BREAK OUT!! of Your Expensive Acne Routine

So the cosmetic and pharmaceutical industry has benefitted from a particular trope about how our skin works and why it breaks out.

OIL BAD. WHEN THE BAD OIL COMES THEN THERE BE PIMPLES. BAD. I'M SAD.

And most of the stuff that is commercially available is some kind of industrial strength drying agent with slight whiff of bleach. Hey, if this stuff works for you, have at it. It's always left my skin red and angry.

Anyone with problem skin can tell you that it's not that simple. There are tiny pimples, big pimples, painful pimples that you can barely see, chronic bumpy skin, and - my personal favorite - the pimple that seems to happen even though your skin is all dry. And beyond that, different kinds of pimples happen in different locations.

Your options for how to deal with your problem skin are numerous these days - Clearasil, whatever that stuff Jessica Simpson advertises is, dermatologist prescribed stuff. And everyone is different - all of the above have worked for people I know.

For me, my skin is an exact reflection of what is going on inside. When I drank coffee my skin was an oil-slick. When I indulge in a lot of sugar, I get tiny zits on my jawline. It's very, very regular and reliable.

This is interesting - it's a Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM) face map I stole off the web. Ignore the provider's address on it - I'm web-lazy.

From what I have experienced, this seems to be accurate, considering what times of the month I get zits and where.

Here are some skin cheats I have learned.

ROSEMARY OIL!!! This is cooling and drying and tends to make the zit smaller within hours. You can also put it on as a preventative measure before bed. Try a little on your face - if it seems too strong for you in its essential oil form, dilute it with a little almond oil.

LAVENDER OIL!!! As someone recently noted on my Facebook page, there have been some recent studies saying this can be a hormone disruptor in boys. So if you're a boy, no lavender oil for you!! But girls, this stuff is great. It dries, it tones. If you have a big, horrible zit that needs to "surface" before it will go away, lavender oil speeds up that process. And it smells purty.

CASTOR OIL!!! I know, I lurves the castor oil, but there's so many reasons too. If you are two days away from a wedding and you're growing either an enormous zit or a horn, do this before bedtime: put a drop of rosemary oil on it and massage in; put a drop of castor oil on it and massage in. If the castor oil is sucked right in, repeat again. Pat off the excess with a tissue and go to bed. Your zit should have significantly shrunk in the night.

WITCH HAZEL!!! This is the only astringent I use besides rosewater. I think that Sea Breeze stuff is too harsh and makes your skin more oily.

APPLE CIDER VINEGAR!!! Don't even get me started on how awesome the powers of Apple Cider Vinegar are. Really, it's the bomb. If your skin is being just kind horrible - dry here, oily there, I highly suggest you use a cottonball full of this twice a day. It's hard to explain why it works, it just does. You'll see what I mean.

Lastly, do check out your diet. Yeah, I know, shut up, but you know I'm right. There are certain food allergies I can identify from 16 paces by just looking at someone's face. Pale and gray with damp looking acne around the mouth and chin? Dairy allergy. Just saying.