Natural Treatments for Acne

How I Treated my Acne Naturally, Yes it works!So, for years, YES YEARS, I struggled with constant, aggravating, painful adult acne. Did I mention it was constant? I’d have oily skin and new pimples developing as the old cystic acne healed (which took FOREVER). My skin was a landmine of dark spots from the old pimples healing, whiteheads, puss filled pimples, basically the full cystic acne spectrum and it had me down. Nothing I tried to treat acne worked. I never even considered I could treat acne naturally or thought about natural skincare for acne because my skin was so bad.

I tried ALL the fancy skincare routines, literally spending hundreds of dollars on anything and everything, at one point I even cut dairy from my diet in desperation.

Then, one day as my boyfriend watched me do my conventional nightly skincare routine of cleanse, mask, peel (obvi not every night lol), serum, moisturizer etc etc etc he said, “have you ever thought that maybe all that crap you use everyday isn’t helping, why don’t you just try not using it all?”

(He’s one of those people that just splashes a bit of water and calls it a day).

I scoffed, “all my serums are good for my skin!” But in the back of my head I thought maybe I should look into it….after all it had literally been about 10 years at this point that I had been struggling with cystic acne for. Clearly my $100 a month addiction to all the fancy Sephora serums wasn’t doing me any favors or treating my acne.

The Toxic Skincare Spiral

I was in a skincare spiral, using one thing to dry my skin out and then another to moisturize it…there was so much that I didn’t understand about how all the ingredients worked together, or consider that all the fragrances, synthetic ingredients and toxic ingredients in these products were actually clogging my skin up and CAUSING my acne and skin issues. (Don’t forget that there is basically no federal regulation about the safety of skincare products, so you need to do that work and make sure that what you are putting on your skin isn’t going to give you irritations, rashes, allergy’s, disrupt your endocrine system, or worst case, cancer ?)

The Revelation: Natural Skincare Works!

So, I decided to give a simple skincare routine a try and started digging & researching everything I could find on treating acne naturally, with natural products and non toxic skincare. Could I heal my skin with a few natural ingredients? Did natural skincare for acne work? What I found as I was becoming *obsessed* with treating acne with natural and non toxic skincare was that its also important to address what causes acne.

A Few HUGE Pointers About Treating Adult Acne Came Up Over & Over. These are my favourite NATURAL Treatments for Acne:

  1. People with acne need to treat their skin delicately! Over scrubbing (guilty), over exfoliation (guilty) – its not doing you any favors. It will only further inflame your skin and possibly spread the bacteria from existing pimples.
  2. Reducing Inflammation is SUPER Important. Skin that is angry because you are putting harsh products on it (salicylic acid and benzoyl peroxide anyone? – these are two of the major HARSH ingredients in most acne treatments and since they dry your skin will also contribute to premature wrinkles). Again, guilty of both!
  3. MOISTURIZE that skin!! Almost all acne treatments are obsessed with DRYING your skin out to reduce oil. THIS DOES NOT WORK! When your skin is dry, you know what it does? It produces OIL. Always have a grease slick on your forehead by noon? I know I always did. The oily skin stopped when I addressed properly moisturizing my skin. Read on for the details!
  4. Drink all the water – proper hydration is key for a healthy life really and your skin reflects whats going on internally. I could get into full diet here, but I won’t, just make sure you are drinking at least 8 cups of water a day, if not more. (Especially if you are a caffeine addict).
  5. Lifestyle: get sweaty at least a few times a week! One of the major causes of Acne is hormones and exercise is a proven way to help regulate your endocrine system.
  6. More Lifestyle…One of the easiest natural remedies for hormonal acne: keep your products crunchy (non toxic)! Synthetic fragrances & chemicals that are rampant in mainstream beauty products can throw off your hormones. Unfortunately, hormones are a major source of acne :/

*Sidenote: as mentioned I became obsessed with what causes acne and how to treat acne naturally, so I compiled all the results into an ebook – If you are interested for a more in an in-depth guide to treating acne click here click here *

What Causes Acne?

This is good to understand in order to help understand how to treat acne. Its so difficult to treat acne because the root cause is not the same for everyone which makes it super frustrating to pinpoint. According to the mayo clinic the basic cause of acne is  “when your hair follicles become plugged with oil and dead skin cells”.  Ok, yeah but what causes the oil? Medical News Today writes about how bacteria on the skin infect the hair follicles “Propionibacterium acnes (P. acnes) is the name of the bacteria that live on the skin and contributes to the infection of pimples.”

Ok, but why do some people have the bacteria and not others? Hormones…Medical News Today continues “rising androgen levels cause the oil glands under the skin to grow. The enlarged gland produces more sebum. Excessive sebum can break down cellular walls in the pores, causing bacteria to grow.” Ok, what else can cause oily skin? It can be as simple as what you are putting on your skin! Remember, skin needs to be treated gently, which brings me to the next point, my home remedies for pimples and oily skin! Are you ready for the tried & tested Acne Treatment? Great, keep reading!

The Best Natural Acne Treatment

Just so you know its not like one day I just did this and it all cleared up – there was about a year of tweaking/adding/removing parts of it and this is the final product. I’ve been working on my routine to treat acne naturally for a year now, and am 98% acne free (I get the ODD pimple like one every 3 months now which is a far cry from the 2-3 new pimples I used to have daily). Point being, it can take some trial and error, so do not give up!

How I Healed My Cystic Acne Naturally, Yes it Worked!

Natural Moisturizer for Acne Prone Skin

A huge revelation i’ve had while switching from traditional skincare to natural skincare has been how simple it is and the power of simple ingredients. Upon researching how to treat acne, one of the crucial pieces of the puzzle was moisturizing my skin. Usually, people with acne think they need to dry out their oily skin because the oil causes the acne. Here’s the thing, the skin GETS OILIER when we try to dry it out! Its a natural response from our skin to try and lubricate itself to protect it from cracking. So, that means that if we are super gentle and moisturize our skin properly it will produce LESS OIL, and then less acne will follow!

The best way I’ve found to moisturize my skin has been jojoba oil. Its AHMAZING. Jojoba oil is a GREST natural moisturizer for acne prone skin because it is the closest oil to our skins natural sebum. That means it absorbs great and our skin then doesn’t go into overdrive producing more oil, because we are giving it what it needs already. I’ve already written a whole blog about the benefits of jojoba oil for skin, so if you want more info on this awesome moisturizer, go check that out.

My Morning Skincare Routine to Treat Acne Naturally With Non Toxic Skincare

Ok, this natural skincare for acne routine is actually SO SIMPLE! (Which is the beauty of it!)

  1. Wake up, rinse face with water in shower.
  2. Exfoliate skin in shower gently for about 15 seconds with my silicone face brush (so simple, yet so effective!) This addresses getting rid of dead skin which can clog pores and lead to pimples.
  3. Once out of shower, dry face.
  4. Moisturize with 4-5 drops of Jojoba Oil.  (Jojoba Oil is basically a magic moisturizer for the skin, it is the closet oil to natural sebum our skin produces itself. Click to read more about the benefit of jojoba oil on skin. Its been a major game changer for me.)
  5. Once the Jojoba Oil is absorbed put a light layer of Aloe Vera on skin. Aloe vera reduces inflammation and is an amazing moisturizer. This step is an important one.
  6. Continue with your regular skincare routine. (ie sunscreen, make up). I HIGHLY recommend using ONLY non toxic & natural products. You can check how safe your skincare products are at ewg.org/skindeep. If you are using toxic products, then your skin is going to have to constantly detox from these and will likely result in inflammation, bumps, whiteheads, blackheads or pimples.

How I Beat Acne With Natural & Non Toxic Skincare, Yes it works!

(click here to buy Jojoba Oil off Amazon and help support my blog 🙂 

My NIGHT Time Skincare Routine to Treat Acne Naturally with Non Toxic Skincare

My natural skincare for acne routine at night time is just as simple as the  morning one, that is key with natural skincare! Less is more when it comes to healthy, beautiful acne free skin.

  1. Cleanse with coconut oil. (TO DO: rub coconut oil on dry skin. Over your makeup – it will lift it off). Once the oil is rubbed all over your face, gently rub skin with a warm wet washcloth until face is clean of makeup.) This is a really great way of cleansing because it does not strip your skin of critical moisture which any type of cleanser with soap will do. Using the washcloth will also gently exfoliate your skin, removing dead skin and ensure pores stay unclogged which would otherwise lead to pimples, whiteheads or blackheads.
  2. Dry face
  3. Moisturize with 4-5 drops of Jojoba Oil.  (Jojoba Oil is basically a magic moisturizer for the skin, it is the closet oil to natural sebum our skin produces itself. To read more about the benefits of using Jojoba Oil click here. Its been a major game changer for me.)
  4. Once the Jojoba Oil is absorbed put a light layer of Aloe Vera over. Aloe vera reduces inflammation and is an amazing moisturizer. This step is an important one.
  5. Thats it, go to bed!

How I Beat Acne With Natural & Non Toxic Skincare, Yes it Works!

(click here to buy aloe vera off of Amazon and help support my blog 🙂 

Conclusion: Treat Acne Naturally

So, this is it, how I finally beat my acne with home remedies for pimples and blackheads for oily skin. It took me about 10 years of struggling with every product under the sun before I figured out how simple it is to treat acne naturally. Don’t do that, do this now and save yourself the hassle and heartache. Its important to know that everyones skin is different and what worked for me to treat acne naturally may not work for you. I know that the journey to healing acne can be frustrating, so hang in there and keep trying. Acne is not something you need to learn to live with, there will be a way to get rid of it once and for all!

If you are interested for a more in depth guide to treat acne naturally read this ebook on treating pimples and here are more natural skin care books 

I’d LOVE to hear how your journey is going and what works for you! My mission is to write about the best acne treatment, so feedback is widely appreciated so I can share more!

5 Responses

  1. Idara

    Great post! I’ve used honey and tea tree oil as a cleanser on my face in the morning and it has helped clear my acne along with cutting out sugar and dairy. Thank you for your inspiring story!

    Reply

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