Hormonal Cystic Acne, Causes, Symptoms, and Treatment 

Quick view: What is Hormonal Cystic Acne?

Hormonal Cystic Acne is not the same as fungal acne. There are many different forms of acne which can make it hard to determine the root cause. People affected by hormonal acne are most commonly in their teens and 20s, affecting both men and women. The cause of hormonal acne is fluctuation in hormonal balance.

Quick Post Preview: Here is what we will be covering in this post. 

• What is Hormonal Cystic Acne
• What causes Hormonal Cystic Acne
• The signs and symptoms of Hormonal Acne
• How to treat Hormonal Acne naturally without medication
• The best foods and supplements for Hormonal Acne

What is Hormonal Cystic Acne

Hormonal Cystic Acne is blemishes and breakouts that are caused by hormonal fluctuations, or hormonal imbalances, most commonly for both men and women that are teenagers and people in their 20. Hormonal Acne also effects women that are premenopausal and menopausal starting around the age of 40. Treatment of hormonal acne can be especially difficult without identifying the root cause. 

What causes Hormonal Cystic Acne

Hormonal Fluctuations for teenagers and those in their 20s, and women around the age of 40 entering premenopause are the most common causes of hormonal cystic acne. Increase in hormone levels causes the skins production of sebum to increase. The excess oil clog the pores. 

Stress, lack of sleep, poor dietary choices, and choosing the wrong skincare, personal hygiene products, and products around your home that are filled with endocrine blockers can be another root cause, or contributing factor to hormonal acne progressively getting worse over time. 

The Signs and Symptoms of Hormonal Acne

How to diagnose what type of acne you have can be tricky to pin point. Seeing a skin care specialist or functional medicine doctor will allow you access to taking a look into your hormone levels using a blood test, or swabbing your skin to test the overgrowth of yeast in your hair follicles. 

This can be done at home as well if you prefer that route. 

Here is a good at home hormonal panel test kit to look into:

Hormonal Ance: Whiteheads, blackheads, or cystic acne inflamed with red bumps under the skin are most common signs of hormonal acne. Often this acne occurs around the mouth and jawline, neck and chest, and in the upper inner thighs. 

Unlike fungal acne which is mostly topical in the form of whiteheads or blackheads, hormonal acne is under the skin. Often much more painful, and can last week’s longer than a traditional pimple. 

Fungal Acne: Pus filled bumps on the surface of the skin, whiteheads, and blackheads are most common signs of fungal acne. People who live in moist areas such as high humidity areas are often more prone to fungal acne due to the high sweat levels. Men and teenage boys are more prone to fungal acne than women.

Touching the skin too often, not cleaning the skin often enough, dirty pillow cases, not cleaning the skin after heavy sweating such as post workout, and poor dietary choices are listed as the top reasons fungal ance forms. 

There are no at-home fungal acne test kits that I know of but here is a great article if you feel you are experiencing fungal acne not hormonal acne with treatment recommendations as well: FUNGAL ACNE TREATMENT: HOW TO IDENTIFY AND TREAT FUNGAL ACNE AT HOME 

How to treat Hormonal Acne Naturally Without Medication

The treatment for hormonal acne is the same treatment approach you would take for hormonal imbalance. After all, it is an imbalance of hormonal levels that is causing acne. The hormonal imbalance is the cause the acne and its outer effect. The first areas to start are food and skincare/personal hygiene products. 

Foods and a lot of ingredients found in our skincare and personal hygiene products fall under the endocrine disruptors umbrella. An endocrine disrupter is a chemical compound that interferes with the normal function of the endocrine system. AKA our hormone factory.

For more on finding and eliminating endocrine-disrupting ingredients from your skincare and personal hygiene products as well as products you use around your home daily check out this post next: How to Find Hidden Toxins in Everyday Products (don’t forget to grab that free printable checklist)

How food affects your hormones

The short condensed scientific answer to how food affects your hormones is by affecting the production of hormone secretion on the gut and changes in various metabolites within the blood. 

When someone eats sugar, gluten, dairy, and other highly processed foods they affect hormone function by increasing inflammation and stress on the adrenal glands first. this often leads to unintentional weight gain known as hormonal weight gain. Hormonal weight gain often shows up in first in the belly, butt, hips, and thighs. 

People suffering from hormonal acne may also notice unintentional weight gain in these areas as well as it is one of the top signs of a hormonal imbalance.

The Best Hormonal Imbalance Diet

Clean Keto is the first eating style I found to work in reversing and eventually healing my homornal imbalance. I was able to loose over 50 pounds, heal hormonal cystic acne, and reverse other symptoms I had due to a hormonbal imbalnce post preganancy called Hypothyroidism. 

Hypotyroidism is estimated to affect over 60% women in the US, and 5 out of 100 people over the age of 12 years old in the US have a thyroid imbalance. 

Clean Keto is Keto without dairy and eliminating as many highly processed foods, even if they fit on the low carb diets, as possible. 

In this post, I dive deeper into the Hormonal Imbalance Diet here. In short, the Clean Keto Diet is the best eating style I have found to eliminate highly inflammatory foods as well as processed highly refined foods.

Try the Custom Keto Meal Planner out for 90-days. This is the quickest and easiest way to start keto. No having to spend hours researching and meal planning, they do it all for you and give you a shopping list for under $40 per month.

The best supplements for Hormonal Acne

I have a really in-depth post on the blog that covers the Top 10 Vitamins for Hormonal Acne. However, buying and taking 10 different vitamins can be a bit overwhelming. Here is what I refer to as the Multivitamin for our Hormones called Hormonal Harmony.

Please note when you click on the link above you will hear many weight loss testimonies. This is a 100% natural supplement, not a diet pill. Several of the testimonies stated they did not even change their diets or eating habits and still lost weight. However, knowing certain foods are bad for our hormones and continuing to eat them because a supplement or vitamin is helping with get rid of hormonal acne or hormonal weight gain is not a recipe for success in my book.

I will get off my soap box and let you decide what is best for you after doing your own research.

For a full review that breaks down all the ingredients of Hormonal Harmony check out this post next: Hormonal Harmony Supplement Review

Conclusion

In this post, you have learned the differences between Hormonal Cystic Acne and Fungal Acne. There are many different forms of acne which can make it hard to determine the root cause affecting both men and women.

The cause of hormonal acne is fluctuation in hormonal balance and is most commonly found in people while in their teens and 20s, and women entering menopause.

We talked about what causes hormonal acne, the signs, and symptoms, and how to treat hormonal acne naturally at home by starting with the elimination of foods and personal hygiene products that may be the cause of the hormonal imbalance itself.

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What is Hypothyroidism | 11 Foods that Harm Your Hormones