Life-Changing Acne Transformation

Speaker 1: I guess I first started having acne when I was probably towards the end of middle school, but it wasn't anything severe, just a few black heads here and there, maybe a little normal. None of my other friends I guess had it and it wasn't until probably half way through high school that I started getting a few actual pimples but, again, it didn't really seem like a big deal until I started getting towards the end of my senior year of high school and then once I started college, I don't know if it was the stress or the hormones, I can't tell you the cause, but I just really broke out really badly. 

At that point I decided I had already taken medications such as doxycycline and minocycline. I had also done a lot of topical creams. So finally at that point my dermatologist at the time, I'd also had three dermatologists told me that I should do Accutane. At that point I was looking for a job, I was about to take the bar, but the long story short is that at that point I broke out in a way that I had never broken out before. There was no space of my face that was not covered with acne unless it was my nose. 

The effect that acne had on my life is unspeakable. And I remember specifically one day, I was actually on my phone while I was in the changing room waiting for other people to come out, and I started looking up how acne affects people's lives I read that acne affects people's lives in the same way that sometimes obesity can affect people's lives when it comes to their self esteem. And I really understood that with people because people, fortunately I'm not obese, but people that are obese sometimes say that they are embarrassed to go out in public. And that is exactly how I felt with my acne. 

I was just embarrassed to go out in public. I had days where I would rather not go out with my friends because I just didn't want to have to cake on all the make up that I would have to put on my face. It hurt my feelings and I didn't want to go out and be anything but natural but I couldn't be natural and be myself because I didn't want anyone to see me. 

I would go to my friend's house for sleepovers, and I would put makeup on before I would go to bed. I would go to the gym, and I would make sure that I put makeup on before I went to the gym because I didn't want anyone to see me. I would go for a run outside where all that I might see is a neighbor and his dog and I would still put makeup on my face 'cause I just didn't want anyone to see me. 

When I started dating my boyfriend I would wear makeup whenever I would stay over ... maybe don't include that because premarital you know, premarital.

So total now, I've had about seven IPL treatments. My first IPL treatment was by far the worst. It was so painful probably due to multiple factors. I think I was skeptical. I had had a bad day, that doesn't help. But aside from that because I was probably skeptical, I was told to remove all my makeup from my face and I did scrub a little. I don't really think I took all of it off. I think there was probably still something left in there and then on top of that, I had very, very severe active acne at that time. 

So since it was so active, when I got that first pulse of that laser light, it just, it stung, it really stung. That experience was a little bit difficult and again, I was feeling skeptical about what it was going to be like. I knew that I wasn't going to leave with no acne from one hour to the next and I think I was just upset that I even had to go through this process when I had friends and family members and no people at work that just get to wake up in the morning with perfect skin. So I think I just felt a little maybe spiteful that I had to do this. 

My second treatment, I finally gave it a better try. I really took all of my makeup off and I just allowed myself to go through the process. Additionally, by that time, I had, or Inspire had given me this kind of cold air, I don't know what it's called, but they gave this cold air to hold so I was able to use the cold air to maybe treat myself and hold onto it while they were lasering. Made me feel like I had a little bit of control and then also I felt like I could immediately put the cold air on the portion where I had just gotten that little zap.

Pretty much after the second one from that point forward, it was, I don't want to say a breeze because there's still a little bit of pain, but it was nothing like the first one and after that second treatment, I could immediately see the results.

I think the first time I looked in the mirror, and I saw that the acne was actually starting to go away, the only feeling I could think of was hope. I thought, oh something might work. I'd be a complete liar if I said that I thought, you know, okay, this is all gonna go away, but I felt some hope. I felt like okay, I can wear less makeup today, which is a money saver to begin with, and I wore less makeup that day. So I just felt excite, look, it's Dr. Drew right there. Hi, how are you?

Dr. Drew S: You look awesome.

Speaker 1: Thank you. It's all 'cause of you. It's all 'cause of you, thank you so much.

Dr. Drew S: You're welcome.

Speaker 1: I don't know what I would be able to do without ... I don't even know if they're ... oh they're still filming. It's awkward.

Dr. Drew S: Hey Dr. Schnitt here with Inspire Cosmetic Surgery. We're getting ready to do some fractionated CO2 laser resurfacing to the face. This is a patient that we've had for a number of months. We've treated her cystic acne which was really severe with significant cobblestoning all over her face. We've been treating her with IPL with an acne filter. 

We were able to get rid of her cystic acne with the IPL treatments. Then we switched to a vascular filter and another red target filter to decrease the redness of her acne scars. Now we're getting ready to do this laser resurfacing of her skin to try to finalize her treatment.

So we're gonna treat this pockmarking that she has on both sides of her face and some other areas. We're gonna do that with a dual mode fractionated CO2 laser resurfacing. We're using the Lumenis AcuPulse which is an excellent modality for this type of scarring and in dual mode, it will both treat the surface of the skin and deeper in the dermis and we'll get started, take us about half an hour to cover the face. When we'll be done, she'll do our post laser treatment therapy and hopefully we'll get a nice result with significantly increased skin quality afterward.

Hello there.

Speaker 1: Hi.

Dr. Drew S: I was just telling Alex you were here and how amazing you look.

Speaker 1: Look!

Dr. Drew S: How's it going?

Speaker 1: Good. 

Dr. Drew S: Doing all right?

Speaker 1: Yes. 

Speaker 3: You don't have nothing.

Speaker 1: Nothing.

Speaker 3: Oh my God.

Speaker 1: No, no, no.

Dr. Drew S: So now we are at about one month.

Speaker 1: Almost exactly, yeah.

Dr. Drew S: After your CO2 treatment. So we did what about six or seven IPL's right? 

Speaker 1: Yes.

Dr. Drew S: And then we did pretty deep fractionated CO2.

Speaker 1: Very deep, Dr. Drew.

Dr. Drew S: And you recovered pretty quickly?

Speaker 1: Yeah, it was good.

Dr. Drew S: And you look amazing.

Speaker 1: Thank you, yeah.

Dr. Drew S: So your entire complexion has changed. Your cobblestoning is gone and a lot of those pigment problems are gone. 

Speaker 1: Yeah, I notice it a lot when I wash my face now.

Dr. Drew S: Yeah, it's amazing. So I'm gonna have you take your makeup off and then we'll look at your skin closely.

Oh, that's even worse.

Speaker 4: Yeah.

Speaker 1: This was November.

Dr. Drew S: Wow.

Speaker 1: Yeah, that's not good.

Dr. Drew S: That's amazing.

Speaker 1: Yeah, I know.

Dr. Drew S: We didn't even see these Alex. Look at that. That's November.

Now we have some of the grid pattern left still to heal and to blend the color into your complexion. That's gonna continue to blend in little by little over time. So for now, you need to always stay sun protected. You need an SPF of 15 or better, 15's okay. Just needs to be high quality sun protection and then you can walk around, you can kind of get from point A to point B but you want to stay out of the sunlight. Then you're just gonna do regular skin care. 

So the things that we prescribed you, the facial cleanser, the exfoliating polish, a hydrator, a collagen builder and a sunblock. And so you're gonna do that regularly. Keep the skin lightly treated and lightly moisturized. Don't overdo stuff, 'cause you may kind of produce sebaceous material again and then we're gonna let that skin kind of rebuild and the complexion's gonna blend back in.

So little by little, it's very early now. Little by little, that color's gonna keep on changing and blending back in with your regular skin color. It's super early. You're just a month out now. 

Speaker 1: Barely out at all, but it's already smooth, so that's good.

Dr. Drew S: Fantastic. The smoothness is amazing and then the color just needs to catch up.

Speaker 1: All right, cool.