Today's Special: Cream Puffs

Here's a Dandy for you......and I'm a little ashamed to admit it.....but.....I've got a ZIT! Yup, over forty and still battling the occasional breakout. Clear skin was supposed to be one of the few perks of reaching that fabulous milestone, so what gives? And it's not like the little bastard is easy to get to. No, this is one of those zits that appears on your face in the form of a small mountain with no visible escape for it's poison. Top that off with it's strategic placement, (on my forehead and just at the hair line) and I am screwed but good. We, in the (beauty business), describe those eruptions (the technical term -no kidding) as the ones that come from the "depths of your soul", so herein lies a major problem. If I can't get to it by picking or popping without making it ten times worse than it already is, how am I going to eradicate it from my face? (one should never pick or pop blemishes-it increases the chance of scarring the skin but go ahead and try using that logic when a big whopper arrives for a visit)

Lucky for me I am a professional who possesses the knowledge and the expertise to utilize the resources available to help combat the tiny intruder and move it forward towards extinction. And like any other unwelcome guest on my face, I must be diligent about it's prevention through a process somewhat like natural selection. With assistance of time and experience, I have amassed a small war chest with all the necessary weapons available in my arsenal to assess my readiness for war.

As for the aforementioned "depths of your soul" zit, the arch nemesis of any individual that follows a daily regimen of facial hygiene, I consider this product the Patriot Missile. (For men, diagnosing this one can get tricky because it feels and looks similar to an ingrown hair as a result daily shaving. For diagnostic purposes, consider the placement of the blemish on the face. If ingrown hairs are you issue, try this fab product.)

Mario Badescu Buffering Lotion :

By far the most superior product to help battle any cystic acne eruption with a simple application a few times daily. Another great thing about this stuff is that it is totally portable. Throw it in your purse, backpack or briefcase and you can apply it easily to fight acne at any time during the day. Just shake and go and it's cheap too! (Also makes a great stocking stuffer for the teens)

For the plain old regular zit, (and excuse me if this is a bit graphic), you know the one that appears with a small white-head at the top, I return to good old Mario for help because he never lets me down.

Mario Badescu Drying Lotion:

This was the #1 selling product in the store where I worked. Great for those eruptions you are dying to squeeze the life out of. The difference with this spot treatment and the one above it are that this product was designed be applied at night, before bed.

It has a pink sediment at the bottom of the bottle and at first glance your natural instinct is to shake the bottle to combine the ingredients. But it doesn't work that way, you don't shake it. Instead you insert a Q-tip into the bottle, touch the pink sediment and remove it, then apply it to the affected area. It leaves an extremely effective pink spot on your face (it even tingles so you know it's working) which resembles the calamine lotion your mom put on your bug bites and chicken pox when you were a kid. (Actually, calamine or camphor is one of it's active ingredients) This stuff is the Holy Grail of acne spot treatments. Cheap and effective, it doesn't get any easier than this. Zits will disappear within days of it's use.

I'll leave it at that for now, as these are the Navy Seals of acne battle. There are so may more great treatments and if you are interested in more information on those pesky little zits, feel free to ask a question or recommend a great product you know of, in the comment section of this post. If your shy and want to ask in private-shoot me an email and I promise to do my best.

This was great and all but it still doesn't change the fact that I am walking around today with Mt. Rushmore on my forehead.