My name is Cymone, I am the owner of Malvern Serenity Salon and Clinic.
My passion for skincare and beauty came from years of suffering with acne, and opening Malvern Serenity has enabled me to help lots of people gain confidence and control over their skin.
In my teens and early 20's I suffered with severe acne all over my face, back and chest for over 10 years and I made so many mistakes along the journey. My mistakes weren’t intentional, but rather due to mis information and lack of education about acne.
I’m sure when you carry on reading you will be able to relate to what I’m talking about and I really hope that I can give some clarity to help you deal with your acne. There are four main causes to acne; hormones, stress, diet and bacteria and I am going to go over all four causes and help you have a better understanding.
One of the biggest mistakes I made was believing that because I had an acne skin I was oily. I used to always to go these shops and buy these spot busting products for oily skin. This is completely wrong, most acne’s will actually have a DRY skin type.
Acne is about how thick the oil is rather than how much you are producing, and with dry skin blocking the skin from breathing the oil gets stuck within the pores. It’s so important that you focus on hydrating the skin and help to improve your natural exfoliation process. One of the biggest things about this process, is correctly cleansing your face, if you use products that strip your skin, you will cause your oil to go into overdrive and increase bacteria to the skin.
There are two amazing products that I believe are amazing for acne sufferers. Youth Essential cleanser from Environ and Cleansing Gel from Katherine Daniels. Both help to clean the skin thoroughly without stripping the skin, reduce bacteria levels and help to stabilise PH on the skin.
Another big mistake made by many acne sufferers is the type of makeup that is used. Chemical based makeup clogs the pores causing more acne, and also aids bacteria growth. It is important to wear makeup as it will help to protect your skin from your day to day environment, but it’s very important that it’s the right type of makeup. The makeup must be completely clear of chemicals and be non cosmogenic. This means that the product doesn’t grow bacteria and is amazing for a sensitive skin type. My recommendation is Jane Iredale, it’s completely chemical and bulk agent free and AMAZING for the skin.
Now this is where I want to approach the conversation of stress…
Stress can directly impact to your skin, I often see people in a viscous cycle; the more concerned about the skin, the more spots they get, the more chemical based makeup is used, and this then aggregates it even more!I know it’s hard not to feel conscious about it, but two key lessons I learnt were:
1. The right people don’t care
2. No one is really looking at your acne.
It’s so important to try and reduce stress where you can.
One topic that I know 100% of people do... picking spots!
When you pop a pimple you create 4 more spots in return. The Baxter pops underneath as well as on top and this can also cause scarring. Rather than picking at those spots, I would recommend you steam your face and allow your body to naturally flush out any irritating white heads! Our Cool Peel Environ Facial is also amazing to release any impurities from the skin.
Diet is a hard one because no one wants to give up cheese! However, a dairy allergy and acne have been proven to have quite a close link, along with a high sugar diet. It’s so important to eat your five a day and drink plenty of water, your skin needs to be able to flush itself out properly. One of my ultimate favourite products is the Skin Accumax supplement range. This product is a must have for acne sufferers as this battles the hormone side of acne which is very hard to treat!
I really hope going forward you look at ways to change your life style to help with acne. If you want to chat one on one, please do book a skin consultation and get 10% off any products and facials when you quote Blog10
