I’m interested in hearing about other people’s experiences with the dreaded pimple. As someone with family and friends who are largely unafflicted by pimples, blackheads and scarring (damn then all!), I’m interested in past and present experiences with acne.
I got my first pimple when I was fairly young (11ish?), but things didn’t really take off until I got a good dose of hormones, which was around 12/13. Looking back, my acne was a lot worse than I realised at the time- oil slick face, pimples everywhere. I didn’t really do anything about it until I started taking an interest in boys, and even then I didn’t really do more than use Clearasil or something like that. While my mum and sisters have beautiful skin, my dad and most of his family have had pimples, and many have deep acne scarring.
I’m right on turning 21 now (birthday next week, yay!), and when I woke up about a month ago with a mass of pimples again, I went to the doctor. I’m using a cream with benzoyl peroxide and taking a low dose of antibiotics. Right now I’ve only got a few very small pimples and baby smooth skin. Yay! I’m also lucky to have minimal scarring (just a bit here and there that look like large pores).
Do you remember your first pimple? How bad did it get for you? What did you end up doing about it?
I’m not looking for medical advice, I’m already taking care of my problem.
Oh, and what’s your favourite quick fix for the massive ones that pop up overnight?
I used to use toothpaste to dry it out, but after forgetting to wash it off one morning before uni, it’s not something I’ll be using other than right before bed!
I would always break out, and nothing seemed to stop it. Finally, I went to a dermatologist in the 30’s. he told me that he could prescribe me something expensive, or I could just switch to Neutrogena Acne Formula soap/cleanser & Neutrogena Moisture moisturizer with SPF 15.
Worked wonders. It’s been 10 years and I never break out anymore.
I have always wanted to try that “put some Windex on it” thing from My Big Fat Greek Wedding, though.
I get a regular amount. Even worse when it’s that time-o-the-month with the hormonal acne :(…It only goes away if I’m on birth control, so for the times that I’m not I have at least 5 large, unpoppable, painful pimples on my face that take forever to fade. I really hate it, and I hate that it does the same to my chest so that I can’t wear any lower cut clothes, and I hate that it doesn’t make a difference no matter how good I take care of my skin.
Sigh.
Normal-pimple-wise, I get a few here and there. Some blackheads, the occassional whiteheads. My brother and sister were the ones with major pimple problems, and I don’t envy them for that!
Sometimes popping pimples is therapeutic.
I tried the toothpaste thing before but it only made my skin worse.
My first zit was my best. I was in 7th grade at the time – 12 or 13, I forgot – and I got a huge red pimple on the tip of my nose. Following the advice of my mom, I squeezed it, and the result was a long, thick string of pus that seemed to have no end. Never got another pimple quite like that.
At 42, my zits are few and far between now. Still, when I get them, they’re often symmetrical … I’ll get two identical zits, each on the exact opposite side of my face or body from the other. It’s really, really strange.
…I’ve tried it. I try nearly anything I come across! The pimple dries out pretty quickly and doesn’t seem as red.
Agree with pimple popping being therapeutic occasionally, as nikonikosuru mentioned. Unpoppable pimples drive me crazy, especially when the massive ones lurk deep under the surface and throb.
Right now the hardest thing for me is not to pop and pick at my pimples. Argh!
I have extremely oily skin and hair, and as a result have had bad acne since my early teens.
I learned fairly quickly that salicylic acid products did nothing for me, and benzoyl peroxide products such as Clearasil cleared my skin but swelled my eyes shut. The antibiotics that my general practitioner prescribed did nothing, and my family didn’t have the money for a dermatologist as we didn’t have insurance. So I settled on trying endless permutations of soaps and washes and miracle cures, until I hit on the best one to minimize the problem for me (wash with Purpose soap twice a day). And I learned how to use concealer and powder.
The acne never improved as it was supposed to as I moved into my twenties, or with the pill.
Several years ago, I finally got around to going to a dermatologist. He told me straight out that he could help somewhat with the right medications, but extremely oily and sensitive skin like mine would always have acne. We tried a couple of different things, and discovered that Tazorac worked brilliantly for me and (unlike most people) caused no excess drying. I wasn’t acne free, but for the first time in a decade and a half I could occasionally leave the house without makeup on. I stayed on it for a couple of years and deeply loved the results. Unfortunately, I eventually felt that I had to get off of it - it’s a class X drug (proven to cause birth defects), and not only was I planning to have children at some point, I was uncomfortable using something with that classification for much longer.
Since we hadn’t found anything safer that worked nearly as well, I slowly gave up going to the dermatologist altogether. My skin is somewhat better than it used to be, I think maybe from aging, so I just use my routine and cope.
On the upside, given my oiliness, I don’t get acne scarring and it looks like I’ll be largely wrinkle free.
I’m cursed with my father’s genetics (though I never got acne quite as bad as he did). I don’t remember my first pimple, but in junior high school I had acne that debilitated my self esteem, with over a dozen large pimples and dozens of smaller ones on my face at any given time. (I remember a girl telling me once, when I was holding my head in my hands, “You know, you probably got so much acne 'cuz you do that all the time!”) I’m pretty sure I’ve got several scars on my face from them; thankfully they look a fair bit like freckles, which I have a few of, so they all seem to blend in.
My doctor eventually sent me to a dermatologist, who gave me a couple different prescriptions (Duac and Retin-A). He also had the habit of liking to pop every whitehead on my face with a pair of tweezers. I would usually leave the appointments with a dozen bloody new scabs on my face.
The medications did help, albeit a bit erratically, and now my acne has gone down to a level that usually doesn’t bother me much. Taking the pill has not helped at all. Usually I’m alright with my face now (a higher self esteem helps that a lot), but there are times, like the last couple weeks or so, when I get random flareups for no good reason and start getting self-conscious about it. Since the acne typically forms on my cheeks or near my temples, I hide them with my hair as much as possible.
And when the nasty whiteheads come up? It’s ten minutes in front of the mirror with a sewing needle and some Kleenex, being very, very careful.
I started to break out during those formative years wehn you realize that your looks are important. “They” told me I’d grow out of it. “They” were wrong.
I’m now almost 50 years old and continue to have regular zits. I, too, tend to break out during my period, which heal just in time for my next period.
In my 20’s, I treated with a dermatologist who recommended Purpose soap and Moisturel lotion which I continue to use. Anything else just doesn’t work as well for me. The dermatologist also treated me with Accutane which did improve the situation but didn’t eliminate it completely.
For you zit poppers out there, check out popthatzit.com for one of the grossest things you can’t take your eyes off of. I simply can’t stand to leave the little buggers alone so I can’t even imagine how some of those people get zits as big as a Buick.
I didn’t get acne until I started college - stress maybe? While it sounds nice in theory not to deal with pimples as a young teen, I still have some at 30. I think I’d rather of had it younger! I use Proactiv and that keeps it under control better than anything else I’ve tried, Retin-A included. Using it properly I only have hormonal flare ups these days.
The first pimple I recall getting was when I was eleven or twelve or so. From then on I would get the usual amount; by that i mean that my skin wasn’t great, and would frequently cause me embarrassment, but it was nothing like the “before” pictures I see on acne commercials.
My worst breakouts as a teenager were always on my back, for some reason; my mom would put Clearasil on it every night and as a consequence I can’t look at Clearasil without thinking of all my bleach-spotted pajamas.
The Clearasil helped a bit, I guess, but the back breakouts didn’t really cease fire til my early twenties. Grew out of them, I suppose. I still get the occasional whopper back there but nothing at all like when I was a teenager. I wouldn’t even go swimming. I felt like a freak.
These days, at the Ripe Old Age of 29, breakouts in general are at an all-time low. I don’t have perfect skin–I get whiteheads and the occasional Big Huge Red Monster–but I can live with that. The only occasional problem I have–that I HATE!–is my chest. It breaks out really randomly, for like a month at a time, and nothing I do can stop it. And I can’t wear anything V-necked.
And then it clears up and it’ll be months before that happens again.
My skin simply doesn’t scar; even skidding on asphalt on my left knee, and burning myself with a 450 degree breadpan, etc., failed to leave a permanent mark.
So I guess I should count myself lucky, cuz I’ve never been able to leave a pimple alone!
I’m 34, and I think all of junior and high school I had like 10 pimples. now I get them all the time, and get some ginormous ones on my lower back and shoulders from time to time. I have 5 or 6 medium to large ones all at once, then nothing for months.
Diet, stress, skin care regime - nothing seems to matter much. I do find I get less of them in the summer, more if I take a break from working out then start again, so perhaps living in a nearly perpetually dark place in the Winter where my skin rarely has a chance to really breath has something to do with it
When I was 16 or so, I saw an ad for a household cleaner that “really gets the grease” (409, maybe.) I had subtle blackheads in every pore of my nose at the time. A teenage boy’s reasoning is not exactly top-notch, but I could see several hundred plugs of grease waiting to be “really got.” I put the stuff on a washcloth and I scrubbed my nose for about 90 seconds before my whole nose was on fire. :eek: I had scrubbed away the top layer of skin. When it healed, the blackheads were still there. :smack:
Started breaking out at 14, would get one or two big ones a week until I went on the pill at 24. Haven’t had a big one since, and my face has calmed down enormously from the sensitive, flaky pain it used to be.
I’ve had oily skin and hair pretty much from childhood. When puberty hit, I started getting breakouts related to my menstrual cycle–since I was pretty irregular for years, the breakouts would often be the only clue that my period was coming. I never really had big pimples, just lots of little ones at once. The only thing that helps at all is hormonal contraception. No matter what I wash my face with, it doesn’t seem to change anything.
This stuff worked pretty well for me. the night treatment, peeling solution and special extra strength zit gel all worked like they were meant to. I still use the face wash, cleansing pads and moisturiser on a daily basis.
I’m 25 and, sad to say, hormones are the main culprit for my breakouts.
Things that worked: Dianette: a type of contraceptive pill that is not approved by the FDA, but is widely available in the UK. Less spots, less body hair, contraception…this pill works really well for me.
Yasmin: another contraceptive pill. I went onto this after the Dianette. Not as good, but still better than my baseline.
Mirena: the absolute best invention ever known to mankind. It’s a hormone containing contraceptive coil and it is the dog’s bollocks. No periods in 9 months, great skin 24/7. This thing fixed my PMT, my endometriosis pain, my skin…it literally gave me back 1/4 of my life. I cannot tell you how much it improved my life.
I know I sound like an advert for Bayer Schering Pharma, but there you go, their stuff worked for me.
Seriously- if you have heavy or painful periods, are monogamous and aren’t planning on having a baby for 3-5 years, Mirena is the bee’s knees. Consider it.
There cannot be an acne thread without a link to the classic Favorite Pimple Story thread, home of Broomstick’s epic multi-part cliff-hanger abscess story.
