Dear Acne: I Thought We Broke Up in High School??

There’s a blemish convention on your face…now? A full-on evacuation is in order! 

Somebody get the MiracleAcneFixerBrand people on the phone! Because like their previous spokesmodels Jessica Simpson, Britney Spears, Lindsay Lohan, Mandy Moore, Katy Perry, and Kendall Jenner, we’re finally ready to shill, baby, shill. Yes, our acne is in full bloom, which means the time for our six-figure endorsement deal with the skin solvers has come! Bring on the infomercials because we’ve got the before part down and are ready to be tapped by that magic after wand! 

Wait?...What—you can’t be serious?...The MiracleAcneFixerBrand people don’t want us to be the face of MiracleAcneFixerBrand?...Huh…Not even for, like, free?... Right, right, Jessica was in her twenties back then. And Brit. And Mandy and Katy….And Kendall Jenner was born in… 1995…. Are people who were born in 1995 even allowed to drink Pepsi, with all that caffeine?....Yes, we’re listening!….Yes, we’re getting the picture…Well… tell ‘em we’re too busy anyway! And how dare they use the phrase “fine wine” in trying to placate us! Have a nice life. 

Deep inhale. Aaaand exhale. Okay, take two. So for the first time in our adult lives we have acne. And we may not be handling it with the maturity and grace we like to think radiates from every corner of our admittedly otherwise pretty great midlife existence. When we first began to notice an aggressive round of blemishes staring back at us in the bathroom mirror we did what any woman who’s not a masochist would do: We reached for the dimmer switch (vanity lighting: great for plucking, awful for actual vanity!) and then decided that it must be a reaction to something we ate, that this too would pass. But pass it did not. In fact, that first round of gnarly visitors decided to throw a party, inviting all their zitty friends to join across our chin and jawline. What was this, a sicko twist on Freaky Friday? Nope! Just menopause waving an indefinite hello.

According to hardcore experts such as Alloy chief medical officer Dr. Sharon D. Malone, a quarter of us will experience an onslaught of acne during perimenopause due to the hormonal ruckus brewing inside of us—estrogen dropping, androgen hormones increasing, If whatever the modern-day Clearasil isn’t doing the trick, talk to your derm about retinoids. And talk to us about smoothing out those raging hormones with Alloy’s FDA-approved, easy to obtain therapies. As a first step, simply fill out our online assessment—it’s likely acne isn’t your only unwelcome new buddy—to get a sense of Alloy and our suggestions for your specific suite of challenges. Help is on the way. 

Chin up, buttercups,

Alloy