Every skin-care professional I've sought for my acne, either at a facial spa or dermatologists office, spent hours picking away at my face while sternly lecturing me why one should never do so. You'll tear the skin, they'd say. You'll make things worse --all the while digging holes in my head with metal implements or fingernails and alcohol-dipped cotton balls. "You know *squeeze* you should never pick at your *squeeze* pimples, you could cause permanent *squeeze* scarring and *squeeze*..." Seriously, every single one. What a scam. I refuse to believe washing one's face and picking one's zits is a complicated medical procedure too dangerous for lay-people, or that one should pay a hundred dollars an hour to have someone else do it for them (and hopefully buy the lot of whatever skin care line they're hawking). I'll pop my pimples at home for free, thankyouverymuch.
But no matter how you feel about skin-care specialists, or where you fall on the 'to pick or not to pick' argument, I want to address the when you must pick issue. Yes, there is a time when you absolutely must squeeze your zits. Why? Because you're really freaking the rest of us out.
A guideline:
When you have such a ripe honker that the hard, yellow pustule is already hanging halfway out of the pore, and worse, is threatening to fall into the sandwich you are making for me at my local deli--you must zap that mo'fo. It's turning me, and everyone in line, off our lunch.
When the blackhead in the middle of your forehead has grown so huge it looks like someone forced a wine cork into your skin with a jackhammer...take a sec and squeeze it out, okay? If you are unsure how, ask one of the many people who are staring at it. Heck, you might even get some brave soul to do it for you.
If you have a jawline full of angry, red spots that will turn into angrier cysts if you so much as touch them, leave them alone. However when one of those angry red dots turns into an inch-high, inch-wide whitehead? That's what we acne-prone call ready. Get a pin, poke, and drain.
And for God's sakes fellas, get a decent razor. Even the most dermally blessed look like they have genital warts on their neck after using one of those orange Bic nightmares. While I'm at it, buy a pair of tweezers and pluck those nasty ingrowns too. It won't make you gay.
Posted by Antigeist at August 7, 2004 04:40 PM