As someone who has struggled with acne ever since I was a teenager, I can relate to how frustrating a break out can be! Especially when you are at an age where shouldn’t have to worry about this kind of thing anymore. You have tried all the fancy expensive creams or the risky prescriptions only to find that whenever you ever come off your acne comes back with a force. It feels like nothing about your skin is every truly resolved. That’s because it isn’t! Most treatments for acne only treat the surface level of symptoms but don’t treat the REASON why you break out in the first place. There is a very strong correlation between your health and your skin and I am going to connect the dots for you in this blog post!
StressOrs and inflammation
One of the most important things to realize is when it comes to your skin, your skin is an outer reflection of what is happening in your internal ecosystem. What I mean by this, is when you encounter a stressor either emotionally or physically, this stressor will cause internal inflammation which will begin a cascade effect, eventually resulting in increased oil production and an acne breakout. I’ll give you a few examples of how stressors actually make me break out from time to time. Over the thanksgiving holiday, I was in charge of hosting thanksgiving, something i have never done before. For a week and a half straight I was running myself ragged, cleaning the house, meal planning, buying the ingredients, coordinating with family, all while trying to launch one of my programs for this business. It was CRAZY. Sure enough on Thanksgiving Day, my skin broke out very badly! The worst I’ve seen it in years.
Another example is a physical stressor is food sensitivities. Food sensitivities are one of the most common physical stressors we expose ourselves to on a daily basis. Whenever I eat dairy or wheat, my skin breaks out terribly and with it comes a myriad of other symptoms like fatigue. These symptoms tell me, my internal ecosystem has been disrupted by the food sensitivity. The dairy or wheat irritated my digestive system, placing stress on my adrenal glands, causing high cortisol levels which causes my liver to release sugar from its stores and spikes my insulin, and finally my skin reacts to all of this stress by producing more oil, priming me for a breakout. You see, your skin isn’t an isolated part of your body! When you start to pay attention to your diet, stress and skin you will see very CLEAR cause and reactions.
Gut disbiosis and poor detox pathways
Now I am taking you deeper, as we explore the connection of the skin and the microbiome. How healthy your gut is will directly affect your complexion. I learned this the hard way. 3 years ago when I began to study and experiment with my diet, I took out the food sensitivities and although my skin greatly improved, my overall complexion still looked blotchy and uneven. I still had small pimples and blackheads in areas like my cheeks and forehead. It wasn’t until I started looking deeper into the health of my gut that my skin fully cleared. I got my gut tested and the results were a little frightening: in my travels I had managed to pick up 5 parasite infections! These infections were causing an overgrowth of candida and secreting toxins that my body was trying to detox. The inflammation these infections causes compromised my skin health. The overgrowth of bad bacteria caused other digestive problems, I struggled with constipation and absorption. Which leads me to my next point…
Your skin is also a sign of blocked detox pathways. Whenever your body either has to detox a lot of toxins or your system is backed up, your body will try to detox through your skin causing you to break out. You may also experience other symptoms of toxin overload, such as particularly rank Body Odor. This happens because your body will try to push these toxins out through your pores in your skin and through your sweat. If you are experiencing constipation, your skin is breaking out and you notice your pits are a little stinker than normal, you probably are experiencing a toxin overload. Listen to your body! Usually an acne breakout is NOT an isolated event, it is usually accompanied by other symptoms that can tell you more about WHY you are breaking out.
