Period Acne: How to deal with hormonal breakouts
Post contains affiliate linksOh periods - it’s not enough that some of us get painful cramps (even before your period starts), intense cravings for everything in the fridge, bloat like crazy - the list goes on. But some of us also have to deal with period acne as well!
This stems from our hormones in our menstrual cycle, which again is enough for the average person, but for some of us it can be even worse for many different reasons. Acne in general can just generally get worse during our period, can’t catch a break can we?
Most period acne that appears just before your cycle and during, is most likely because aunt flo has come knocking and then it suddenly clears up when your period finishes - great, a week of sometimes painful acne!
Our hormones naturally fluctuate throughout the month and during our cycle, with certain conditions such as Polycystic ovaries, our hormones can really skyrocket or dip really low, breaking us out, giving us some of those painful spots as well and maybe a chin hair or two - just me?!
There are a whole bunch of different types of blemishes, some of the most common ones are blackheads (those lovely little things live on my nose rent free), pustules - the ones with a little yellow top filled with pus (sounds sexy doesn’t it) and nodules forming under the skin, don’t tend to have a head and take forever to leave your face.
I currently have one by my ear and think it may have taken a mortgage out at how long it has been there - granted I irritated it - which you should never do - I tell myself off every time for doing this but habit hey. Lesson number 1 folks, never pick your skin.
Hormones, and even chocolate, can cause period acne
Why does it flare up before your period you ask? Hormones baby, hormones. That is why. Our hormones fluctuate throughout our menstrual cycle and just before our period begins, estrogen and progesterone levels drop. This in turn can cause our sebaceous glands to create more sebum (that oily stuff) and too much of that can clog up our pores and create breakouts.
I personally suffer from blackheads, they seem to really love me and love to overstay their welcome and even come back once I have kicked them out. So you see, not only the gift of hormones gives you sore breasts, PMS and the ability to devour a giant Dairy milk chocolate (or block of cheese) it is also partly responsible for the acne that has kindly graced your face. Speaking of chocolate..I know we want to eat every cake in sight, but all the extra sugar we may consume around and on our period can cause us to break out even more. It doesn’t cause acne per say but it can certainly aggravate it.
Try to limit your extra snacks as much as you can, I know how hard it is to resist - I want to eat the world in the run up to my monthly cycle!
How to get rid of period acne?
How can we help our skin during this time? Most period acne tends to appear around our chins, jawline (often known as our hormonal area) and sometimes our cheeks and it isn’t really something we can entirely control, as it is caused by internal factors. However, we can help our skin by doing a few things:
#1 Avoid touching your skin
Doing this just adds more bacteria from the handrail you may have just touched or the door handle you just used. As mentioned earlier, please please do your best to not pick the blemishes, it can cause scarring and your purse a whole lot more money buying other products to try and reduce the damage!
#2 Keeping good skin hygiene
in general can help prevent period acne, also it is just really good daily practice - you would be surprised how much dirt is on our skin even when we aren’t wearing makeup. Ingredients such as Glycolic and Lactic acid help skin cell turnover which can help prevent our pores becoming blocked - no one likes that for their pores.
#3 Take your make-up off
As always don’t forget to do this so that you don’t irritate the already existing visitors on your skin.
The best remedies for period acne
One of my go to Glycolic acid products is The Ordinary Acid 7% Toning Solution and I sometimes combine it with The Ordinary Lactic Acid 10% + HA 2% which together work well at reducing acne scarring - they are popular for a reason!
The Ordinary
Glycolic Acid 7% Toning Solution 240ml
The Ordinary
The Ordinary Lactic Acid 10% + HA 2% 30ml
Apply products that contain Niacinamide and Salicylic acid. The one I use is The Ordinary Niacinamide 10% + Zinc 1%, it helps dry out blemishes. Honestly this stuff REALLY dries out your blemish but don’t get carried away because this can cause dry flaky skin, it’s happened to me!
The Ordinary
Niacinamide 10% + Zinc 1% 30ml
One product that doesn’t ever leave my skincare bag is the tried and tested Sudocrem! It always helps reduce the inflammation of my spots and the redness, this is due to the ingredients Benzyl Alcohol which has antiseptic properties and Zinc for helping calm down the mountain that is on my face. Remember the ear spot I mentioned earlier? Well sudocrem has kindly shrunk that bad boy for me!
Sudocrem
Antiseptic Healing Cream 125g
To help keep the skin at bay, at the end of my period I like to do a facial to really tighten those pores, clear off any dull skin and any remaining spot or blackhead, they get kicked to the curb thanks to the one and only Drunk Elephant T.L.C. Sukari Babyfacial - this product for me is up there in my top ranked products, I have loved it for years! Thank you Sephora gods for stocking it. It has a combination of a few of the acids I mentioned above and is perfect for that self care sunday routine!
DRUNK ELEPHANT T.L.C
Sukari Babyfacial T.L.C. SUKARI BABYFACIAL 50ML
Wave goodbye to those unwanted visitors
I know acne in general can be a pain but if we consistently do our best to maintain good skin care hygiene, drink lots of water, reduce our sugar intake, get good quality sleep and add some little gems to target those unwanted visitors on our skin - then maybe that blemish might just go on a very long sabbatical.
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