Alright, time for a heart to heart post. It’s gonna be a novel, so get cozy.
So… okay. Where to begin – I’ve landed here safely in Australia and have begun the storming and norming process of life with the in-laws (we’ve moved in with my boyfriend’s parents for the next 6 or so months, for those of you who don’t know). Now, the word “in-law” has always had negative connotations, but I’d like to say before we start – Luke’s parents are lovely people.
So far everything is going quite excellently – they have a beautiful house, and they live in a gorgeous area right near a big expanse of sandy, Aussie beach. It’s early spring here, and it seems we just missed their short cold patch of winter – the weather got summery just as we arrived.
And I wake up every morning to pretty birds singing pretty songs and kookaburras laughing outside the window.
In other excellent news, I met all of Luke’s friends and they were all wonderful, and so is his sister and her boyfriend who also live with us. And there are tennis courts just down the road and we’ve started playing tennis, and I LOVE it. It’s so much fun. I was also uncharacteristically proactive and signed up for three dance and fitness classes per week, which I’m really excited about.
And what about the food?
Erm…. well that’s where I’m running into a little bit of trouble. Now, this is hardly anything to do with them – it’s clear to me that it’s mostly me vs myself, and let me tell you why.
Okay, well first of all, let me tell you what the food situation is like so far – his mom is doing the grocery shopping, although I am fine with throwing in the requests for what I want to eat. We all eat whatever we want for breakfast and lunch, so I’ve been eating fruit and big salads. That’s fine – but then we all have a shared dinner. Luke and I have been sometimes cooking it, but a lot of the time it’s been his mom or sister.
The family eats a fairly standard diet, but they are very respectful of my requests to not eat gluten or too much dairy. However, I realize now what a long list of weird picky-seeming things that I do with my own diet I have, and that I don’t feel all that comfortable bringing them up. Especially because it’s not like we’re eating terrible things – the meals we’re having are predominantly whole foods and delicious, so, you know… it’s like…. who am I to complain.
I mean… in reality, I’m sure everyone would be stoked if I offered to do all the grocery shopping and all the cooking… but let’s be honest, there’s also the problem that I am simply REALLY enjoying having someone else cook dinner sometimes!
Anyway, how is this affecting my skin?
Well, it was going okay and I was feeling fine (despite the fact that I ended up getting too scared of Australian customs and leaving my precious manuka honey at home), but recently a few semi-biggish pimples have cropped up on my chin.
Honestly… in reality… they aren’t even that bad at all. But they pulled that fear trigger in me, and I ended up crying about my skin two nights in a row. Suddenly all the heart-wrenching pain I experienced when my skin was so bad came rushing back and I even naturally contorted my face into a look of terror as I was hugging Luke, staring at the wall behind him.
I haven’t cried or gotten seriously upset about my skin in quite a while. In fact, in day to day life, the fear doesn’t affect me at all. I’ve managed to be able to have small breakouts and not let them get to me or ruin my day.
I was maybe even thinking that I was “over it”.
But this is perfect evidence of how we simply hide emotions from ourselves that hang inside somewhere, wreaking havoc, silently. They are hard to identify because we don’t tend to feel them on a daily basis, until triggers pull them to the surface.
I know exactly what’s happening here with me – I’m responding negatively to this loss of control.
For a few weeks before I left Canada, I got a little lazy about all my diet rules and was being much more liberal about what I was eating. My skin broke out a little bit but it didn’t really bother me very much because I knew it was all my own doing, and that if I wanted to clear up my skin, I could do so any time I wanted.
I was in control.
Now all of a sudden, I’m not in control anymore. My fear is putting the blame on my new communal living situation. There is nothing I can do – I’m at someone or something else’s mercy. Just like I am always at the mercy of my acne.
And there is the point that I’m trying to get across – this whole story has nothing to do with my in-laws and what we eat for dinner. It’s about my realization of how much I use food not to control my acne, but to attempt to control my fear of acne and the subsequent suffering.
Deep down, I know this whole issue is probably the real reason I still get acne.
When I first was clearing my acne, my control freak tendencies were pretty severe. I managed to clear myself up 90% with a seemingly flawless diet, but the acne that remained tortured me. I wasn’t excited about the future like I used to be. I love to travel and I realize there are times in life when you can’t eat a perfect diet. So if that meant that the loss of a perfect diet meant pain and suffering because of acne, then I guess that meant I would have to avoid life and become apathetic. I looked forward to nothing.
After I finally decided to take the emotional cause of acne seriously and delve into what was causing me a lot of distress, I put two and two together that my severe acne had come at a time when I was having problems with my ex boyfriend and it was doing a serious number on my self-esteem – and that this must be a major factor with my skin.
When I came to this conclusion, I had such an “aHA!” moment, and suddenly I had this overwhelming feeling of hope for the future – like everything was finally going to be okay. This was something I hadn’t felt in a long time.
No jokes, the rest of my acne immediately cleared up.
Of course, I can’t say it lasted, because healing takes time and effort, and I soon reverted back into my usual state of fear and apprehension. And so back came the mild acne.
Anyway… this shows me what is valuable to me and my wellbeing, and that is hope and excitement for my life to come – without condition (ie. only if I have perfectly clear skin). For me, it seems that without that unconditional hope, acne is probably here to stay. ….. yet I can only achieve that if I let go and stop trying to control my acne.
God…. what an absolutely frustrating paradox.
I’d like to say too that when I say unconditional hope and excitement, I mean this in a completely emotional sense. Rationally, I am excited and hopeful for the future. My life is super – Luke and I are in love and plan to be together for a long time, and The Love Vitamin is giving me a focus and purpose that I have never found with anything else.
And I fully realize that even if my skin does take a bit of a hit while I’m here – does it really matter? It’s only six months, and after that, we’ll be back to living by ourselves and doing whatever we want with our diets. This is all hardly the end of the world.
But, the rational rarely makes much of a dent into the emotional, and so I have had a potent reminder to find ways to work through this fear that keeps me shackled and bound.
Thanks for reading – next post will probably be some tips on how to deal with loss of control! Stay tuned!
Does acne make you feel out of control?
yes i’ve came to the exact same realization recently. I want to get clear and i know if i eat a little healthier it will help, but i know that isn’t the real issue. It’s almost more frustrating knowing that in order to get rid of your acne you basically have to surrender all your control almost as giving in to it. i think that really is the hardest part for me.
Its funny because I actually test this theory with my back and chest. sometimes i will break out in those areas randomly, and maybe touch it and concentrate on it for awhile, but when i completely stop caring it clears right up. every single time. I dont know why i can’t do the same with my face, or i guess i really do, but its strange how that works.
Yep… it’s hard. I clearly haven’t figured it out yet… but I remember the same thing happening with me the first time I was in Australia. I broke out in terrible bacne, but since I couldn’t do much about it, and it didn’t stress me out the same way as if it had been on my face…. I just ignored it, and it quickly went away :/
The face is just way more of an emotional trigger I guess.
I just wanted to thank you for your posts. You are so brave. This post particularly came at the right time, as I am having a weak moment this past couple of days. Thank you!
I can definitely relate. You can even tell which areas I’m more concerned about on my face. Even though I’m mainly dealing with mild acne and leftover scarring, I get so stressed out about my cheeks and those areas seem to take forever to heal or tend to be more acne-prone. Even though I’ll get some pimples on my forhead, I don’t stress out too much about them and they are literally gone in a few days with no scarring.
One question: If Manuka honey is from Australia, wouldn’t it be more accessible there? Just wondering.
haha yeah…. they do have a lot of it here, but it’s REALLY expensive… even more than in Canada. I was shocked – I mean… New Zealand’s RIGHT there… how annoying. Anyway, I just got some more.
Burnette – Manuka is from New Zealand.
Yea, I realized that after looking at my bottle of honey. I always interchange Australia and New Zealand since they’re next door to each other. Natives probably dislike me right now 🙂
I was waiting for this kind of post! I’m going to make a trip to the U.S. next month with my boyfriend to meet his family for the first time. We will stay at his sister’s house and I’m already totally worried about the food situation there. As far as I know their diet is awful (diet coke and pizza, a lot of non-organic meat probably, bbq..). I’m stressed out, because I wanna make a good impression on them and not be too picky and cause too much trouble because of my eating habits. And knowing myself I know I will have a hard time to relax.
I could write a long letter now with all of my issues with eating, and dinner invitations (as I have one tonight to a restaurant, where they only have “Schnitzel”..), but I just wanna say thank you for sharing this story! And will think of you when I’m at the dinner table with my boyfriends family. And will try to work on my control issues and fears more..
Yep, it’s a really tough situation Eva. How long will you be staying with them?
The trip is shorter than I expected now, it’ll only be 2 1/2 weeks. I know it’s not a long time and I shouldn’t worry too much but my main concern is that my quite sensitive digestion will react and that belly aches will make me unhappy and grumpy. But the truth is, that right now there is no reason to worry about all of this as it’s only distracting from my real issues: my digestion has already been a mess the last month, although I eat good and healthy. And that’s probably because I’m totally stressed these days, very unhappy with my life situation and haven’t figured out yet how to move on as I have some very serious questions about my life these days.
I’m feeling stuck and congested and so does my digestion and skin. And yeah, I have to admit to myself, I’m not feeling very excited about my future these days..it’s as if I lost my vision. What keeps me sane in this crisis is that I started practicing yoga every day at least for one hour. And I have a very supportive boyfriend.
Yes it seems as though we do the exact same thing … instead of addressing the real issues that we’re worrying about (because there doesn’t seem to be answers), we put our worries onto food. :/
I think the answer for me and you and many people is work on being present. Almost all our fears are based on things that happened in the past, or things that we expect to happen in the future but have no idea if they will happen or not. I know my skin isn’t that bad right now, but with every new spot comes the intense fear of the past … that my skin will get to be that bad again. If I was just in the present, then there would be nothing to be afraid. I admit, I totally slack on practicing “emotional healing” stuff even though I know how important it is…. I want to develop some kind of emotional healing course that we can all do together. To help you guys, and me.
Emotional healing course sounds great! I’m looking forward!
For being present and being in the now (yeah I also read Eckhart Tolle, it’s a bit like a bible to me) ..hm I guess I’m still pretty good with avoiding the now. Especially with eating I often catch myself not even sitting down or being on the computer while putting something into my mouth. There is the thing that I’m ex-bulimic. I haven’t been bulimic for nine years. which is good ( and I also don’t believe that I become bulimic again), but I’m noticing that a certain panic around eating, the moment of eating and enjoying it, is still remaining. I just watched myself eating something and realised that tight feeling in my chest, also sadness that I don’t wanna feel. I just had that moment where I finally realised that I still haven’t dealt with that left over issue around eating and enjoying myself. If I’m honest to myself I know exactly what this is about and it goes way back into my childhood. I think I didn’t wanna admit to myself so far that I still have such an eating issue as I wanted to consider myself a normal eater and not being reminded of that bulimic person that I once was.
This is oddly, very convenient that you posted about this now, because I’ve been dealing with some emotional problems that have been “hiding” for the past 2 years. But 2 days ago something at school triggered what I thought was nothing and it turned out I had a lot more underlying issues than I thought. So, of course, this has taken it’s toll on my face. And it’s really frustrating to feel like your acne is controlling you when it feels like it should be the other way around. But it’s comforting to know that I’m not the only one who feels this way.
By the way, I’ve been trying to eat healthier, but the rest of my family has a terrible diet and sometimes I either have to eat what they’re having or nothing at all. So, I don’t really know what to do about this. Any advice?
Hi Noah!
I’m not sure what advice to give about not eating what your family gives you, since I’m in a similar situation now. What I’m working on is just doing what you can within your means. Controlling what can be controlled and letting go of the rest. Actually this is what my next post is on, so read it tomorrow for my advice!
Give up control and accept acne to get rid of acne… sounds impossible. I am going to think on this a lot.
Erm… yeah. It’s friggin tricky :/
You can always fast for 6 months! 😛 Not really though.
As long as someone is still eating healthier than you are eating crappier, all the effort they’re putting towards health isn’t going to undo itself so it’s not something to be concerned with too much.
hahah… could you rephrase that in English Sampson :p ? I don’t get what you’re trying to say there at all!
Haha, I have no idea either.
I wrote that after getting back from the bars and I thought it was so smart. Apparently not.
Tis article definitely relates to me, i just finish my army reservice n while inside e camp, e food is super unhealthy wher i have no control, nw i m breaking out like crazy esp at e chin area. When i eat healthy on a strict diet, e chin breakouts will stop, but when i start eating milk chocolate or sugary foods, i will start to breakout again. Although its not serious but i jus totally hate it, its like e acne is controlling me n nwadays i jus dun feel like doing anything or go out.
Congrats on landing safely in Australia!
I’ll throw my favorite quote at you: “Do the best you can with what you have from where you are.” -Mike Dooley
This is, by far, my favorite quote. Follow it and throw out as many fears and worries as you can.
When you do, life will be grand. Not sure if you knew but I am in Hawaii!! I’ve been here for 1 full week and am not flying out till October 26!
Have fun in Hawaii, Toad! You must be going through a little bit of the similar loss of control what with being on the road…. hopefully you’re handling it better than me!
… I’m doing okay though. I’ve calmed down a bit and my skin is following suit.
Ah, I totally understand this post. I’m vegan, so when staying with people I tend to feel guilty or demanding – especially when they don’t realise there are animal products hidden in so many things. You just have to make sure you’re being sensitive, contributing to the cost of groceries and doing your fair share of food preparation. Usually it’s not a massive deal 🙂 Either way, I hope you work something out.
Im really glad i read this because ive just had a mental breakdown over my skin 🙁 everytime i think that ive controlled whatever emotional issues i have, all of a sudden i start crying randomly! So everytime my skin looks like its clearing up nicely, BAM more breakouts after a crying session, any suggestions on how to actually deal with emotions? coz i’m on the verge of depression 🙁
For now, try looking up the emotional freedom technique and give that a try. Soon I’m going to get to work on building a happiness/emotional healing course which will compile all sort of strategies…. but … yeah… that’s not ready yet :/ I’ve tried EFT before and it seems to help so give it a go.
This post makes so much sense to me and the more I think about it the more I think my fairly severe acne is related to emotions and stress. I have been grasping at straws trying everything to fix my skin, but now i think im doing too much and im caught in a vicious cycle. The worse my skin is the more I think about it, stress about it and touch it. Im currently taking the pill (Yasmin)for a few reasons which helped clear up my skin a few years ago. But have only taken it for less than 3 months, I have also just started taking antibiotics, as much as I didnt want to, i just feel like there is so much bacteria on my face and I keep reinfecting the same area. I think I have a fairly good diet, but I am quite controlling already, I feel my food restrictions are creating an anxiety that is making the problem worse. Also I do alot of exercise (because I love it, but also sometimes feel like I have to) and I find it hard to slow down and relax.
I know my skin will get better eventually, but I just feel like I need a break and need to find ways to stop thinking about it all the time.
Hey Sarah… I totally understand. It’s so easy to get wrapped up in the food and exercise aspect, completely ignoring the emotional side until it just gets to the boiling point and something has to change. Anxiety is the worst culprit…. if it’s not the acne, it’s the food, and luckily I’ve come a long way from where I was when I was feeling the exact same as you are now…. but it’s still lingering… but tomorrow is a new day! Tomorrow is a new day to make changes for the better… to examine our lives and see what the problem is and move forward from it. Good luck Sarah. Much love! xox
Hi Tracy,
I have changged my diet one year ago cause i had and still have some teeth problems. My diet teeth got better, sadly I got acne as an sideeffect. I accept the acne cause the teeth were more important to me.
Later I cut out diary and the accne got better. The diet change changed my life and im mostly eat for myself and im somehow happy with it. Diet worth so much.
Actuacly it remebber me a bit on durianrider who is in Australia. Or he was and now is in Bankok and New York cause the bannana prices are so high in Australia.
So what this mean for Harley and his ggirlfriend freelea, their fruitarian high ffruitt ddiet is so important that they even try to be flexible and move. If for you your ddiet is so important i hope you can give it a focus in life and make a proffesion out of it.
My Accne probablyy occured ccuase i changed my lifestyle ffrom a life totaly nomading moving ffrom one place to another sleeping under free sky. chalalged by weather to now living in a flat being more alone and isolated.
The reducing of stress thrrouggh an own appartment healed me and tthe control over my diet. The being loneely and isolated somehow. or the feelingg of it make me also focusing more problems with diet or with food.
Probabblyy you also thought on this by making money with your wisedom and making paid consulting. Maybe thiss can give you a more freedom. Its also what i wwish and alsso doubt. Cause i wanna help for free and also wanna prrottecct myself.
I wish you that you can give yoursefl that what you need.
Niko
Thank you Niko 🙂
I am totally feeling this! So I have finally started to eat healthier and live a healthier life syle. green smoothies every morning, no caffine, no dairy, not a lot of sugar or processed foods and plenty of salads and fruits and veggies. I am so proud of myself and I feel so much better and I’m starting to see a difference in my skin as well. But I’m also getting terrified and feeling out of control because I know that my parents are kicking me out soon so that means all my money i spend on these whole foods now is going to have to go more into rent, bills, ect. Do you have any advice? I am currently spending 150$ a week on food! Do you have any advice to help save money with a healthy life style? I really want to keep this us and don’t want to have to change my diet 🙁
Hi Brooke,
I know, food prices is one of those very annoying realities… it pisses me off that real food is more expensive than fake garbage. But that is how it is sometimes. Here is a great article that may help you out: http://mummyicancook.blogspot.com.au/2011/04/how-to-survive-on-real-food-on-student.html
So after I diligently read and studied your writing, found my own method or “ritual” for my skin that’s more gentle than I’ve ever done, and my acne’s better than it’s ever been. Except. It’s cyclical, like yours, and I did think it comes when I break my good “habits” and am not diligent enough or “good” enough to keep my skin relatively “clear.” But really, I think it’s not just from not reading your articles, but from the emotional insight that comes with it. I’m a lot kinder to myself/skin when I’m hearing/reading you say things like “no one will love me any less with acne” because i honestly just don’t believe it on my own. So thank you. I need to think less about “controling” my habits and my acne, and more about how my acne, my self, is “ok” and then the blemishes will take care of themself.
Totally – I think total acceptance of self, even in our dark hours and anxiety ridden times – accept everything and it will go. Easier said than done, but I wish you the best of luck on your journey Jordan 🙂
Tracy,
You are so able to hit the nail right on the head! I found the love vitamin about a month ago and have been incorporating your tips into my life: manuka honey, jojoba oil, and cleaning up the diet. Although I am finding it is very hard for me to let go of the dairy. I did eat about 8 serving a day so when I was substituting dairy milk with almond milk and cultured coconut milk for yogurt, I am not getting as much protein and I was starving and making other bad choices instead… like eating way too much natural peanut butter!
Anyway, I am a habitual “picker” and I have known for a long time that I needed to stop because when I do my face starts to heal and look a lot better within a few days. But then… new ones start forming and it is like an really bad habitual addiction. I was doing extremely well not picking with all of the other good habits I am finding through your articles. This weekend though, I gave in! 🙁 I completely attacked my face and now it is raw and sore 🙁 I asked myself when I got done and saw how badly I had destroyed all my good progress “Why did you do that?” I really wanted to think about it and figure out why I do that to myself. I think when I get anxious or feeling stressed or out of control, forcing the pimples and blackheads out, gives me the feeling of being in control of something and the physical pain is much easier to deal with than emotional pain.
You are so completely right about forcing emotions down and not really feeling them until something pulls the trigger on the surface. I have been wanting to learn how to deal with my stress for a long time now and your articles have reminded me that I need to do that, like NOW, but for some reason I always put that very important piece of health’s puzzle on the bottom of my list. Maybe because I am scared of figuring things out or letting go of that control, when really, when you really think about it, I am not in control of much of anything except what I eat, and how I treat myself and others. Much of it is because it is something that is not on the surface, and is going to be the most difficult to do. I have never done meditation before so I really do not know what to do if I tried. I think I may start with Yoga and writing all my feelings and thoughts down in a journal daily in a quiet spot. I feel like sharing this is a start in healing my emotional health to heal my acne.
Keep up the good work and soak up the land down under! I have been there for a month a couple years ago and would absolutely love to go back sometime! 🙂
To Clear Skin and Clear Minds!
Lauren
Hey Lauren – thanks for the comment… sending you love for your journey of digging deep. It’s all a process that you chip away at little by little, especially the emotional stuff. It’s hard to get started, but you can do it 🙂
My acne popped up when I was in 7th grade, right when my parents got a divorce. It was an extremely traumatic time period, and the fact that my entire family (extended as well as nuclear) is very dysfunctional. When I was in 10th grade I switched schools, and my acne was severe. In 12th grade, I was very, very depressed, and my acne was severe. I’m 22, working and in college, dating an amazing guy (who has also battled with acne, but now he is 95% clear), and my acne is as minimal as it has ever been since 7th grade. I think now my battle is trying to clear up my emotional problems. I’ve endured some serious stress, and being a depressed person has became my identity, unfortunately. I think I need to let that go and “find myself”. I think then I will finally be free of skin issues. My current source of stress in the acne itself, and just like in your article, the days where I don’t obsess over my skin, and stop touching it (!), are the days I don’t see new ones crop up. I read your articles over and over, because they make me feel so much better.
Hi Lauren, glad to hear my articles are a source of comfort for you! Delving through your emotional problems can be one of the hardest things you do, but so worthwhile. Good luck with everything, *hugs*
Hmmm. There may be something to this. I want to apologize for the comment I wrote on a different article yesterday, it was probably harsh in some parts (something trashing “positive thinking”—what a jerk am I?) I was falling asleep while I wrote it. But… reading this may be the “missing piece” in my acne problems. I already changed my diet, for about a year now; I have a serious suspicion that my acne is not caused by bacteria OR oil Or even DIET because I take topical probiotics, fermented foods, lots of Vitamin A foods, and how oily my skin gets has nothing to do with my breakouts. It COULD be the stress… my skin started getting bad when I started stressing about my diet. Back when I didn’t care about health (because my ignorant view was that people only care about health if they want to lose weight, but I’m skinny so I dont have to care) I didn’t get these breakouts. I still had mild acne, one or two pimples at a time, but nothing like it is now. And I don’t think it’s even the diet itself : my skin periodically clears up, and once this happened after I ate fried (lots of vegetable oil) rice (but without worrying about it as usual!)
I became very convinced of what you said when you mentioned the idea of accepting what you don’t want… of relinquishing control, to gain control. This is actually a very religious idea, one that I agree with in theory but is admittedly extremely difficult to practice. It’s called “surrendering to divine providence”, where you accept what you cannot control. You abandon your desire to make a thing happen, and paradoxically, it is often what it takes to make it happen!
Hi Claire 🙂
It’s funny reading back on these old posts of mine. I still struggle with that relinquishing control thing but I have come a long way!