Tough Spots

You’re not alone: It’s on the rise. We’ll help you deal when your face thinks you’re 13.

- Katheryn Erickson

There are very few things that feel as unfair, at least in the beauty realm, as waking up with pimples when you’re a grown-up woman. The one thing that softens the blow: Acne is no longer something to be ashamed of and to mask in heaps of concealer (see celeb Instagram selfies of spot treatments and the viral world of YouTube phenomenon Dr Pimple Popper). Still, having a face full of zits in your twenties and thirties is a drag, and with derms telling us that female adult acne is on the rise, we hunted down the latest fixes to cure and prevent it, without turning into a flaky mess.

FIRST, KNOW WHY YOU’RE BREAKING OUT:

Hormones—they continue to act up. Your hormones were behind the acne of your adolescence. During puberty, “your hormones are suddenly acting on your oil glands,” explains California-based dermatologist Dr R Sonia Batra. “Skin tends to be very oily; pustules and inflamed spots crop up at the surface of the skin.” Most breakouts in adulthood are still hormone-related; it’s just that now they tend to fluctuate around your cycle or be triggered by other influences. And adult acne looks different: “It’s more clogs, blackheads and whiteheads all over, as well as inflamed cysts and pimples along the jawline and upper neck,” says New York-based dermatologist Dr Neal Schultz.

Stress could trigger breakouts too. Again, hormones play a role: “When you experience stress, the adrenal gland secretes hormones like cortisol, and with that, androgens,” Dr Schultz says. In some women, that’s enough to make oil glands secrete more oil and cause acne.