Life as a teenager is never easy. There's the struggle with self image, self esteem, self doubt and finding you own identity. Not to mention there is always the unavoidable cruelty and judgement of other teens if you're a little "different". That's what made growing up with acne so hard for me, and I'm sure for the countless other teenagers out there afflicted with persistent facial acne. Teen Acne: My Story My lifelong battle (hence far) started at the ripe young age of 14. Up until then I had enjoyed the even toned, glowing and blemish free skin of youth. Just when looks started to really matter to me, and for that matter to all of my adolescent peers, I experienced my first acne breakout. I was in a frenzy. How cruel could nature be? Wasn't it enough that I was filling out, growing breasts and becoming a mature, curvy "woman" all of a sudden? Adding to this sudden onslaught of a hormonally charged set of physical changes seemed like more than I could handle. Especially when the "first little breakout" never went away, and consistently got worse no matter what I used on my face. What started as a few pimples localized only to my chin began to manifest itself in deeper, more cyst-like pustules that were actually painful, and began to disseminate to my nose, forehead and cheeks like wildfire. My hormones had taken off full throttle in a matter of a few weeks, and by the time I turned 15, I had already been living with moderate to severe acne for several months. To add insult to injury, apparently I was one of the first teens in my small ninth grade class to actually have real (and very noticeable) problems with acne. Of course, my classmates were soon to follow, but up until then I was the unlucky "pioneer" of the teen acne acedemic! I was a painfully shy teen to begin with, so adding chronic and many times severe acne to my situation only made me more self conscious. I remember countless days of waking up with an especially bad skin day, most of the time pinpointed to certain times in my menstrual cycle, and not wanting to go to school simply because I felt as though I looked like a "freak" or a "monster". I completely withdrew myself from socialization in most cases, making my high school years barely tolerable. I'm not blaming all of my high school angst on acne, but it certainly added to my already negative perception of myself. It made me feel outwardly ugly and ashamed of who I was. I do feel that acne had a profound impact on my self image during high school, and prevented me from enjoying my youth time and time again. Silly? Maybe, but I think we all know how rough adolescence can be already. Something like acne can really exacerbate any self esteem and socialization issues during this awkward period of adjustment. The Acne Treatments Available "Back Then" I tried all of the over the counter acne creams, cleansers and cleansing pads, but to no avail. None of them worked on my skin to clear the acne. In fact, back in the late eighties and early nineties, most over the counter acne products were very harsh and drying. Needless to say, many times I ended up with dry, red peeling skin on top of acne bumps. Couple that with awkward teenage makeup application and the heavy powders and foundations that were available back then (when a matte finish was the makeup style), and what you have is not a pretty sight. I could get into my vicious cycle of dermatologist administered treatments starting at the age of sixteen, but that is just whole different article all together. The bottom line is, many of the treatments available only address the problem of acne temporarily, and become worthless once treatment is stopped. They also have side effects. Let's just say, I'm glad I now enjoy virtually pimple free skin at the age of 31 through a series of hit and miss acne treatments, I think I've finally found my "true skin". |
