you worry stop using it. If you aren't sure what to do then there's a few options; take a break from it and see how your skin responds; use it less frequently (how often are you using it?); use a lower strength such as .025%; use less than the recommended pea sized amount; or use moisturizer as a buffer. I also suggest you thoroughly research it. Can I ask where you got the Retin A from? During my research, I've found that many people who buy the product off the Internet are receiving retinoids that are much more acidic than normal.
Ihope your skin has either acclimated to it or recovered from using it.

I haven't checked this thread until now and I will just report what I read and how my skin is doing.

To answer your questions, yes I had dry flaky skin, it was peeling and I used tretinoin daily for almost 2 weeks. My pharmacy literally mixed it themselves as prescribed by my dermatologist, so what I got might have been harsher than brand name tretinoin. Brand name tretinoin usually has some ingredients to make the irritations less severe.

Anyways. I completely went off of tretinoin for my skin to heal. After 3-5 days the tightness, flakiness and burning sensation when applying any cream on my face completely went away. But the shine was still a problem. 4 weeks have passed and the shine is almost completely gone on most places of my face, except around my eyes. That area is a bit shiny still. But overall it has decreased and I'm confident it will be completely normal eventually.

I know the internet has very few information on this specific problem, so I will post what I know to help others with the same problem.

So why does the shine occure?
It's over-exfoliation. Tretinoin causes skin turn over to fasten and the outer most layer will therefor quickly shed. The top layer of your skin will peel and that leaves you with this really alien, shiny look on your face, because there is barely any texture. The texture of your outer most layer of skin is not there, so your skin is very smooth and reflects light easily.

How to heal?
LEAVE YOUR SKIN ALONE. That's it. I've read some nightmare stories of people who went off tretinoin and still had the shine a year afterwards. No idea if their skin ever recovered. It shouldn't be like that though and honestly I think these people never gave their skin time to heal, because they kept exfoliating. You can't do that. You have to stop with the peelings completely. No AHAs, no BHAs, no physical peels, no tretinoin.None of that, until your skin heals. That's my only explanation. Your skin being mat (not shiny) is the result of dead skin cells and the outer most layer of skin giving it its rough texture. That layer couldn't be permanently gone. Unless someone would continue to exfoliate again and again and again, giving your skin not the time to recover. Recovery time for this specific issue could be 28 - 90 days. The only product you could use to heal your skin would be Cerave Moisturizing Lotion or pure Aloe Vera gel. You could also not use anything. The point is to give your skin a rest. Completely. Until it heals.

Bonus advice.
Just leave it at 0,025% tretinoin. Studies prove that there is barely any significant difference between 0.025% and 0.1% tretinoin when it comes to the benefits of the substance. Irritation on the other hand gets significantly worse the higher you raise the dose. More irritation does not mean it's working better. That's a common misconception. When my skin recovers I will go back to 0.025%. I used that dose last year for my acne and didn't have this nightmare inducing plastic skin.

Here are my sources for what I said that.
http://www.youglowgal.com/8-signs-over-exfoliating/
http://www.debraspence.com/how-much-is-too-much-exfoliation/
http://www.medscape.com/viewarticle/733085_5
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/7544967