@botemp
So so sorry for late reply to your incredibly helpful post - have been away with work, and wanted to reply to you properly and express my heartfelt thanks for your taking the time for such a detailed and thoughtful post. Thank you!
*I know it’s tough going and PCOS is no fun even without all of the fertility stuff on top. I was going to suggest you go pretty basic as the likelihood would be that you become pregnant within the next year or so by the time you’d be done breastfeeding your skin would be in such a different state all previous efforts are long forgotten. Seeing as you don’t know where this ship will strand I can certainly understand the need to tackle all this but at the same time I think we need to be realistic that your skin is at the whim of hormones so there’s only so much you can do with that currently.
Please see previous tirades for non-prescription use of tret but more importantly the dose you’re on is a starter dose that you build up gradually to an ever increasing dose (which is usually hard to tolerate for most for prolonged periods of time). By the time you get there you might not be able to use it anymore (if pregnancy does happen, hopefully) and you’d be forced to start all over again (as pregnancy and all that it entails plus time in between will change the state of your skin) so it feels rather useless to do now when everything is so uncertain, on top of that for acne, Retin-A isn’t the favoured drug (Differin is, it’s similar to Retin-A but slightly different and less sensitising/clogging/drying) and it’s at a higher strength. In other words, beyond the whole grey/illegal mumbo jumbo surrounding off prescription use and dare I even ask if you’re using a stand-alone broad spectrum SPF50 I just don’t see much point in using this currently*
Sadly it is clear we are at the end of the road with my fertility treatments, and that surrogacy is the only way we will have a baby, so there’s absolutely no danger of pregnancy or breastfeeding being considerations when it comes to skincare.
This month will be the last month on artificial hormones, so will be interesting to see what my skin does thereafter, as I haven’t had a month since Jul 15 when I wasn’t taking fertility meds (or pregnant or miscarrying)
I actually saw the link on another MN thread to the online pharmacy services at Boots and Superdrug to get prescribed Differin, and have to confess the thought did cross my mind as it being a better alternative to dodgy tret. I absolutely hang my head in shame for use of unprescribed tret - would welcome your thoughts as to whether (properly prescribed) Differin might be worth considering.
I use Neutrogena dry touch SPF 85 in summer, and She Uemera SPF 30 mousse in Spring…I must confess in winter I haven’t been using a standalone SPF (BAD banana) because I only see about 20-30 mins of sunshine a day walking to and from the tube, and nipping out to get a sandwich at lunch - so given I’m already taking 10,000iu vitamin D and only have levels in high-normal range, I thought in winter might be OK to get away without a standalone SPF, just to get a bit of natural vitamin D to my skin.
Will re-read the threads for recommendations for good standalone SPF!
A few things stood out from your form but mostly this: ‘crepey dehydration lines’, this sounds more like over-exfoliation than classic dehydration and the use of Pixi Glow Tonic, Liquid Gold, and a Clarisonic Brush (and no sunscreen!) further give me ground to these suspicions. You’re attacking your skin very harshly and eschewing the actives that are more beneficial to oily/acne prone skin. Added to that, whilst offering it a lot in terms of hydrating products it doesn’t sound like it’s making much of a dent, when you’re at a point of compromised skin barrier due to over-exfoliation you can see the effect that hydrating agents like HA will end up pulling moisture from your deeper skin reserves instead of from the atmosphere and delivering it there (this also happens with severely dry people in desert like conditions) causing further dehydration. Does this sound like what’s happening with you?
Sounds very plausible for sure!! I thought the crows feet around my eyes were just ageing & dehydration, as the glycolic or Clarisonic doesn’t touch anywhere around my eyes, so I’d assumed it was just thirsty skin getting older. Definitely the case that the hydrating products aren’t making much of a dent, as I don’t feel like I’m feeling the benefits of the HA - I’d put that down to not drinking enough water, but what you describe definitely makes a hell of a lot of sense, as my skin feels oily and thirsty!
Wrt products/routine I can sort of give two options, one keeping in mind the possibility of pregnancy that you can then continue to use without issue or one with a heavier set of actives that you’d have to stop and start up again. I don’t mind outlining both either, you can then mix and match and stretch out to including stronger actives when you feel like it. Just let me know if the above wrt over-exfoliation aligns with how you’re assessing your skin, as this will determine product and ingredient recs.
Thank you so so much! We can definitely take pregnancy out of the equation, so a regime with some decent actives would be terrific. I think the over exfoliation definitely sounds like it could be an explanation for why I seem to be feeling so dehydrated despite throwing a fair amount of HA into the mix (although very possibly not the right choice of HA?)
All and any recommendations very very gratefully received - sincerest and most heartfelt thanks in advance :)
Wrt to sugar and PCOS, I am quite evangelical about it, mostly because it has made such a massive difference to me. While there’s definite evidence that changing diet wrt sugar and high-GI foods (and sometimes dairy) helps greatly, I’m also aware that people with PCOS are rarely alike and there’s a huge amount of variation. It doesn’t sound like you struggle with insulin intolerance so this might just not apply to you so for once I'm not going to be too hard on the chocolate but I would still suggest the high % stuff instead with natural sugar alternatives if you must.
Absolutely no question that sugar isn’t helpful to my PCOS - I don’t have insulin resistance, but my consultant said even in skinny women it’s still a metabolic disorder, and advised the importance of eating low GL, and hence why I’m on metformin. The metformin was to reduce the risk of miscarriage, but now we’re stopping treatment, I’m going to ask if there’s any benefit to staying on it just for management of the PCOS symptoms. I suspect I’d be better off it, because it really does a number on my appetite, and the stress of the last 2 years has taken its toll on my weight as it is, and I really do need to work on getting my weight up and cutting out the sugars. I’ve been self medicating through the miscarriages and failed treatment with chocolate, but as we’re now at the end of the road, I need to (wo)man up and get my arse in gear and sort my diet out, and try to get back into a more healthy lifestyle. It’s very tempting to take the easy way out and go back on the pill, as my skin was absolutely flawless when my hormones were under control. But it’s too emotionally difficult to have a daily reminder that I can’t have a baby, so I think it’s better to try and work on my skin through diet and a better skincare regimen
Thanks again - your sage advice is massively appreciated 