Acne 101

There are different types of acne: hormonal, stress-related, type of/lack of skincare you use

How to Prevent Acne

Tips:

1. Make sure to wash your makeup brushes every week, especially the ones you use for your whole face ie foundation and concealer brushes. You can easily do this by pouring soapy water into a cup and just rinse your brushes. Afterwards you want to squeeze dry. The reason you want to wash your brushes is because when you have foundation on your brush it accumulates not only the residue from the makeup product but also the bacteria buildup. This bacteria will then grow if the brushes are not cleaned.

2. Use silk pillow cases. Silk keeps your skin hydrated. Due to the super-smooth texture, it will not absorb as much moisture from the skin as would a regular cotton pillow case do.

3. In the summer time you want to pull your hair back when you are sleeping to prevent bacteria or oil build up around your face.

4. Wash your pillow cases as often as you can. Not only is there dust and bacteria sitting on top of your pillow, but once you have your hair all over it, you leave hair product residue. As a result, leaving a colony of bacteria waiting for you to put your face on there, which leads to breakouts.

5. When your skin is really red, and you are breaking out. The best thing to do is to do NOTHING! Before you go to bed, make sure your face is clean and just go straight to bed. In the morning it should be able to recover because your skin's natural antibiotic system helps to fight off bacteria at night time. By leaving nothing on your skin also allows your skin to breathe.

How to Control Hormonal Acne

Hormonal acne is caused by an imbalance in your body, any form of change in your body. In girls, you can get them when your on your period, when your pregnant, or going through puberty, etc. Your oil glands are more prominent when you are on your menstruation cycle.

Tips to help control:

1. Exercise regularly - allows your body to produce endorphins, which not only makes you happy but also controls excess hormones. During your period, it is hard to exercise but walking 20 minutes a day helps a lot.

2. Watch your diet - cut out peanuts, chocolate, and dairy products around menstruation period or when your body is going through some sort of change. Try to eat nice and clean (fruits, salads, meat, spinach).

3. Sleep - regulating your sleep is very important. When you have a more regular sleep pattern for example sleeping from 10pm to 7am daily for a whole week, your body tends to be more calm and your skin is more intact. I realized that once I start staying up really late, my skin and everything else goes crazy. So try to regulate your sleep pattern and rest well.

4. Drink water - flushes out all the toxins and allows your skin, hair, and nails to maintain its health.

5. Don't stress - stress causes illness, hair loss, and breakouts. It also increases the production of excess hormones. Try to destress: go shopping with your girlfriends, grab your boys and play video games, watch some TV shows, paint your nails, listen to music.

How to Treat Acne

The different types of acne: blackheads, whiteheads, sore red bumps, cystic acne, hormonal acne, etc. Acne is usually caused by excess oil and bacteria, which causes your skin inflammation and infection.

First, to prevent acne from spreading, you must be very thorough with your hygiene. So before you touch your face you should sanitize your hands. The way to treat pimples is to first use an extractor and then apply medication. However, do not use a pimple extractor if you do not know how to use it. If you do not know how to use it, you can just take two cotton tips and squeeze the sides of the pimple. Make sure to squeeze until the blood is clear. Do not push too hard.

Healing: once you finish the extraction process, make sure your hands are clean and then go over the spot with a cotton pad and toner and wipe it dry. Then you can use a spot treatment containing salicylic acid or benzoyl peroxide. Afterwards, I recommend you using a pimple sticker either during the day or preferably when you sleep. It forms a cover for the acne, so you don't rub the wound anywhere and it's not causing any airborne bacteria to attack it. This will reduce the size of the acne dramatically.

Product recommendations:

1. Kiehl's Acne Blemish Control Daily Skin-Clearing Treatment: use straight after you cleanse and tone your face

2. Mario Badescu Drying Cream: use over areas that are still affected, only for day-time or sometimes during the night but not in the winter

3. Clearasil Pimples & Marks Wash and Mask: apply and wait 10-15 mins, removes excess dead skins cells and reduces the size of existing acne

4. Origins Out of Trouble Mask: apply and wait 10-15 mins, removes excess dead skins cells and reduces the size of existing acne

5. XI GE Acne Acarid Clean: use to kill mites on your skin. People with excess oil, especially those with really bad acne have massive colonies of those mites, which are microscopic.

Acne Scars

Red bumps, cystic acne, and whiteheads all leaves scars. All pimples start with red bumps. Do not pick the pimple if you do not know how to extract your pimple because you are likely to break the skin and thats when your body produces melanin that causes acne scarring. There are two types of scars: brown/black ones caused by melanin and ice picks which are dents due to the surrounding cells have died. Ice picks are only removed by laser or dermabrasion.

Treating Brownish Acne Scars:

1. Exfoliation - remove excess dead skin; Kate Somerville Exfolikate - apply on affected areas and massage. use 2-3 times a week. If you have sensitive skin, just use it once a week

2. Whitening - use products containing vitamin c.

3. Mask - help to boost brightening care; sheet mask or bottle mask - Chanel whitening massage gel mask and Chanel gentle scrub

4. Sunscreen for protection and prevention!

Thank you for the read, I hope this is helpful!

Cheryl Liu