COMMON 10 MISTAKES MADE BY PEOPLE TRYING TO FIGHT ACNE

After Skinlycious has launched our anti-acne range products, we’ve gotten quite a few queries on acne-related skin care. I’ve compiled a list of mistakes that I’ve made in the past when I had acne in the hope that others do not repeat the same mistakes as me.

1) Squeezing Your Acne

DO NOT squeeze your acne. Yes, it is so tempting especially when they are “ripe” and you can see the whitish-yellow substance. However, squeezing will leave scars that are extremely difficult to treat. Just leave it alone, no matter how tempting.

Use spot treatment instead, like our acids-based Glow Exfoliant or vitamins-based Clarifying Serum that reduces acne overnight.

2) Not Using Moisturisers

People with acne usually have dehydrated skin. Dehydrated skin lacks of water. Because skin cannot product water, it will produce more sebum, leading to clogged pores/bumpy/textured skin.

Skinlycious oil-free Hydrating Serum adds and holds water in the skin with hyaluronic acids and amino acids. Once dehydrated skin is quenched, skin will be balanced and textured skin will be gone.

There’s also people with dry skin having acne. Skin dry can cause an excess build up of dead skin cells, leading to clog pores.

Skinlycious Barrier Booster Moisturizer and Balancing Facial Oil is perfect for acne-prone skin as it moistures without clogging pores. High in linoleic acid to balance the lower levels of linoleic acid that most acne skin has.

Barrier Booster Moisturizer also has skin-identical blend of ceramides, cholesterol and fatty acids to strengthen skin barrier and lock moisture in.

3) Washing Your Face Too Many Times A Day

Washing twice a day is sufficient. If you wash too often, you will tend to dry out your skin. Our body works such that they will compensate what they think it lacks of. That means, your excessive washing will cause your face to dry up and your face will generate more oil to compensate the dryness. The increased oil production will just make your acne condition worse. If you exercise and sweat a lot, you can wash your face after that but be sure to apply hydrating serum again after washing. Using a gentle cleanser that doesn’t make your skin feel dry and tight after washing is equally important as well.

4) Scrubbing You Face with Facial Scrub

Do not use those facial scrubs with granules to wash your face. The granules will actually aggravate your acne problem as it involves physical exfoliation. Previously, when I had acne, I was recommended by those beauty consultants to try out a tea tree scrub. I wasn’t knowledgable at that time and tried it. After using the scrub, my acne condition got worst though tea tree is suppose to help in acne.

Exfoliation by mild peeling induced by chemicals in low concentration, such as salicylic acid, is good for you skin. The faster skin cell turnover induced by mild peeling helps in healing. Our Glow Exfoliant combines Mandelic Acid and Salicylic Acid to exfoliate surface dead skin cells and dissolves the clogs in the pores. However, I would caution against using strong chemical peels. In the past, when I had acne, I went to a famous General practitioner(GP) that does aesthetic for my acne problem. She’s very popular in forums. Her clinics are always packed and there’s always a long waiting time. I can’t remember how many chemical peel sessions I went through with the doctor but I do remember that the chemical peels were increasingly stronger and after the last few sessions, my face was very red and flushes easily. The strong chemical peels left me with very sensitive skin. About after a year, I realised her treatments were not working for me and so I stopped going to her.

5) Using The Wrong Products

Use products with non-comedogenic ingredients. You can use our checklist here to weed out comedogenic ingredients, especially in make up.

Don’t use products that are too harsh, as that will mess up your skin barrier, leading to sensitive skin. Use gentle effective products.

Here at Skinlycious, all our products have been formulated and tested by acne fighters. They do not clog our pores. This family of gentle and effective products are all you need in a skincare routine.

6) Switching Products Too Soon

Some people are too impatient and they stop/switch products too soon. Many times, acne treatments don’t work as there’s no compliance and continuation. If you are trying out a new acne product, give yourself some time to assess if the products are working. A good timeframe is about a month. Here’s a post where you can understand the difference between allergic breakouts and purging. If you see improvements, continue to stick to it and you should see results. However, after a month, if your acne condition is getting worse, you should consider trying out other products or see a dermatologist.

7) Not Observing Good Hygiene

Here’s some general hygiene tips that you can observe when you have acne :
 Clean your hands before you wash your face.
 After washing your face, use a facial tissue to dry your face rather than a face towel as there might be a possibility that the face towel is accumulating bacteria. Spread the whole facial tissue over your face and press into your face gently, allowing the water to absorb. Don’t rub or try not to reuse the facial tissue on other parts as that might spread the acne bacteria to other parts of the face. I usually use two facial tissues to dry my face.
 Change your pillow case frequently.
 Clean your handphone using alcohol swabs regularly.
 Do not touch your face with your hands.
 Clean your make up brushes regularly.
I buy those bottle of alcohol disinfectant from drug stores such as Guardian, pour it on a facial tissue and uses that to clean my make up brushes and handphone. More lifestyle and acne tips here

8) Not Using Sunscreen

We all know that the sun causes premature aging of the skin. By not using sunscreen, we are putting ourselves at risk of developing wrinkles, pigmentation, and saggy skin. A lot of acne products work by exfoliation so our skin is actually thinner while we are on acne treatments. If sunscreen is not applied, the risk of premature aging, especially pigmentation, is even higher when our skin is thin.

Use Skinlycious Mineral Sunscreen SPF 47PA+++. Determined not to use chemical screens in our products, our founder, Jasmine, spent 1.5 years breakout out before discovering this formula that doesn’t breakout her acne-prone skin. Other than ZnO and TiO2, Skinlycious sunscreen also contains olive leaf extract and allantoin to protect and soothes skin.

If you don’t already know, chemical screens have been found in the bloodstream and breastmilk after application. Hence, we only use mineral screens.

9) Using Blotting Paper All The Time

This is the same theory as not using hydrators or using too harsh cleansers. Blotting away the oil on our face will make us feel better due to the reduced shine but this will actually trigger more oil production. Our skin will think that there’s not enough oil and compensate by increasing oil production.
Blotting paper will also spread the acne bacteria to other parts of your face unless you discard it once you have used it on one area of the face.
The best way is to use a facial tissue and dab your face to remove the oil. Facial tissue does not remove oil that much but it takes away the shine. You can double fold the facial tissue into a square, and use each square to dab oil away on one section of the face. Turn over to the other side and use the clean side to dab a new area. There’s a total of 4 clean squares you can use to dab oil off your face.

10) Using Peel-off Pore Strips

Not all of us suffer from serious acne. Some of us do have chronic blackheads/whiteheads, especially on our nose. Some of us use those pore strips to strip out the comedones. Although pore strips unclog the pores, the ripping movement leaves our pores open and make it more susceptible for bacteria to enter, leading to outbreaks. Using these kind of pore strips will cause our pores to be enlarged as well, making it more susceptible to more clogging. Pore strips also remove the skin of its essential oils, prompting it to produce more oil.
Skinlycious Glow Exfoliant can be used to unclog pores and remove blackheads/whiteheads. 

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