These creams are designed for acne prone skin care and aim to eliminate the bacteria which causes it. In theory, without bacteria, acne would not form. The active ingredient in most creams for pimples is benzoyl peroxide, which has been proven to kill p. acne vulgaris but is also very damaging to the skin.

Benzoyl peroxide dries up the skin, pharmaceutical companies have combined benzoyl peroxide with moisturizing agents to neutralize this effect.

The Problem with most Products used in the Treatment of Acne

The problem with all acne creams is that it only temporarely kills the bacteria. The bacteria that is responsible for acne is very resilient and returns withing hours of it being killed. This is why the only successful acne cream regimen seems to be Dan’s from Acne.org in which he applies exorbitants amount of cream all over his face. The cream is then absorbed by the skin and provides longer lasting effects versus bacteria.

It is then essential to apply massive amounts of moisturizer in order to keep your face from litteraly peeling off. He claims that it takes 2-3 months for your face to get adjusted harshness of the benzoyl peroxide, after which the redness fades away.

I do not know the long term effects of this treatment, but I would imagine that applying heavy dosages of benzoil peroxide for 10 years would not be healthy. Especially since your liver is responsible for filtering all the chemicals absorbed through your skin.

The solution to treat acne? Avoid most creams!

The worse creams seem to be the ones that are commercially available over the counter. These do not successfully kill the bacteria and dry the skin. This results in more breakouts than before, resulting in the consumer buying more creams. Instead, concentrating on keeping your skin as healthy as possible will be much more effective in your fight against acne. So throw those acne treatment products away, most of them are junk anyways.

If it’s a severe scar, it can form a permanent mark or pit, if you have any acne scar pits, then you might eventually want to look into professional scar treatments.

The Basics of Treating Acne Scars

Treating acne scars, in most cases, involves abasing the skin so that it can regrow and repair itself. This can be done through scrubs, washes, chemical peels and masks. Once the top layer of skin is slightly worn down, the body heals itself and creates a new, fresh layer of skin.

There are various professional skin services which will aid people with skin scars. These are not necessarily the best treatments and they will require you to have stopped producing acne.

Professional vs Natural Scar Treatment

The natural solutions are softer, take less time, are MUCH cheaper and can be done even when your acne is minimized.

The professional acne treatments include:

• Dermabrasion
• Laser Resurfacing
• Chemical Peels
• Punch Technique
• Subcision
• Augmentation

The more natural treatments include a light scrub, either with a soft toothbrush or a clothe. There’s even an aspirin with cotton swab treatment! If done properly, these can be just as effective as the other treatments.

Using Scrubs as a Scar Treatment

Scrubs are a common element in general skin care and can be crucial to clear, healthy skin. In theory, scrubs are slightly rugged semi-liquid products that are applied on the face in order to ’scrub off’ dead skin cells and dirt. With an ideal scrub, you would have no dead skin cells on your face, no irritation, no dryness. This would alleviate one of the main causes of acne, which is clogged pores. However scrubs have their limits and even the most intense scrub only affects the most upper level of the epidermis.

Without clogged pores, sebum cannot get trapped and bacteria will have an extremely difficult time forming.

Most scrubs are flawed. They are either too harsh on the skin, use chemicals which irritate the skin or not effective enough. The scrubs like the famous apricot scrub, irritate the skin because they are too rough. Although they are effective that removing dead skin cells at the moment, its the after effect that will do more harm than good.

Avoid harsh scrubs!

After using a harsh scrub, your irritated skin will dry up and die. This in turn produces more dead skin cells a few hours later, and then pimples form. To minimize this effect, people have resorted to using toners and moisturizers in order to keep their skin from drying up.

Medium scrubs are hard to find, you will know that you have a medium scrub if after scrubbing your face is slightly flush for a minute or two, and then returns to normal. Medium scrubs will be the most recommended scrub, because they tend to eliminate the most dead skin cells without producing new ones. It is recommend to *very* lightly massage the face with this scrub.

Light scrubs are similar to soap and use chemicals to disloge the dead skin cells and impurities. In theory, they would work great if the chemicals they used didn’t irritate and dry the skin. The chemicals are absorbed by your skin and continue to eat away at it even after your wash it off. These scrubs are to be avoided entirely.

Green Tea to Help with Acne Scars

Up until recently, I was never a big fan of coffee or tea. That’s why I was surprised to learn that you can take green tea to clear acne scars. I disliked both but the promise of getting rid of scars made me search for higher quality teas. Originally I was taking green tea extracts for acne and that seemed to help. So I was trilled when I found that the tea purchased in local health stores is often much better tea and seems to have a much more prominent effect on my skin.

Recommended Tea to Treat Acne scars

However, the ‘real’ teas (the one you can buy at certain specialized tea shops that I find in Chinatown) are MUCH better. I find that drinking 2-3 glasses of green or white tea helps to cleanse my body, which is important for fighting acne. The reason that tea helps so much is that it has a high concentration of antioxidents which cleanse your system. It also helps you relax which also very important for clear skin. If you’re an adult and not drinking green tea, I would recommend you start immediately.

There are also other teas such as kombucha tea which have live bacterias which can be helpful. These will improve digestion and mineral absorption. Unfortunately, it is a bit more difficult to make kombucha tea and I have to settle for green tea that I can buy at the health store. Please take note that red, black and white tea are also beneficial for acne, and in some cases might even surpass green tea’s effect.

Finishing the Treatment

When you’re concentrating on reducing acne scars, make sure that you eat a balanced, healthy diet. The food that you eat will be used to rebuild your body, so choose your construction blocks wisely. Make sure you’re getting plenty of vitamin C and E from fruits and vegetables when you’re performing your acne scar treatment and you will see much faster results.

History of Herbal Remedies in the fight against acne

Herbal medicine has been used for thousands of years to combat acne, as it was the first form of medicine ever adopted by our world. Throughout the years, generations have narrowed down which herbs are the most effective against pimples and now they can be conveniently purchased from the local health shop.

The most common herbs used for acne

Some of the most commonly used herbs for acne are milk thistle, burdock root, neem, basil, sandalwood, elm bark, dandelion root and olive leaf. These herbs are usually blood cleansers and all work in slightly different ways. Milk thistle, for example, boosts liver action which consequently increases your body’s cleansing. Olive leaf extract act in a way that is similar to antibiotics and hinders the bad bacteria in your body so that your immune system can naturally cleanse it out.

• Milk Thistle
• Burdock root
• Neem
• Basil
• Sandalwood
• Elm bark
• Dandelion root
• Olive Leaf

Herbs are powerful for short periods of time

Although herbal acne treatments are powerful, your body will quickly become accustomed to the herbs being used and after 2 weeks, the effects will beging to die down. Within 3 weeks, human bodies get used to herbs and the effects fade away. In this sense, herbs are to be used as a temporary boost to your system and are not a permanent solution.

A recommendation when using herbs to cure acne

One way to increase the effectiveness of the herbs is to switch the type of herb every 2 weeks.

This way, your body will not get used to them as quickly. Even with this technique, acne herbal remedies are not a permament solutions.

Of course, people will soon realize that these topical creams do nothing against acne. Have you ever put cream on a pimple and have it magically disappear the next day? Of course not. What usually ends up happening is that the skin dries up in a massive & unhealthy way. Then the pimple ‘dies’ an ugly death, only to be avenged by 2-3 other pimples on the other side of your face. If anything, it seems that all the acne products and creams actually TRIGGER breakouts. Let’s be honest, your skin doesn’t like the creams, in fact, it gets irritated. When it gets irritated, you get more acne.

Now, I’m going to attempt to explain why using cream as a spot treatment on one side of your face can potentially trigger many other acne pimples.

Note: this is just a theory of mine.

My theory on Acne Products and Merchandise

We all know that skin absorbs whatever it comes into contact with. Using that logic, we can assume that the antibacterial solution that is inside every acne cream will be propagated throughout your entire face through your blood vessels. Therefore, for a little while (until the solution dilutes to a point where it is no longer effective), your entire face will have this ‘antibiotic’ fighting p. acne.

Immediately after, there will be a rebound effect where all the supressed acne bacteria will replenish, in larger quantities than before. Finally, you breakout. The trick to figthing acne is to keep everything in balance. If you’re using acne creams, its like breathing on a fire, the flames will subside momenteraly, but the fire will come right back at you, stronger than before.

So what do can I can’t use cream based products against acne?

Well that’s pretty simple, basically the best thing to use against acne is, (brace yourself), water.

Yes, H20, water has been found to be the best way to control acne in the long run. If you really want to get that ‘clean’ feeling and get all the dirt off, you can use this special (ok its not special, its pretty basic) technique: Splash warm water on your face (pores open), splash cold water on your face (pores close), splash warm water on your face (pores open) and finally splash your face with cold water one last time.

There, its done, your face is now washed and it cost you about $0.00 (unless you live in Europe where that amount of water cost you 250 euros). At least now your skin won’t breakout.

But I REALLY need to use a product on my face!

Ok, if you MUST use a product on your face, I will tell you which ones to avoid. Whatever you do (seriously), DO NOT BUY USE A PRODUCT WHICH IS AIMED AT FIGHTING ACNE. If it says: “for acne prone skin” then DONT USE IT. Also, avoid anything that’s antibacterial for the reasons previously mentioned. A good soap that I found was goat milk’s soap, which can be found at health stores.

Exceptions to the no-acne-product-rule

Ok ok, there is ONE exception (sorta). The only situation where cream will actually work is if you completely overload your face with cream. Now in my opinion, this will be seriously detrimental to your health and I do NOT recommend this. What Dan talks in his regimen is applying a ridiculous amount of cream *everywhere* on your face on a daily basis. Applying an obscene amount of cream will mean your face entire will take longer to completely dilute it into your blood stream and process it (through your liver? yeah, that sounds really healthy). Therefore, for 24 hours, the acne will be under control.

The drawback is that your skin will be extremely reddish and irritated from this. To counter the reddish effect, you must use intensive moisturizer to lessen the effects.
Now after about 3-4 years of this, your liver will probably be roting and your skin will be paper thin, so you better wear sunscreen or your face might catch fire when you’re out in the sun.

Enough said, I do NOT recommend applying this much cream (or any for that matter) on your face. All you’re doing is making other people rich and hurting yourself in the progress (sort of like cigarettes)

To summarize, there have been many people that have been very successful in using only water to treat their acne. I suggest that you try it for a while instead of spending more money on acne products that you really don’t need.

So whenever I do start my anti-acne regimen, I always refer to the day I do the facial cleansing. Starting at this step, it takes about 1 week for me to clear up.

In a nutshell, what I do is steam my face for approximately 10 minutes, then I gently wash face with baking soda and finally I apply a half ACV/half water solution on my face as a toner, then I go to sleep. This gets rid of pimples so fast you’ll be wondering why you haven’t done this before.

Steaming for Acne, the Process

1. Boil water in a tea kettle or pot, whichever. When the water is boiling, put it in a plastic container that’s as big as your head and shallow… think a Tupperware container that’s long and shallow.
2. Quickly put salt in the water, put a tower covering your head and the plastic container (so steam doesn’t get out) and then let the steam rise to your face for 10 minutes. The salt is to lower the boiling point and cause more steam… so you can use table salt, it doesn’t make a difference. WARNING, DO NOT TOUCH THE BOILING WATER WITH YOUR FACE! I shouldn’t even have to say that… but I felt I should. Don’t get too close to the water so it hurts. EXTRA tips: sit down when you do this, use straws to breathe if the steam is too much to breath in, play a bit of music in the background (after about 3 tracks you’re done usually since most songs are like 3-4 minutes long.
   baking soda
3. Run to bathroom, splash a bit of water on your face (not freezing, but something to refresh your face a bit) JUST A BIT, DONT OVERDO THIS. One or two splashes!
4. Put baking powder in a bowl and put a bit of water (I use bottled water because tap water has toxins and I don’t want those on my face) JUST put a bit of water, the trick is to have the powder wet so you can put it on your face. Usually I actually prepare this BEFORE steaming. Then very GENTLY rub/massage your face with the baking powder. This should be done right after your splash when your skin is still warm and pores are open. This cleans off all the ‘bad’ stuff that’s been released by steaming. However, it’s basic and that’s not great for the skin.
5. Rinse off the baking powder!
6. Mix half ACV & half bottled water (I also prepare this before steaming)and apply it all over your face. This is a very good toner for me, I let this dry and then go to sleep! I find it has a tiny odor so I only put this on at night, but my skin loves this.

That’s it!

How long does it take to get rid of acne?

The next day you can EXPECT to have 1-2 smaller pimples come out, whatever, it’s stuff that was going to come out anyways, you just made it come out faster.The amazing thing is that the day AFTER that it gets much better, and the day AFTER that your skin looks amazing. All because of the home made facial acne treatment. I still remember learning about how to get rid of acne, trying everything that seemed like it could work. Out of all the treatments I’ve tried, this is by far the best thing!

So what did I do ? I set out to search what could possibly trigger my acne and I made a list of all the items I suspected worsened my acne.

Here was my own personal list of potential acne causes:

• Chocolate bars
• Chips & salsa sauce
• Soft drinks(soda) & Ice tea
• M&Ms
• Mouthwash
• Stress
• Lack of sleep
• Poutines (Fries and cheese)
• Subs
• Wraps
• Gum
• Cookies
• Orange juice
• Pastries
• Ice cream
• Nuts

Evaluation of the acne breakouts list:

I suspected a lot of things promoted acne, and a lot of those foods were really enjoyable! I didn’t really want to give them up, at least not completely, especially not for a homemade acne treatment! Not to mention I didn’t even have any hard evidence that these foods flared up my acne… I mean, I have eaten these things before without getting acne, so why would I assume they are harmful now. Not to mention, tons of people eat it those things and never get acne!

Something must be wrong.

But at the same time… I can vaguely recall eating those goodies in excess and then having a breakout 1-2 days later… what’s happening?

Digestive track and acne

Well for me, because I have a poor digestive track (probably due to doing Accutane, the worst acne remedy), I have to watch out for foods that would otherwise ‘clog up’ my system. In a healthy body, you eat, absord all the necessary nutrients from the food and then expell the trash. However, what happens if I clog up my system is that the trash stays in my body for longer periods of time. This is not healthy. Imagine leaving chinese food out for 2 days in your home, what kind of odor would it have.

Now the foods from the list that ‘clogged’ up my system were subs (with soggy bread and meat), poutine (fries and cheese), chicken wraps and pastries. All these foods would just sit in my system for days, reducing my bowel time (time it takes to go to the washroom) to days instead of something like a regular 12-24 hours.

Now, if you have a good digestive system, ignore these things as they aren’t likely to affect you at all! Make this remedy your own by adapting it to your body, not mine.

Sugar and my acne triggers

Next on the my homemade trigger list: the sugars. Soft drinks, M&Ms (my favorite candy), chocolate, orange juice, ice cream, cookies. Now the reason sugar affects me is not because of the sugar itself… but because of the reaction my body has to the sugar. Anyone doubting this should read the best seller “The Perricone prescription” book.

I dont think that sugar is bad, but excessive amounts affects me. How much is excessive? That depends from person to person, in my case, it’s fairly low.

Environmental acne triggers

Now, what about the mouthwash & gum ? Well, the mouthwash was one of those weird catalyts that everyone has at home … when I started taking some on a regular basis, I noticed that I would break out near my mouth. And although I dont have any studies to back this up (hey, if I dont have anything, I’ll tell you straight up) but there’s a reason they say: “DO NOT SWALLOW” and not to give it to children. It’s because it’s not good for you! Of course I dont swallow it, but there is some mouthwash that remains in my mouth even after rinsing, and that gets absorbed through the linings in my mouth.

What about the gum?

Well… 90% of it has aspartame, which is renowed to be a poizon in high quantities. For some reason, I believe I am more sensitive to these things than regular people who do not have acne, and therefore I have to avoid it while others can go and chew on it all day. It’s a personal thing, what causes acne for me might be different for you so it’s up to you to figure out exactly what triggers your acne and then keep that list handy.

My all Natural Cure for Acne

Whenever I get a break out I do this for one week and my acne clears up. I usually end up doing this for two weeks just to be sure, and then I go into maintenance mode. My maintenance mode involves doing the exact same things as the homemade recipes for acne cure, except instead of doing them daily, I do them every 2-3 days.

Also, the great thing is that I can cheat and drink a soda after, or have a chocolate bar, chips, etc. Of course, I can’t return to eating trash all day, but why would I want to do that?

Natural Acne Treatment:

1. Eliminate all ‘bad’ foods
2. Steam
3. Eat 1 small portion of salmon per day
4. Drink 1 lemon water mixture per day
5. Drink 1 ACV water mixture per day
6. Get 15-25 minutes of sun per day
7. Vitamin C per day

Extra Acne Treatments Tips

Now along the years, I’ve discovered a few more things which really seem to make a difference in my acne. They aren’t really crucial to my regime, but I figured it could help some people and it would be worthwhile to mention them.

First, the most important thing when starting a treatment is to stick with it. Regardless of what treatment you choose, if you don’t go through with it, then you’ll never know if it works or not. This is especially important with the all natural treatment because if you don’t eliminate the ‘bad foods’, then you won’t see the full benefit of it.

Second, when starting natural acne treatments, it’s important to log and keep track of your progress. You should be taking notes on a daily basis of the improvement (or lack of) of the treatment. That way, you’ll see if you’re improving or not after a week. If you aren’t, then it’s time to change something!

Now, pimples usually take a day or so to fully appear, but for this article, we’ll concentrate on the first moment you notice you have a pimple ‘growing’ on your face.

Does your acne ‘pop up’ at different times of the day? In different places? What are the triggers?

Morning Acne – Possible Cause and Effect

Being chronological, we’ll start by morning pimples. You wake up in the morning, walk to the mirror (actually, you don’t even need to walk to the mirror, you can feel them on your face by making weird smiles) and you see that you have a few new pimples to start the day.

So what’s the likely cause of these morning pimples? Because you sleep a whole 8 hours, it can be a multitude of things.

Pillow Acne

Possible cause #1. One of them is often that you simply get really warm while sleeping, perspire more than usual and your blocked pores are rubbing in your oily pillow. You therefore get a pretty much the idea conditions for pimples to form.

The solution ?

Before going to sleep, wash your face with water (do the warm/cold/warm/cold wash) and then go to sleep on your back. Yes, it takes some getting used to for many, but force yourself to sleep exclusively on your back. That way, your face won’t rub on your pillow throughout the night. It will also be a lot cooler and your face won’t ‘perspire’ as much if its exposed to open air.

Acne caused by Excess Waste

Possible cause #2. Another factor that affects morning acne is that you didn’t spend all your energy the night before. Therefore, throughout the entire night your body has to do something with those calories you didn’t spend. Its like if you put a log in a fire, and then you put the fire out… You end up with having a log. But your body can’t just have a log sitting inside of it. It has to expel anything it doesn’t use. And since your skin is the biggest organ, it expels it through your skin. Have you ever exercised a lot in a day, and gone to bed completely tired? Usually the next day, you wake up with a bit less acne. The opposite is true too, have you ever ate tons of sugar before going to bed? Yeah, the next morning isn’t pretty.

The solution?

Go to bed tired, make sure you do enough physical activity throughout the day, watching TV or being in front of the computer before bed doesn’t count.

Acne caused by indigestion

Possible cause #3. Finally, because you’re sleeping for 8 hours, it can also be indigestion, if you didn’t have any bowel movements during the day, chances are you have food just sitting in your stomach, and it needs to be expelled.

The solution?

If that’s the case, eat an 2-3 apples in the morning. This simple step will improve your daily digestion immensely and you should start seeing results shortly.

Now obviously there are many more causes of acne that were not mentioned, but if any of these seem to be part of your life, then definitely pay special attention to them. It’s by noticing what affects you that you will eventually overcome your acne.

As we all know, having a clear, well functioning system is good for acne. So I imagined that having an all fruit diet for my acne would be a good thing. Unfortunately, as the saying goes, too much of anything is not good.

Too Many Fruits Can Cause Acne

What happens when you eat too much fruit is that you get a lot of sugar which promotes candida growth. Not only that, but having a high fruit diet makes your body very acidic. This is completely the opposite of what we want! Since this discovery I have opted to eat more green vegetables, which do not produce candida overgrowth and alkanize your body instead.

Here’s a list of fruits that have been known to be especially helpful for acne:

• Avocado
• Kiwi
• Apples
• Oranges
• Grapes / Raisins
• Pears
• Grapefruit

Just make sure you don’t add sugar!

Adding fruits to your daily regimen is one of the most beneficial things you can do. It improves digestion, cleans out your system, hydrates you and provides you with many vitamins which are essential. The trick is not to overdo it. I usually try to eat 2 portions of fruit per day, usually apples or oranges. If you’re going to eat fruits for acne, make sure to balance it with a lot of green vegetables as well.

Zenmed’s herbs

In terms of usage, I have found that Zenmed’s herb capsules are the best ones and are the most efficient (seriously, they were good stuff). However, they are pricey and only worked for me for about 2 weeks. Afterward, the effects wore off.

If you do venture off in the Zenmed zone, remember that you really don’t need to buy the whole system, just the capsules will do. I have found they they are better than the arcadia herbs for acne and skin conditions.

Nature’s way AKN did help but wasn’t as strong as Zenmed’s.

And finally, Skin & Hair helped a lot and I was able to use it for a longer period of time. I suspect it is because one of the main ingredients inside is MSM and this is actually something that our body needs on a regular basis.

“I’ve been taking Nature’s way Skin & Nails supplement for a while now, the main ingredient is MSM and I really didn’t think it would help that much, but to my surprise, it has A LOT. MSM is responsible or a lot of things happening in your body and this whole formula has helped me tremendously. Also, I’ve been taking it for 4 weeks and the effects don’t die off like other herbal supplements I’ve taken. I suspect it’s because it’s providing me with more than just herbs.“

My recommendation is, if you’re going to try to take herbs for acne, first start by researching them. You’ll hear a ton of people talking about how great they are… but remember that the effect is temporary. The last herb for acne that I haven’t mentioned yet, but is extremely useful is milk thistle. I’ll have an entire post dedicated to it shortly, that’s how good it is.