It’s Acne Awareness Month, so let’s chat a little about hormonal acne. Hormonal acne can be frustrating, but understanding why it happens and how it relates to our cycles as females can be immensely helpful in treating and preventing it.
We recently published a video on Instagram explaining hormonal acne, and the relationship between our cycles, surging hormones and hormonal acne.
Each month, we uniquely have different levels of surging androgens (this is the parent hormone that creates testosterone). Testosterone is a key component for controlling our natural sebum (oil) production. As testosterone rises, our sebum production can rise and also can become stickier, which causes it to be harder to purge from our pores as combines with dead skin cells to form a thick, congesting network over our pores, leading to breakouts.
Below are some key pieces of managing hormonal acne:
1. Endogenous management of hormone levels (spironolactone, birth control, hormone modulators, etc.) is usually required to balance our levels of androgens from the inside out.
2. Topically, managing hormonal acne includes:
• Consistent, thorough cleansing, including double cleansing every evening.
• Keeping your pores clean and unclogged. I recommend 2% Salicylic Acid (SA).
Paula's Choice 2% SA is a fantastic salicylic acid product. I also recommend Emogene & Co. Renew Facial Toner for less frequent breakouts, as it is formulated at 0.75% SA, which is perfect for minimal breakouts. Hormonal acne, however, usually requires a stronger concentration closer to 2%.
• Regulating oil production by applying non-comedogenic moisturizers/facial oils to down-regulate our natural oil production.
Emogene & Co. Prime Niacinamide Serum and Repair Facial Oil are perfect for hormonal acne!
• Increasing cell turnover By increasing cell turnover, dead skin cells aren't able to reside under the dermis and combine with sticky sebum in our pores that traps dirt/impurities inside, which leads to breakouts.
Vitamin c, retinol, and retinol alternatives such as moth bean extract, bakuchiol, etc. are your best bets for cell turnover!
Have questions about hormonal acne? Shoot me an email at info@emogeneandco.com and as always, I'm happy to help!
