For the last 13 years of my life I have battled cystic acne. 13 Years is an awful long time to not have clear skin and believe me I was on the verge of giving up.

I was never a person who cared for make up. The most you’d see me in was mascara and a lip here and there. So my acne scars were there for the world to see and you’d never know that they bothered the crap out of me. I wore those scars with my head held high as if they were man made freckles. That’s actually what I called them. My freckles! But behind closed doors I was unhappy and I had already tried just about everything you could think of. Everything on the shelves of your local drug store to the topical prescribed by a random dermatologist that knew nothing about my skin.

Late last year, I was at my wits end and decided to do some research to find an African American dermatologist in Charlotte, NC. There a handful to choose from and I came across Dr. Gary Slaughter of Charlotte Dermatology. He changed my life. I wanted to find a doctor who knew about my skin and the outcome that I wanted.

We started out using a topical and a pill. They helped stop the acne for a little but I would still get a pimple here and there and the scaring was taking forever to fade. I was on that for about 3 months. After that didn’t work as quickly as Dr. Slaughter had hoped we began to talk about Accutane. I had my reservations because I did some research on the side effects and they worried me but even after seeing before and after photos of other people suffering from Cystic acne I knew it was the right move.

Continued in next post…