Life Fright

A few years back, slugging was the latest skincare trend. It involved slathering petroleum jelly on your face after applying your other skincare products to lock in the moisture and skincare ingredients. You would go to bed looking like a greasy slime ball and then wake up in the morning with glowing, refreshed skin after removing all the left-over residue.

I tentatively tried this out and the first time I was pleasantly surprised and impressed by the results. It worked! And this was astonishing because normally it would take a long time to see any results when I tried out new skincare products.

So I started incorporating it into my routine and that’s when the trouble started to brew under the surface. After a few slugging sessions, I started for the first time getting deep, under-the-skin chin acne. Now, prior to that point I had never gotten chin acne at all so I knew something was up right away and attributed it to slugging. I stopped the practice and hoped that my face would clear up quickly. But it did not. Instead, the acne started creeping up alongside my jaw and onto my cheeks. It looked like an angry, red, bumpy rash was taking over the lower half of my face.

I was absolutely miserable and I tried all sorts of acne remedies to help with the issue all to no avail (salicylic acid, benzoyl peroxide, hydrocolloid pimple patches, etc.). I also dug deep into my diet trying to ascertain if something else was going on internally causing the issue. Sadly, nothing offered any hint of relief and as the present acne healed up, the next wave of acne would appear and the cycle would repeat. To make things worse, each round would leave a parting curse of hyperpigmentation – unsightly dark spots in addition to the new inflamed acne.

It took a long time for me to get to the state now where I don’t deal with acne to that extent any more. I had to stop using tried-and-true products that were in my routine years prior. To this day, I’m still not sure why slugging started off this confounding, perplexing issue. If I were to hazard a guess, I would say my skin barrier became compromised and any attempts to “cure” it or continue with my routine was promptly and decisively rejected with more acne and inflammation.

The problem itself was resolved by getting a prescription topical antibiotic so my skin could have an ally to help tamper down the acne-causing bacteria and give my skin a chance to heal and start with a clean slate. This happened very rapidly (less than a month), allowing for the new emerging acne to surface and fade away. In the meantime, I had already stopped using all the products I had been using and kept it at the bare minimum: micellar water (in place of using a cleansing oil – see how this contributed to my acne plight), gel moisturizer, and a lightweight mineral sunscreen.

If you are even thinking of attempting slugging, I would advise the highest caution and to consider the following guidelines in addition to extra research:

• don’t slug if you have acne or oily skin

• use a pea-sized amount of petroleum jelly to cover your entire face. You really only need a super thin layer to achieve the desired effect

• make sure your face, and most importantly your hands are super clean prior to applying the petroleum jelly! As mentioned before, petroleum jelly is occlusive meaning that it traps everything beneath it, including acne-causing bacteria. Allowing these strains of bacteria to grow unchecked will lead to the nightmare I experienced and so much anguish. Be careful!