What Triggers Acne?

Whilst the acne skin care products that you use are certainly important in helping to control your acne, the lifestyle you live is equally if not more important.

Live an unhealthy lifestyle and eat the wrong type of foods and your acne could flare up, leaving your face looking red and inflamed.

But if you live a healthy lifestyle and eat healthy foods, your acne is likely to be much easier to control and far less noticeable.

The key therefore to managing acne is to live a lifestyle in which you avoid the things which will cause your acne to flare-up.

Unfortunately however this isn’t possible in every case, but being aware of these triggers should put you in a much better position to deal with your acne when it starts to take a turn for the worse.

Below is a list of some of the most common acne triggers.

1 – Stress

One of the most common things that can cause acne to flare up is stress. If you can find a way to reduce your stress levels such as through exercise or meditation, you will find your acne a lot easier to control.

2 – Hormones

Hormones are one of the main reasons why people get acne in their teenage years, and also why women tend to get acne outbreaks shortly before their period.

The bad news is that there isn’t much you can do about this, apart from eating a healthy diet and exercising on a regular basis.

3 – Picking At Spots

Although it can be tempting to pick at your spots when they appear on your face, doing so will only cause the acne bacteria to spread leading to more spots on the face. So as difficult as it is, do not pick at acne spots.

4 – Drugs

Drugs such as cocaine and other stimulant drugs can cause acne breakouts and keep them active. So stay away from drugs not only for the sake of your health, but also for the sake of your skin.

5 – Stimulants

Stimulants include things such as coffee, caffeine, sodas, tea and sugar. Stimulants tend to cause acne to flare-up making a small outbreak much more severe.

6 – Smoking & Alcohol

Both smoking and alcohol can make you more vulnerable to acne eruptions and can also keep acne eruptions active.

7 – Working Conditions

If you work in a hot and humid environment such as a kitchen, factory or dry cleaner you may find that you experience acne eruptions on a much more regular basis than others who do not work in such an environment.

8 – Vacation Acne

It is not uncommon for people to experience increased acne outbreaks when they go on holiday, especially if they are visiting a warm country.

To reduce the occurrence of vacation acne don’t moisturise your skin as often and exfoliate your skin regularly with a salicylic acid exfoliant.

9 – Junk Food

The type of foods you eat can have a massive impact on the severity of your acne. If you eat lots of junk food you can expect your skin to react badly in the following days.

10 – Random Acne

Sometimes its seems that no matter how hard you try and no matter how healthy your lifestyle is, you just seem to get random acne eruptions.

The bad news is that there is little you can do about this, the good news is that if you have been living a healthy lifestyle these outbreaks should be relatively minor and easily controlled.