Oil can help you control and possibly eliminate your acne. Yes, you read that right.
If you’re someone, who like me, has suffered through terrible acne, this bit of advice may sound a bit insane…but it’s true; putting (the right) oils on your face can make your face less oily and less acne prone.
It took me years of desperate buying and switching from harsh product to product to before I decided to give this bit of advice a chance: after one particularly awful cycle of benzoyl peroxide I got tired of drying and potentially carcinogenic products and started looking at some natural alternatives.
After hours of research and a little initial resistance, I decided to take the plunge and give it a try- I haven’t looked back since.
The concept
The concept of Oil for skin care has been around since ancient times; there is a plethora of information out there that would be a bit overwhelming even if I could cover it all. So to make things simple, I’ll break the topic down into two sections: prevention and cure, then further separate the sections into part I and part II.
For this post, I’ll only cover part one of prevention (Prevention I). Please stay tuned for the articles in this 4 part series. (see part 2 here).
Prevention Part I :
(Side note: Don’t you just love how dramatic it all sounds? Okok, let’s get back to the post.)
Jojoba
Jojoba (pronounced ho-HO-ba) oil is a botanical extract of the seed of the jojoba tree. Now technically jojoba is a wax ester and not actually an oil, but behaves and looks like an oil in almost every single way and is therefore referred to as such. The distinction between wax ester and oil does matter in one very important way though: out of all of the compounds in nature, this wax ester (jojoba) is the most similar to human skin oil (sebum). Because jojoba is so similar to sebum, when applied, it can trick the skin into thinking it has produced enough oil and thus aid in balancing oil production.
How this relates to acne:
Acne tends to develop when a sebum produced by sebaceous glands mixes with dead skin cells and other debris to plug pores and cause bacteria to thrive. The oil balancing effect of jojoba coupled with hygienic skin care practices (such as not picking your face-for starters) can be a great aid in reducing incidents of acne flare-ups. Additionally, jojoba oil is a great moisturizing agent, has anti-oxidant (and therefore potentially anti-aging) properties and is non-comedogenic (meaning it does not cause acne by clogging pores).
**IMPORTANT: Pure Jojoba Oil is the best for skin; If it doesn’t say 100% jojoba oil, I wouldn’t recommend it for use on your face as it could be sulfated (meaning sulfur has been added).Sulfated jojoba oil is comedogenic and sulfur can irritate sensitive skin.**
To use, simply apply a small amount (a little goes a long way!) directly to your face. Alternatively, you can mix in other beneficial oils for your own custom serum. For more info on how to do this, please stay tuned for part 3 in this series.(You can subscribe below in order to be notified when the post goes live)
In part two of ‘Prevention’, I’ll cover how cleaning your skin with oil can probably give you the cleanest skin you’ve had all year…