Acne’s not just for teens — and it’s disfiguring and debilitating

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here’s a widespread misconception out there that acne is a teenage problem, a minor annoyance that might impact a child’s self-esteem, poor thing.

I learned firsthand that it isn’t.

I was 27, married, and a mother, when I contracted a disfiguring skin condition. When I was growing up, my skin had been normal. I had a few zits, sure, but for the most part I looked fine. My skin was clear at my wedding, and stayed okay through my first pregnancy, birth, and nursing.

But one day it wasn’t okay anymore. My hormones decided balance was boring, and clear skin was for other people. (Fertility, too, for that matter.)  The cysts were painful, and my face looked awful, bad enough that I couldn’t go out in public without heavy makeup. A long Yom Tov had me hiding in my room, leaving in the middle of a seudah because I couldn’t stand having my condition on display. At a family levayah, a relative asked what was wrong with my face.

I felt hopeless and frustrated and ugly. I stopped looking at myself in the mirror, and when I inadvertently caught a glimpse, I’d be upset for hours.

Then there was the shame that came along with the condition, the insinuation from others that you haven’t tried everything or aren’t working hard enough to get rid of it. People assume you’re somehow too klutzy enough to try the treatment that worked on their great-niece’s sister-in-law. That maybe if you changed your diet, or used the right magical treatment, the acne would disappear.

But it doesn’t work that way.