BFRB Positivity

1. Having cystic acne is not your fault! It’s not some sort of failure, and no amount of face-washing would have saved you from the bacteria. Contrary to what people will try and tell you, you are not unclean.

From years of experience, here are the techniques that have helped me the most! TW: Skin Picking

1. Band-Aids! Creates a physical barrier between nails and the picking spot. Seals in the wound to help prevent infection, and is a great reminder to let yourself heal. 

2. Short Nails! I know that long nails can be beautiful, but for those of us who suffer from skin-picking compulsions, they make it easier to dig a deeper wound. Added bonus: Short nails help with typing!

3. Fidgets! I love a good fidget, find one that suits you! I really love fidgets that are disguised as jewelry, like spinner rings and bracelets, since they are both helpful and aesthetic!

4. Moisturizer! When skin is moisturized, it becomes soft and unsatisfying to pick at. This will also help heal old problem spots (do not put in open wounds).

5. Positive Self Affirmation! I cannot stress this one enough. Skin Picking can get better, do not lose hope! Even larger and deeper wounds will heal. There is nothing wrong with your scars, they are a sign you have let that spot heal. If you’re bothered by them there are plenty of options from creams to lasers. You are not alone! Celebrate those little victories!

Cystic acne is one of the hardest type of acne to deal with and I’ve experienced it myself. After a long time of dealing with it, I finally found a way to stop them from appearing and make them go away as fast as possible. I still get a cystic pimple here and there, usually around my period, but it goes away quite fast. This routine worked for me, but I’m sure that it will help you too.

If you tend to get very painful, red, inflamed acne that doesn’t have a ‘head’ and it’s deep inside the skin, you probably have cystic acne. It’s caused by clogged pore that gets inflamed or infected and develops into a painful bump that spreads the infection on your skin, causing more acne. It can stay on your skin even for months. No one is really sure what causes cystic acne, but it can be caused by hormone imbalance, inflammation, bacteria and it can also be genetic.

A dermatologist would usually recommend you some kind of harmful medication such as accutane, birth-control pills or very drying face cream. These things can help you, but it can make you acne much worse before it starts working.

So here is what I’ve done to make my cystic acne go away:

• Topical treatments don’t work

If you try to put a spot treatment on your cystic acne, it will not do anything because acne is deep inside the skin and it can even make it worse by drying out the top layer of your skin and preventing it from fading away. It’s important to know that cystic acne isn’t caused by oil (sebum), so drying out your skin won’t work. So avoid putting any kind of stop treatments, clay masks or soap on the area where you get cystic acne.

• Hydration

Hydration is very important, on the inside and on the outside. You need to use a very hydrating moisturizer and drink a lot of water during the they. When I started drinking 2 liters (68 oz) of water with lemon juice, I started to see results only after one week, and it really helped me the most.

• Avoid dairy, sugar, processed and junk food

Good diet is really important here because cystic acne can also be a sign that there is something wrong inside your body. Maybe it’s hormonal imbalance from drinking milk, or you’re eating a lot of sugar. Find out which of these foods are you eating and try to cut them out. I know it can be a hard thing to do, but you can at least try to see more results. Also, drink more vitamins and eat more healthy fats, vegetables and fruits. Listen to your body and do what feels right.

• Don’t touch or try to pop your acne

In most cases, it’s not really possible to pop out cystic acne. It will only get more inflamed and spread the bacteria through your skin, therefore causing more acne.

• De-stress

Don’t stress over your acne and the way your skin looks right now, it can be the cause why you’re even getting it. Find the way to de-stress during the day, listen to music, read, write, meditate, paint, go for a run or walk. Find what works for you and set a positive mindset during stressful moments so that you don’t get even more stressed.

• Sleep

You need to get at least 7 h of sleep every night because your body repairs itself while you’re sleeping, so it can help with your acne as well.

• Be patient

It will probably take at least one month to get rid of cystic acne this way, so you need to be patient and follow all of these steps at all times, even after you get rid of acne to stop them from coming back. If you don’t see any kind of results after a month, see your dermatologist and listen to them. I’m not a professional and I can’t guarantee you that these steps will help you, but it helped me, so you can at least try it out to see if it works for you.

Most people have a couple of scars from childhood playground scrapes; oven burns that never healed; cuts from sports injuries. I have one on my left knee from skidding on the gritty concrete of my primary school playground during a game of rounders, an injury so common that a number of my classmates can boast sporting a similar injury. It’s not my only scar, however. My skin is a perfect pointillism portrait of every cat scratch, chicken pock, bug bite and grazed knee I have ever had. I have excoriation disorder, also known as dermotillomania.

Dermotillomania is an obsessive-compulsive type disorder whereby sufferers compulsively pick at perceived imperfections in their skin, such as spots or bug bites- some people will pick at skin that has absolutely nothing wrong with it. This sets it apart from other mental illnesses in that it is easily one of the more physically obvious ones, yet it’s one of the least well known.