Tretinoin (Retin-A) Update & Sephora Haul

10:17:00 PM mandy 7 Comments

I mentioned a while back that I saw a dermatologist, who prescribed a tretinoin gel (generic brand of Retin-A) for me to use for my acne. I did diligently follow her instructions and slowly increased my usage until I reached a once every night application.

Doing so made my skin peel like never before. (When I first started to use the La Roche Pose Efflaclar Duo, my skin did peel but it I don't think it was as bad.) All the exfoliating and moisturizing I was doing did not seem to help either. After a follow-up visit to the derm, she told me to decrease the applications to every other day since daily was, obviously, too strong for me.

But I must admit, I didn't follow the doctor's orders. Instead I completely stopped using the treatment altogether. (I think) I saw her a month or two after the initial appointment and at the time I didn't see too many benefits, acne/break-outs wise, from the tretinoin gel. Pair that with the unsightly flaky skin (in the summer no-less), I wanted to 'run' as far away as possible from the treatment and the dermatologist. (I haven't made a follow-up appointment since that second/last visit.)

After a few months of taking myself off the gel, my skin seemed to regulate itself and there wasn't massive amounts of flakiness on my face. I was and am still breaking out quite often and a lot. But I didn't want to risk using the treatment and having to go out of the house all flaky and peeling. So I took the opportunity before the holidays and right after my Fall semester ended to put on a layer of the tretinoin gel and give it a second chance. "This time I know better!" is what I said to myself.

But I didn't. Either I was a little too heavy-handed or my skin really can't handle the tretinoin because my skin started to immediately peel, flake, dry-up, so on and so forth the day after. Even the trusty ol' Olay Beauty Fluid that I relied on for the past 2 winters didn't help the flakes (which lasted for over a week, not exaggerating).

I hadn't been thinking of getting any new skincare items, despite the skin condition. I even settled on the idea of just riding it out (even though I still sulked about it here and there). But a "quick" stop to a Sephora to check out eye creams got me curious about some new Dr. Jart+ items that I remembered the Muse spoke highly of for drier skin folks. After doing a bit of review searching, the Ceramidin line seems to be pretty effective for other dry-skin gals as well. So with the combination of the weather being all chilly now and having dry-ish/combo & flaky skin, I went from having an itty-bitty speck of curiosity to flown-blown desire to have the products. (Why does this happen?!...)

Here are the items that got:

L to R: Dr. Jart+ Ceramidin Cream, Bobbi Brown Hydrating Eye Cream, Dr. Jart+ Ceramidin Liquid

I can't wait to use them. Maybe with these in-hand, I'll give the tretinoin a third chance. Perhaps third time's the charm?
Has anyone tried any of these products before? How do you like it?