No cap products that helped my adult acne.

Good morning! I begrudgingly roll over to ‘snooze’ what used to be my favorite song until I decided to use it as my alarm. Sunlight streaks in through the slits in the closed blinds. The warmth on my skin give me hope today will be good day.

What a time to be alive! I find my balance and make the 10 trying steps from my bed to my bathroom. Flip the light switch through still guarded eyelids that I press open for the today's first look at myself.

What-the-f**k is that! A new tenant has moved in on my face. He’s burrowed himself deep down into my most sacred ground. How dare he! He’s larger than could have been expected and he’s pulsing, angry and red. Any hope I had for a good day has been shattered. My fate has been secured. I am destined for a week of feeling ugly, self conscious worry, and stress that’s guaranteed to only exacerbate the situation. My arch enemy - a pimple.

If you’re like me, you experience mornings like this on an unfortunately regular basis (if you’re not - get the hell out of here, I literally can’t with you right now) You might ask yourself, "What did I do to deserve this?" You have a full regimen; you do it every day - twice a day! You just spent hundreds at Sephora the other day; surely things should be going better than this?

For a while it seems like nothing would end this suffering. For me, it took a shift in thinking to lead me toward a few solutions that FINALLY made a lasting difference. Maybe I didn't have bad skin after all. Maybe I was just treating my skin badly. I shifted focus to ensuring my skin was healthy; that it was clean, balanced, and moisturized. I'm here to share with you a few keys I’ve picked up that I feel like not enough people are talking about.

1. Oil is not the enemy

My first revelation was that maybe oil is not the enemy. Years of “Oil-free” marketing lead me to believe that oil was to be avoided at all costs. Even a drop could clog a pore and fuel a monster zit. Turns out there are a number of oils that are nourishing to skin and are a natural way to prevent the dreaded breakout.

Initially, I thought double cleansing was just a clever marketing strategy for “Big Beauty” to sell more soap. If your cleanser is so great, why would I need to call in a back up?

It was less of a leap of faith and more of a spend $25 more dollars to get free shipping but I finally decided to give double cleansing a try and purchase my first an oil based cleanser.

I chose Kiehl’s Midnight Recovery Botanical Cleansing Oil. It was the most natural formula and I am already a huge fan of Keihl's products. Between the texture and the scent it was a joy to work with! I definitely felt that in conjunction with my usually cleanser I was getting a far more thorough clean. Here's what Kiehl's has to say about their cleansing oil:

Our aromatic, lightweight cleansing oil melts away dirt, makeup and impurities. This gentle, yet effective formula transforms to a cleansing milk when it emulsifies with water. Formulated with a blend of botanical oils, this makeup-removing oil cleanser removes impurities without over-drying skin.

2. Clean beyond your skin

So now I’m thinking, if double cleansing is working - how is my face getting dirty to begin with? How can I wake up or go to sleep having done a whole skin-care routine only to find pimple popping up just a few hours later?

Come to find out, pillow cases harbor nights of sweat dirt and oil from your skin and hair. Even if you are washing your face right before bed, if you go to lay down on a used dusty pillowcase you’re just undoing all that work.

So, I started changing my pillow case every 2-3 days. I got a bunch of these great Mulberry Silk pillow cases on Amazon and I keep switching them every couple of nights. Silk is resistant to bacteria growth and reduces the rubbing and irritation our skin and hair experience when we sleep. Using silk pillowcases leaves both my looking and feeling healthier and smoother, and better moisturized.

The same concept can be applied to your towels. For sustainability’s sake (and maybe a pinch of laziness) I was reusing my bath towels a couple times before it hit the hamper. I was also using the same towel for all my drying purposes - hands, face, body. I know, blehk.

Gone now are the days of haphazardly spreading the dirt and bacteria hosted in my towels all over my face and hands. I found these great disposable towels online. Instead of sticking the face I just double-cleansed into a terry cloth petri dish, I grab a fresh “ towel“ to dry off secure in knowing it’s perfectly sanitized. I also use a still fresh part of the towel to then apply my toner - eliminating the need for the countless cotton rounds. Game - changed.

3. "It's a patch!"

I thought putting a patch on a pimple would only call more attention to my shame, but they're actually the greatest little things ever. My first dive into pimple patches was through world of Starface. Their "Hydro-Strars" are these incredibly cute stickers that conceal your spot and suck the ick right out. Not only do they drastically reduce the severity of your blemishes, they are vegan, cruelty-free, and hypoallergenic. They also keep you from picking and making things worse, as well as take a lot of the shame out of carrying your little red friend out into world with you. Read below how Starface describes its star ingredient:

Hydrocolloid is a substance borrowed from surgical dressing that’s clinically proven to help flatten pimples by absorbing bacteria and fluid... to shrink pimples overnight.

If you want a patch with a little more punch - I also loved the KILLA patches from ZitSticka:

Powered by ZitSticka’s signature microdart technology. These tiny microdarts self-dissolve to flood the heart of your early-stage zit with targeted ingredients, clearing the upcoming drama before it gets real. Each kit also contains CLEANA swabs soaked in exfoliating, de-stressing ingredients to prime the area prior to application.

They've also got another patch for clearing up dark spots or as like to call them, the ghosts of pimples past. Spooky.

Who would have thunk it? All this time I had good skin - I just wasn't treating it well enough. Looking back at the carnage of skincare products tried and failed, I was probably torturing it. It took a while to come to this shift in thinking; this revelation, but better late than never, right? I share these things with you in the hope that you too can achieve healthy, clear skin. Let us all learn to love the skin we're in.

What a day! If I only treat my unwanted guest to a few niceties, he won't be so angry anymore. I start off with deep double-cleanse, then grab myself a clean new face towel to dry off with.

Sweet dreams! I dot my spotted face in stars, and wish upon the constellation I just created that I wake up with clear skin. I lay my head on a freshly laundered silk pillow case to slip into a smooth slumber.

Goodnight! I can hardly wait to wake in the skin of my dreams.