15 Things That Secretly Cause Your Acne Breakouts (3 of 4)

Sweating Too Much

As said before, sweat is a contributing factor to developing acne. Paired up with daily run-ins of bacteria, your skin producing oil and the chemicals from makeup and the like will lead to more breakouts.

Understanding this, you’ll be able to deal with this issue much faster. For one, if you know you’re going to the gym, not bothering about makeup will help. The same applies to knowing if you’ll be doing any kind of strenuous activity that will lead to sweating. If you do have makeup on before doing either of those things, just wash off your makeup with water or with a facial wipe.

And of course, after any hard workout be sure to shower immediately.

Laundry Detergent

Along the same lines as all these other products we’ve mentioned, certain laundry detergents could be the issue with your breakouts. Some of the ones on the market can be too harsh for your skin and may lead to your skin being irritated. And once you start wearing your clothes that have been soaked with that detergent, your complexion could react to the residue that is still left on the fabric. This can lead to your complexion being riddled with breakouts all over your body.

Again, ingredients can be the reason, but also if you’ve recently changed to a new detergent – because it was on sale or something – then that could be the issue too. This is a simple fix though, simply go back to the same detergent you’ve used.

If you want to mix things up though, look for one that’s fragrance-free, dye-free, and dermatologist-tested.

Dry Skin While Sunbathing

You should know by now that baking in the sun and using tanning beds can lead to skin cancer.

That said, it hasn’t stopped people from going to the beach without sunscreen. If you’re the type of person who still does this, another reason to add to the pile is that doing this can make you go into worse breakouts.

Contrary to what people tell you, the sun isn’t some healing aspect for your acne problem. The sun uses the heat to dry up your skin if you’re exposed to it for long periods of time. And like we’ve said before, when your skin gets dry, it sends a signal to your body to produce more oil that seeps out onto your skin. That overproduced oil all over your skin leads to those acne problems.

The fix for this is also real simple: stop going to tanning beds from now on. Obviously, we can’t avoid the sun itself, but you can prepare your skin for it. Getting some titanium dioxide- or zinc-based sunscreen will help. Those chemicals are natural sun protectants and are least likely to cause skin irritation. It also wouldn’t hurt to wear a hat and sunglasses.

Diet

Yes. Even the foods that you are eating can cause issues. While what you eat and drink will vary from person to person, there are some general aspects that we can glean from this. First off, tomatoes and peppers – two of the most common ingredients in spicy dishes – contain acidic lycopene. That chemical is a common irritant that throws off your skin’s pH levels and can lead to breakouts around the mouth.

This doesn’t happen only with spicy foods though. There are people who get a reaction to dairy, gluten, or other types of foods. As such, if you are getting breakouts and if none of the mentioned points fit you so far, perhaps this could be the issue. Talk to a dermatologist or gastroenterologist to see if what you are eating is the issue.