Your Acne Treatment Options
Acne is one of the most common skin disorders in the world today. It strikes people of all ages and races usually beginning in the teenage years. Over 60 million people in the U.S. are estimated to suffer from acne right now and, while many of them will look for over-the-counter acne solutions, only a small fraction of them ever seek professional help.
There are some strong opinions out there as to what causes acne breakouts. Some would say that stress causes acne. Others would claim environmental toxins are to blame. Diet, genetics, prescription medications, all at one time or another have been branded as primary causes for sudden acne breakouts. But that’s not really true. These things certainly can contribute to the number and severity of skin eruptions, but none of them are really the underlying cause.
Acne is caused by the over-production of oil in the skin’s sebaceous glands. These are miniscule glands that live in the pores of our skin. Their job is to manufacture the oil (or “sebum”) which in turn keeps our skin moist. It’s a perfectly natural phenomenon. But when we hit our teenage years, those little glands kick into overdrive because our hormone levels go through the roof. And our pores are literally loaded up with more oil than they can handle. That excess oil combines with loose skin cells and dirt to form an oily plug in our pores. These plugs then grow and grow and turn into either blackheads, pimples, or those bumpy nodes that seem to burrow deep under our skin, acne cysts.
Now everyone’s acne is a little different. There are a blessed few of us that never seem to suffer from even an initial acne breakout. Then there are some of us who experience severe and widespread acne breakouts across not only the face but the neck, arms, and back too (i.e. body acne). Most of us are somewhere in between but all of us find acne blemishes or even the thought of blemishes an uncomfortable or unhappy experience.
Because we all suffer differently from acne and breakouts, we all need to be careful about what we use to treat them with or how we try to prevent them. Home acne treatment can work, but real acne solutions are not about a single acne cream or drug store medication because they won’t necessarily work for everyone. To determine just how to clear acne often times requires some experimentation. Sometimes we need to try a few different products before we find one that works for our skin type the way we want. That can be a hassle and time-consuming but it’s the truth – sometimes that’s just what it takes to find the right acne solution for you.
In the end, you have a lot of acne treatment options to choose from. The trick is to be disciplined and diligent in your approach. Over time you can turn those options into solutions.
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