What Causes Your Acne And What You Can Do

The problem of acne (also called acne vulgaris), spots and pimples is something that pretty much all of you had to endure at some stage in your life. For most of you it was during your teenage years (some of you might be at that stage right now). As a matter of fact more than 85% of teenagers suffer from acne problems. For others acne and similar skin disorders follow on into your adult life. Have you ever stopped to ask yourself exactly what's causing your acne or how it might be treated?

Acne is normally seen as a very common thing with easily identifiable causes and cures. This isn't really the case and acne is a more complicated matter than many of you reading this may think. The problem starts with skin pores becoming blocked with dead skin cells and your skin secreting more oil (called sebum) than it actually needs. The blocked skin pores are the perfect growing environment for certain types of bacteria. This type of bacterial infection then causes your skin to become inflammed and sore. Other skins pores become infected and within a few days you can have a total acne outbreak.

One of the most popular misconceptions is that spots, zits and pimples are caused by oily skin. This excessive oil then causes your skin pores to become blocked and all of a sudden you've got acne. There's only one problem with this theory - the oil produced in the skin pores actually moves through the blockages and onto your skin. It's part of the process but not actually the cause at all. This of course means you now have oily skin and an acne outbreak so it's easy to see why people might make this connection between the oil (sebum) and the development of the acne itself.

So what is at the heart of your acne problem? There isn't one single cause for acne itself - there are several. What may surprise you is that the ones you expect to find here aren't the ones you may expect. Hormonal activity (puberty and the menstrual cycle for examples), family history, poor skin care, steroids and stress are amongst the most common causes of zits, blackheads and pimples. You may have noticed that junk food wasn't included and that's simply because there's no proven link between junk food and acne.

The spots and pimples are not, however, your only concern when you have acne. Acne that's left untreated and allowed to roam wild over your face can and will leave your face scarred with dozens of tiny holes. Don't just ignore the problem and hope that it will vanish. You'd be better off taking action now to treat it instead of living with the scars for the rest of your life.

What acne treatments are available to you? Fortunately the treatments for acne are many and varied. You can start with basics of skin care which is exfoliation. Then you can start looking at natural treatments like taking lots of Vitamin A. Next we have the topical and oral antibiotics, Retinoic Acid (also called Retin-A), laser therapy and light therapy. Last (and by no means least) is the simple option of following a healthy lifestyle, eating plenty of fruits and vegetables, drink lots of clean water and get a fairly reasonable amount of exercise. This puts your body in balance and allows it to function properly and prevent skin conditions like acne.

You can conquer your acne. Take steps today to cure or prevent it. Your skill will thank you in the long run.