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Over-the Counter Product Helped My Blemishes: Case Study

By: Sarah Knowles BA, MA - Updated: 19 Sep 2012 | comments*Discuss
 
Spots Acne Teacher Oxy Face Wash

Jaime Davis had suffered from acne ever since he was a teenager. “It was never horrendous, I never had a pitted face or anything, but my forehead and one side of my face always had spots,” he recalls.

“This went on for as far back as I can remember. I had tried most things, from really cheap face washes to spending £30 to £40 on a face wash. But nothing really made much of an impact.”

For Jamie, who’s a 29-year-old teacher from London, the profusion of spots made him feel like he wasn’t really an adult. “At the end of the day, the perception is that you’re a teenager because you get zits,” he says.

“That’s what we all associate with spots, being young. You assume you will grow out of it, but when you still have them as an adult it’s very frustrating. As a teacher especially, it made me feel like one of the students, which is a bit weird.

“I teach kids post-16, which means that they are all 16 – 18 years of age. So when you are walking around and your skin is no better than theirs, then you start to think that there’s not much of a difference between them and you.”

Nothing Seemed to Work

Jamie tried all sorts of products to make his spots disappear for good, but nothing helped. Then a friend gave him an “OXY pack”, which was designed to kill bacteria and moisturise skin at the same time.

“I got given this OXY stuff by a friend and thought I’d give it a go, and it actually worked remarkably well,” he says.

“The pack had a two-step programme, step one was the face wash, which I tried to use twice a day, then step two was an anti-spot balm which worked like a moisturiser.

“I also used the OXY face scrub two or three times a week, and touch wood it has all been amazing.”

Killing Bacteria

OXY’s range of products tackles spots four ways, through removing dead skin, killing bacteria, eliminating excess oil and reducing redness.

It contains an extract from Brown Seaweed called Phycosaccharide ACP, as well as zinc sulfate. It is free of alcohol and parabens, and also is SLS-free.

“My skin is completely clear now,” Jamie says. “Obviously there were some times in the past when my skin had looked good, but it has stayed clear for a much longer period of time now.

“When you are younger and you get acne, you just sort of accept that you’re young so it’s not that unusual, and hope that you’ll grow out of it.

“But when you are in your mid-twenties and still getting spots, it’s a different thing altogether.

“It never really bothered me confidence wise all that much, but I am getting older now and should not have to deal with bad skin, especially as I look after myself well, on the whole."

Looked After Himself

Jamie added that as he always had a healthy diet as well as a healthy cleansing regime, the origin behind his spots remained a mystery. “I never understood why I was getting the spots in the first place, which made it very frustrating," he says.

“I’m not really a junk food eater, so it has never really been a case of, ‘Oh I’ve got spots at the moment, that’s because I am not eating well.’

“I keep my face clean, keep active and work out, so there has never really been a reason why I always had a spotty forehead and things."

He says that now that his skin is clear his inner confidence is better, although he successfully managed to hide any insecurity he felt about his skin in the past.

"Everyone goes through having bad skin at some point," he explains. "It’s when you get over the spotty teenage stage and reach your twenties and realise that you still have spots that you have to do something about it."

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