The best skincare tips for people with acne prone skin
I’ve talked about my struggle with acne on my blog before in my post “A college girl’s guide: How to look gorgeous without makeup.” Because I have such bad acne, I have to do special things for my skin in order to keep from breaking out. Today I’m going to share with you the best skincare tips that I’ve found for my acne prone skin.
I’ve had pretty bad acne since I was in 7th grade. I tried everything to get rid of it. Pretty much every “acne product” on the market, including Proactive (which completely ruined my skin by the way). My freshman year of high school my skin went crazy. I had painful cystic acne all over my face. I was a cheerleader, and I remember sitting in front of my mirror before football games frantically crying while trying to get some makeup to cover my giant pimples to no avail. I ended up having to make an appointment with a dermatologist.
Since then, I’ve spent my years continuing to battle with acne. I’ve now tried just about every acne medication (oral and topical) as well as skincare products.
While finding good products to use on your skin is important, there are many other things that go into keeping your skin clear that many people don’t think about. In this post, I’m going to share with you all of the knowledge that I’ve acquired over the years.
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1. Use gentle cleansers
My biggest tip is to be wary of products that claim to be for acne. Most of the benzoyl peroxide and salicylic acid acne products will do more harm to your face than good. They just dry out your skin, which will irritate it further–therefor causing more acne.
The face wash that I use is this one. It was recommended to me by my dermatologist, all of my friends who struggle with acne use that cleanser, and recently I’ve even been seeing it recommended all over the internet for acne treatment. If you’re looking to get a new cleanser, seriously try it. It is the only cleanser that I’ve found that gets all of the oil off of my face without drying my skin out.
2. Don’t use harsh exfoliators
When you have pimples on your face that are close to popping, be careful when you use harsh exfoliators. (When I say “harsh exfoliators” I mean St. Ives scrubs and ones that are similar). The rough beads in them can scratch open blemishes and spread bacteria on your skin, causing more acne to form.
I like to use more gentle exfoliators like this one.
3. Stay away from peanut butter
This one came as a shock to me when I first found out. Peanut butter contains omega 6, which increases the production of sebum (oil), which will then make you break out. After I found this out I stopped eating peanut butter, but one time I slipped up and accidentally ate some and ended up with giant cystic acne bumps all over my face. Moral of the story, stay far far away from peanut butter.
4. Drink green tea
Green tea reduces inflammation all over your body, and it also contains antioxidants that fight free radicals and heal your skin, making it the holy grail for people with acne. Drinking it is awesome, but you can also use it in the form of cleansers, moisturizers, or basically any topical treatment.
5. Use SPF
There is a myth that getting some sun will clear up your acne. THIS IS NOT TRUE. Going in the sun might temporarily clear up your acne because it dries out your skin, but in the long run sun exposure will just cause your skin to get irritated and inflamed, which will cause more acne.
Always use spf when you are going to be in the sun! If you don’t, you could get wrinkles, acne, or even skin cancer. My favorite spf to use on my face is this one because it is really moisturizing, yet doesn’t make my face greasy.
6. Stop touching your face
This one is reaaaally hard for me. If I get bored the first thing I do is start picking at my face. However, the oil and dirt from your hands causes breakouts. So, keep your hands away from your face whenever you can.
7. Less dairy
If you’re getting really bad cystic acne breakouts, you should try to lessen your dairy consumption. Dairy has hormones in it that can make your skin go crazy.
8. Cover your hair/ pull it back when you sleep
Like your hands, your hair has oils that can clog your pores and cause acne. You want to keep your hair from touching your face in general, but specifically when you’re sleeping because if you don’t pull it back, you probably end up having your hair all over your face when you sleep.
I like to pull my hair into a braid or a french twist when I go to sleep, but my sister likes to use a silk cap like this one to keep her hair out of her face. Covering your hair when you sleep is a good idea if you have acne because it keeps your hair oil off of your face AND pillow, which will keep you from having to wash your pillow super often. Using a silk cap is really good for your hair as well.
9. Wash your pillowcase
Not only does your hair oil get on your pillowcase when you sleep, but so does your face oil, hand oil, and probably drool. Your face touches your pillowcase every night! Wash that sucker to help keep you from breaking out.
10. Choose makeup wisely
When I went to the dermatologist she told me to stop wearing makeup completely. However, I am all too familiar with how easy it is to feel insecure without makeup when you have red spots covering your face, so that’s not the advice I’m going to give you. (However, if you’re confident without having to cover your acne–more power to you! I love it when I see people rocking their acne in public. It takes a lot of confidence.)
The advice that I am going to give you is choose your makeup wisely, because the vast majority of foundations and concealers will make you break out. It’s just a sad truth. It’s a better idea to go for a BB or CC cream, and even with those you have to be careful.
The only CC cream that I’ve found to be full coverage enough to cover my acne while also not causing me to break out is this one. It blends into your skin so nicely and feels just like a moisturizer. It blows my mind how it is so full coverage but also so light on the skin, AND it has SPF! I’m not the only one raving about this product right now either. I’ve seen it alllll over the internet this summer. It’s a holy grail product for sure.
I could go on and on with these tips, but I’m going to stop here because I’ve got the biggest ones covered.
Having acne can be such a frustrating and painful experience, but just know that I understand your struggle. It’s hard, but I hope that these tips help.
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