Acne Acne Acne

Katty

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Based on some discussions in the Getting Ripped thread, decided to start a separate post on acne.
The particular question that came up was why does milk cause acne? For me, it seems that whey in particular is the offender. I can tolerate re-strained greek yogurt and some hard cheeses (though they might be causing some skin issues), but milk or whey protein makes my skin go crazy.
I've tried high doses of Nutrisorb A, which I thought helped a bit at first, but then not really in the long run. I've also been eating liver once a week for a long time. I haven't tried a zinc supp in a while, might try one out (I used to eat a ton of oysters for the zinc, but now they come up on me, and they're not always available and they're expensive).

So why does whey cause acne? Has anyone been able to troubleshoot this? I remember some posters noting that progest-e seemed to calm down some acne. Is whey somehow increasing estrogen?
 
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It's a common issue that you hear, milk gives me acne. [Edit: Here, rather than list remedies for acne in general, what if we think about remedies for milk causing acne?]

Zinc and vitamin A are protective against acne, and so it seems that, assuming milk does somehow bring on acne, milk may suppress the protective effect of Zinc and Vitamin A.

But supplementation of zinc is not recommended by Peat, since zinc is oxidative and therefore dangerous. Vitamin A supplementation is also dangerous for some people, and it's difficult to know how much Vitamin A may be problematic for you. Of course, these caveats apply all the more for the hypothyroid.

What to do? A possible solution is Vitamin E. A zinc deficiency depletes Vitamin E. And Vitamin E spares Vitamin A. Two for the price of one.

Better yet, Vitamin E is safe to supplement even in megadoses, unlike zinc and Vitamin A.

So here's the Peatian bio-hack, if you'd like to try it, when drinking milk? Supplement large doses of Vitamin E, maybe even as much as 2 grams. Peat also suggests that selenium complements Vitamin E, so you might want to supplement with about 200 micrograms of selenium, or have seafood which is a good source of selenium. I think toxinless.com has reviews of good sources of Vitamin E and selenium.

[Edit: As Wilfrid suggests below, make sure you're using Vitamin E and not an artificial synthetic acetate. And as Peata suggests below, you may also want to try some K2-MK4 from Thorne research.]

Finally, Peat himself suggests applying progesterone and E directly to the acne.

The good news is Vitamin E is also good for lots of Peatian types of benefits, such as neutralizing PUFAs and rendering iron less toxic. So it's a win-win.

If you decide to try it, please share with us how it works?
 

Wilfrid

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It may be possible to avoid any zinc side effects ( as according to RP, the oxidation process begin in the stomach and/or intestines).
For RP, a safe and effective dose of supplemental zinc is between 5 and 10mg.
Knowing that, in case of supplementation, he would favor the sulphate or gluconate form of it, it's also another clue.
If you decide to give zinc supp a try, let's say a liquid zinc sulphate ( see toxinless.com), put only one drop on the back of your hand and lick it. Then repeat it, five times, to get to 5 drops licked all at once.
Do this operation , 4 times a day between meals. All of the zinc will be absorbed through the thin mucous membrane of your mouth. Preventing any oxydative process in the stomach and/or the intestine.
Putting the drops directly under the tongue ( where the zinc, if kept longer enough in the mouth, is going to mix with a lot of saliva) won't work as efficiently as the "licking" process.
As for the supplemental vit A, if you don't eat liver weekly, a dose of, no more than, 5000 IU daily is safe even for hypothyroid people according to RP.
Or, if you eat liver weekly but need extra-vitamin A, the transdermal route would be safer with a daily dose between 20 000 ~ 25 000 IU. This topical dosage should be equivalent, more or less, to the 5000 IU taken orally. Ray says that if ones choose to apply vitamins on skin, 4 or 5 times the oral dose on skin is the way to go. In a previous post, I couldn't find more than a few studies confirming that.

viewtopic.php?f=3&t=1070

But, I personally think, now, that between 35 000 to 50 000 IU of topical vit A is the minimum to get significant absorption. I got this info ( more or less than 10% absorption rate) thanks to Pr. Adrian Williams, who wrote an interesting ( but very hard to find) book on transdermal and topical drug delivery.

http://books.google.fr/books?id=hWwpR2M ... &q&f=false

As for the vit E, like visionofstrength said, the supplementation is pretty safe but, at least, one exception should be noted, for which the implications are unknown, were a lowering of serum thyroid hormone levels and a slight increase of fasting triglyceride concentrations for young women ( Tsai AC, Kelley JJ, Peng B, Cook N. Study on the effect of megavitamin E supplementation in man. Am J Clin Nutr 1978;31:831-837.) was found, but the supplementation was made with the synthetic acetate form of E ( without any mixed tocopherols) though, which is also important to know.
 

Peata

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Also I've read that large doses of vitamin A and/or vitamin E cause problems with absorbing or using vitamin K. Just something else to keep in mind.
 

Blossom

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Sulfur soap is mentioned as a topical approach to acne in the Ray Peat email exchange.
 
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Katty

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Thanks for the thoughts everyone! I've tried a lot of these recommendations, guess I just haven't found the right combo of things yet.

visionofstrength said:
What to do? A possible solution is Vitamin E. A zinc deficiency depletes Vitamin E. And Vitamin E spares Vitamin A. Two for the price of one.

Better yet, Vitamin E is safe to supplement even in megadoses, unlike zinc and Vitamin A.

So here's the Peatian bio-hack, if you'd like to try it, when drinking milk? Supplement large doses of Vitamin E, maybe even as much as 2 grams. Peat also suggests that selenium complements Vitamin E, so you might want to supplement with about 200 micrograms of selenium, or have seafood which is a good source of selenium. I think toxinless.com has reviews of good sources of Vitamin E and selenium.

2g of Vitamin E?!?! That's about 2,979 IU per day. :shock: Perhaps a tad excessive. But I do have some Unique E, and Vit E is always low for me on my cronometer, so perhaps that is a place for me to start (around 400iu).

Wilfrid said:
If you decide to give zinc supp a try, let's say a liquid zinc sulphate ( see toxinless.com), put only one drop on the back of your hand and lick it. Then repeat it, five times, to get to 5 drops licked all at once.
Do this operation , 4 times a day between meals. All of the zinc will be absorbed through the thin mucous membrane of your mouth. Preventing any oxydative process in the stomach and/or the intestine.
Putting the drops directly under the tongue ( where the zinc, if kept longer enough in the mouth, is going to mix with a lot of saliva) won't work as efficiently as the "licking" process.
Why only between meals if it is bypassing the stomach anyway?

I've tried liquid zinc before, but always swallowing it. Oddly, a couple days of zinc supplementation would make my gallbladder freak out (and then kill the rest of my digestion). My only thought on this is that I have copper built up in my gallbladder and the zinc was displacing the copper??? The zinc might have been helping with my skin, but I couldn't take it long enough to tell for certain.
When I was eating a lot of oysters, that didn't seem to help my skin. So maybe after adding in the E, I'll try some zinc.

Wilfrid said:
As for the supplemental vit A, if you don't eat liver weekly, a dose of, no more than, 5000 IU daily is safe even for hypothyroid people according to RP.
Or, if you eat liver weekly but need extra-vitamin A, the transdermal route would be safer with a daily dose between 20 000 ~ 25 000 IU. This topical dosage should be equivalent, more or less, to the 5000 IU taken orally. Ray says that if ones choose to apply vitamins on skin, 4 or 5 times the oral dose on skin is the way to go. In a previous post, I couldn't find more than a few studies confirming that.
I tried topical Vit A- probably wasn't enough, but it didn't do anything. I recently tried really high doses of Nutrisorb A (like 75,000mg) which was probably too much. I know too much A can lead to hypothyroid issues. So maybe I just still need to find the right dose for me.

Peata said:
Also I've read that large doses of vitamin A and/or vitamin E cause problems with absorbing or using vitamin K. Just something else to keep in mind.
I take Thorne K2. Right now about 2 drops per day (which is 2 mg). Does anyone know Peat's recommendation for K2 dosing?

Blossom said:
Sulfur soap is mentioned as a topical approach to acne in the Ray Peat email exchange.
I'll look into this. Although I want the acne to go away, I kind of want to fix it form the inside out so that I know the change is legit. But it might be useful to clear my skin for special occasions.

NIACINAMIDE
I've tried mixing some niacinamide into my face cream. It seemed to clear my skin for a couple weeks, but then seems to stop working. That seems to be pretty common with most things and acne-- 2-4 weeks of clearing with some new treatment, and then it comes right back.

ASPIRIN
Forgot to mention I've tried aspirin for acne too. This was a while ago. The powdered aspirin was causing weird sensations in my mouth (allergic?), so I started taking the pills- I can't remember, but I think I was doing 4-6 aspirin per day. Acne was clearing... but I gave myself what I believe was an ulcer. So had to stop that. I started putting largish doses of dissolved aspirin powder in my baths. I know it was getting into my system, because I would bleed a lot at even a little scratch (apparently I wasn't taking enough Vit K). But for some reason, it wasn't helping the acne. I still don't understand why I have to take the aspirin orally for it to help my acne, even though it was clearly getting in my system when I was bathing in it.
 
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Katty said:
2g of Vitamin E?!?! That's about 2,979 IU per day. :shock: Perhaps a tad excessive. But I do have some Unique E, and Vit E is always low for me on my cronometer, so perhaps that is a place for me to start (around 400iu).
That amount comes from the 2 - 2.5 grams that haidut mentions in studies here.
 

Mittir

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Increased Metabolism and Acne

Someone asked Ray Peat about milk causing acne. His answer was that
it was possibly due to vitamin A deficiency caused by increased metabolism from calcium in milk. Extra vitamin A should help here. Whole milk without added vitamin has about 1,000 IU of vitamin A per quart. I remove some of the fat from whole milk and i eat beef liver to get most of the vitamin A. I only get skin issue when i eat store bought butter. Most hormones and
some pesticides are concentrated in fat. I do not get skin problem when i drink full fat milk.
I avoid full fat milk, because it seems to slow down my metabolism.
Cows eating allergenic food can cause gut irritation and that can result in acne.
RP has mentioned in other places that dried foods, especially whey protein can be
quite allergenic because of high content of fragile amino acids like
tryptophan and cysteine. These fragile amino acids get oxidized in high heat.
He thinks taste of milk is a good guide. He recommends changing brands to find a suitable one.
I think it is a good idea to rely on cheese for protein and calcium if milk is not digested properly
 
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Re: Increased Metabolism and Acne

Mittir said:
Someone asked Ray Peat about milk causing acne. His answer was that
it was possibly due to vitamin A deficiency caused by increased metabolism from calcium in milk.
Thanks, Mittir. That's what I was guessing in my post, but I don't see Peat's answer to this question in the toxinless.com search results for 'acne' and 'milk'.

Because of the dangers and difficulties of supplementing Vitamin A, the suggestion is to take a large dose of Vitamin E mixed tocopherols, since Vitamin E lets you use Vitamin A more effectively.

Peat also suggests liver and as a source of Vitamin A.
 
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Katty

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Re: Increased Metabolism and Acne

Thanks for posting this Mittir. Some thoughts:

Mittir said:
Someone asked Ray Peat about milk causing acne. His answer was that
it was possibly due to vitamin A deficiency caused by increased metabolism from calcium in milk. Extra vitamin A should help here. Whole milk without added vitamin has about 1,000 IU of vitamin A per quart.

I've heard this before but I'm not sure if that's what's going on in this particular instance. Only 1 tbsp of sweetened condensed milk (organic, no added vitamins) causes really bad acne for me. I can't imagine 1 tbsp of the sweetened condensed milk speeds up my metabolism that much. I could imagine if you drank a lot of milk over the course of some time that it might speed up metabolism. But one small serving?
I've also tried different brands of milk, even goat milk, and I get the same reaction.

Mittir said:
I think it is a good idea to rely on cheese for protein and calcium if milk is not digested properly
I'm down with cheese, but it's hard to find really low fat cheese, whereas skim milk is easy.
 
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Re: Increased Metabolism and Acne

Katty said:
I could imagine if you drank a lot of milk over the course of some time that it might speed up metabolism. But one small serving?
I've also tried different brands of milk, even goat milk, and I get the same reaction.
I'm guessing "speed up metabolism" may not be a literal quote from Peat, but the idea is that the inability to use Vitamin A effectively is linked to acne. Something about lowfat milk makes this worse, is the theory (maybe calcium).

But whatever the cause, the remedy may be to increase Vitamin E by a lot, since it's safe, and it helps your body to use Vitamin A effectively.
 

Wilfrid

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@Katty,

The idea of taking the supplemental zinc between meals and not during meals is the following:
When you lick the zinc between meals you will swallowing only trace of it because the zinc isn't likely to mix with a lot of saliva. Plus, a trace of it won't even mix with ( any vitamins naturally occuring in ) foods thus minimizing greatly any oxidizing process in the mouth and stomach. As for the antagonism between the zinc-copper thing, I don't see it as a problem if you stick with a dose of ,no more than, 5~7 mg of supplemental zinc.
This antagonism usually take place with much higher dosage and ,often, with weeks of supplementation with either zinc or copper alone.
I would also add, to get back to the zinc stuff, that during a meal, you will produce a lot more of saliva and you will absorb,for sure, more of the zinc element. And the chances are greater that, if swallowed with foods and/or mixed with foods in your mouth, that the supplemental zinc will produce the oxidizing process that RP warns about.
As for the vit A, if you put 75 000 IU of it topically, the dosage may be too high. If you may consider an absorption rate of (little more or less than) 10%, an effective but yet safe, dose would be 50 000 IU maximum.
 
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Wilfrid said:
I don't see it as a problem if you stick with a dose of ,no more than, 5~7 mg of supplemental zinc.
Yes, Wilfrid, I think Peat seems to agree with you that you should not supplement zinc for a long time:
Ray Peat said:
Taking zinc orally, 5 or 10 mg, can replenish the body's stores in a few days, but
the supplement can oxidize other nutrients in the stomach or intestine, so it isn't
good to use it for a long time."

Here, with milk giving acne, we would like to have a sustainable life strategy, and while zinc and even Vitamin A supplements may be safe in low enough doses in the short term, they should not be supplemented for a long time, as a life strategy.

The good thing is, Vitamin E works best when you supplement it in the long term as a life strategy, and it accomplishes the same thing as supplementation of zinc and Vitamin A, but safely.
 
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Katty

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Wilfrid said:
@Katty,

The idea of taking the supplemental zinc between meals and not during meals is the following:
When you lick the zinc between meals you will swallowing only trace of it because the zinc isn't likely to mix with a lot of saliva. Plus, a trace of it won't even mix with ( any vitamins naturally occuring in ) foods thus minimizing greatly any oxidizing process in the mouth and stomach. As for the antagonism between the zinc-copper thing, I don't see it as a problem if you stick with a dose of ,no more than, 5~7 mg of supplemental zinc.
This antagonism usually take place with much higher dosage and ,often, with weeks of supplementation with either zinc or copper alone.
I would also add, to get back to the zinc stuff, that during a meal, you will produce a lot more of saliva and you will absorb,for sure, more of the zinc element. And the chances are greater that, if swallowed with foods and/or mixed with foods in your mouth, that the supplemental zinc will produce the oxidizing process that RP warns about.
As for the vit A, if you put 75 000 IU of it topically, the dosage may be too high. If you may consider an absorption rate of (little more or less than) 10%, an effective but yet safe, dose would be 50 000 IU maximum.
Thank you for the explanation on that!

visionofstrength said:
The good thing is, Vitamin E works best when you supplement it in the long term as a life strategy, and it accomplishes the same thing as supplementation of zinc and Vitamin A, but safely.
Starting E right away. :D
 

Wilfrid

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visionofstrength said:
Wilfrid said:
I don't see it as a problem if you stick with a dose of ,no more than, 5~7 mg of supplemental zinc.
Yes, Wilfrid, I think Peat seems to agree with you that you should not supplement zinc for a long time:
Ray Peat said:
Taking zinc orally, 5 or 10 mg, can replenish the body's stores in a few days, but
the supplement can oxidize other nutrients in the stomach or intestine, so it isn't
good to use it for a long time."

Here, with milk giving acne, we would like to have a sustainable life strategy, and while zinc and even Vitamin A supplements may be safe in low enough doses in the short term, they should not be supplemented for a long time, as a life strategy.

The good thing is, Vitamin E works best when you supplement it in the long term as a life strategy, and it accomplishes the same thing as supplementation of zinc and Vitamin A, but safely.

As for the zinc thing, it's rather me agreeing with RP than the other way around. As everything I wrote, in this post, on zinc (except the licking stuff) came directly from him. :D
Thanks for the very good info regarding the alternative utilisation of the vit E in case of zinc and A deficiency.
 

Peata

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For me, Progest E did the trick. But I took a lot of it for a while. I started taking it daily about mid-April and stopped around the end of June. Anywhere from 60 - 100+ drops per day. I went by symptoms.

It seemed to reset something in me because *knock on wood ha* I haven't had much trouble with acne since. At Ovulation and during luteal phase, I have had some acne come up in the usual offending places - chin/jawline usually, but if that happens, I start taking Progest E again (I don't measure now, just put a "strip" on gums). If the pimple is cystic or extra painful I do a strip on both top and bottom gums. Usually the pimple turns into a regular pimple as opposed to the worse cystic kind or just shrinks back down and goes away. I find I don't have to use it everyday even during luteal phase (though perhaps I should be using it even if I don't have active acne?) - just on an as-needed basis, and it works so far.

Now I'm trying to help my body keep up its own progesterone by increasing protein.
 
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Katty

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Peata said:
For me, Progest E did the trick. But I took a lot of it for a while. I started taking it daily about mid-April and stopped around the end of June. Anywhere from 60 - 100+ drops per day. I went by symptoms.

It seemed to reset something in me because *knock on wood ha* I haven't had much trouble with acne since. At Ovulation and during luteal phase, I have had some acne come up in the usual offending places - chin/jawline usually, but if that happens, I start taking Progest E again (I don't measure now, just put a "strip" on gums). If the pimple is cystic or extra painful I do a strip on both top and bottom gums. Usually the pimple turns into a regular pimple as opposed to the worse cystic kind or just shrinks back down and goes away. I find I don't have to use it everyday even during luteal phase (though perhaps I should be using it even if I don't have active acne?) - just on an as-needed basis, and it works so far.

Now I'm trying to help my body keep up its own progesterone by increasing protein.
Thanks, Peata. I remember you writing about taking progest-e for your acne in your log. It's on the list of things for me to consider taking again. I didn't have great experiences with it so I'm a little concerned about starting it again. Perhaps my body chemistry has changed so I might react differently to it now, but I'm still nervous.
I'm trying to increase protein too. Protein is definitely one of the most difficult aspects of the diet for me to increase/adjust.
 

Peata

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Katty said:
Peata said:
For me, Progest E did the trick. But I took a lot of it for a while. I started taking it daily about mid-April and stopped around the end of June. Anywhere from 60 - 100+ drops per day. I went by symptoms.

It seemed to reset something in me because *knock on wood ha* I haven't had much trouble with acne since. At Ovulation and during luteal phase, I have had some acne come up in the usual offending places - chin/jawline usually, but if that happens, I start taking Progest E again (I don't measure now, just put a "strip" on gums). If the pimple is cystic or extra painful I do a strip on both top and bottom gums. Usually the pimple turns into a regular pimple as opposed to the worse cystic kind or just shrinks back down and goes away. I find I don't have to use it everyday even during luteal phase (though perhaps I should be using it even if I don't have active acne?) - just on an as-needed basis, and it works so far.

Now I'm trying to help my body keep up its own progesterone by increasing protein.
Thanks, Peata. I remember you writing about taking progest-e for your acne in your log. It's on the list of things for me to consider taking again. I didn't have great experiences with it so I'm a little concerned about starting it again. Perhaps my body chemistry has changed so I might react differently to it now, but I'm still nervous.
I'm trying to increase protein too. Protein is definitely one of the most difficult aspects of the diet for me to increase/adjust.[/quote]

Same here.
 

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