Lupus and Skin: Learning not to Overdo begins with Light Exfoliation

Raise your hand if you know what the consequences of over-exfoliating are? 

Yeah. Well, now I know, too. 

Before I explain, let me just say that I thought I was doing the right thing. 

I was experiencing a stubborn acne flare (yes! At my age!) that can likely be attributed to hormonal changes. After about a week, it just wouldn't subside. So I asked my daughters (skin experts via YouTube) what they would do, and they suggested lightly exfoliating once a week.

I tried it once, and loved it. It instantly smoothed my skin, gave it a lovely glow (that I now know means I scrubbed too hard), and the acne seemed to go away overnight. Plus the exfoliating scrub I used has a menthol cooling element which felt a-maz-ing on my face. 

It was awesome.  

I waited a few days, and the acne came back. 

So I used the scrub again. 

Same lovely results as the first time. 

So I used it the next night. And the next night, and the next. 

Before too long, my glowing, smooth skin with a soft pink hue morphed into dry, flaky skin that had turned red and blotchy. It took on a rough texture, and the acne was back - maybe even worse than before.  Argh. 

When I was researching the results I was getting,  I read this snippet of an article featuring the opinions of two dermatologists:  

“Over-exfoliating is very common. If some is good, then more must be better, right? No!” says Dr. Gmyrek. In fact, too much exfoliating can strip the skin of its natural oils and lead to excessive dryness, which can — ironically — trigger the overproduction of oil and lead to breakouts, she notes. “Over-exfoliating damages the skin barrier, which helps keep the skin balanced, nourished and protected from environmental factors,” agrees Dr. Yadav."

But exfoliating feels sooooo good while you're doing it!!!! 😭😭😭😭

After reading enough articles to know that I had simply overdone it on the exfoliation, I set out to heal my temporarily damaged skin, which ironically takes much longer than it does to over exfoliate in the first place! 

This is such a typical life lesson for me, as I tend to overdo. 

I did it during my early days with Lupus, and there were definite consequences back then, too: 

Fatigue, aching joints, brain fog, hair loss, pleural chest pain, swollen nodes on my elbows and feet, all symptoms that happened within mere hours of doing too much. 

In fact, we used to say a single swollen joint, what my husband, sister and I used to call "a piggy" was the telltale sign that I was doing too much. The other symptoms mentioned almost always followed, unless I heeded the "piggy" warning and slowed down, rested more, and stressed less.

So here's your daily reminder not to overdo. 

Your skin, body, and mind will thank you.  

If you need more motivation to scale back and ease off the pedal, there's a whole library of previous posts under the search term "overdo" that you can read here. 

See? I told you. This is not my first rodeo! 

P.S. I made the same exfoliating mistake years ago and wrote about the baby steps I took to fix it here. If you're down on yourself for continuing to make the same missteps over and over again, don't despair. We all do it. Let's hope I can lick this misstep in two blog posts or less!