the state of my skin

My skin flared up this fall for the first time in years (since college, actually!). I tried using mild soap (Cetaphil) and a prescription acne medication but it wasn't making any noticeable change, and I was getting super frustrated (who has horrible acne at age 28?! argh!!!). In the past I've taken two rounds of Accutane, which is hardcore medicine for cystic acne. At my age, with our prescription coverage, I wasn't willing to try it again.

But. Somewhere in my Pinterest ramblings, I stumbled upon this article, which claimed to heal cystic acne with a combination of castor oil and olive oil. I was ready to try anything at that point & castor oil is pretty cheap compared to my former prescriptions.(I got mine for 8 bucks at Whole Foods.)

I follow the author's recommendation for acne-prone skin and treat my face every night. I don't do anything in the morning or after exercising besides rinse my face. (Note: the oil doesn't make my skin greasy at all, because the process involves basically steaming your face with a hot washcloth before wiping off the oils. Read the article for the exact rundown.)

The good news: My scars are fading. The left side of my face had some serious scarring from previous acne outbreaks and the combination of oils softened my skin, left it smoother, and lessened some of the nasty dark purple-ish marks.

Bummer news: My acne this week is worse than it's been in the last six months, in terms of number of breakouts. I'm not giving up because I haven't found any better solutions, but I'm disappointed that my skin is still this bad when I'm two years away from being 30.

The lighting in these iPad photos is bad, but I think they give a little glimpse into how the scars are healing:

Early January, 2013

Mid-February, 2013

Here's the left side, which started out really scarred:

 So, would you try this? Am I the only late-20-something who suffers this way?!