Your Teenager’s Acne

It can be heart breaking to see your teens suffer from acne. The low self-esteem it causes can be extreme. Teens, both – male and female are very sensitive about the way they look. Acne can be hard to get rid of and also leave scars. A good course of action is to prevent them from starting in the first place by taking some preventative measures.

Usually a bad case of acne starts with a blackhead. Your teen picks at this thinking it is a pore filled with dirt. This is an illusion Oil, dead cells and other substance block the pore and mix with bacteria and it is the exposure to air that turns it black. Once these become inflamed they turn into the angry red pustules we know as teenage acne. What it really amounts to being are a hole in the skin that can become inflamed.

Over time these inflamed pustules develop white heads and when these break they cause horrible scarring on the face. Many teens, especially girls find this quite disfiguring. Unfortunately covering up these scars with make up is also not such a hot idea. It can make the acne problem look even worse.

There are some acne home remedies you can try. Some are actually silly sounding but they do work. Some might worsen the condition. Common remedies include toothpaste, egg whites, ice, salt water, and steam, wheat germ and apple cider vinegar. Usually these ingredients are applied directly to the acne pustule in an attempt to shrink the inflammation.

Your teen's acne may also respond to Acutance. If it is you that has the acne keep in mind that you may not be pregnant while taking it. The same goes for a pregnant teen if you should, God forbid, happen to have one!

Sometimes it is just hormones. Birth control pills may be prescribed to a girl to help correct her acne in that case. Some teen girls break out in acne around their period just like we do. In adult acne incases the pustules almost always develop along with a severe case of premenstrual syndrome or PMS.

There are also a lot of herbal remedies for acne. Herbs such as juniper, dandelion root, chamomile, lavender, bergamot, and burdock root can be used to reduce toxicity and improve the overall condition of the skin. Echinacea, pokeroot and red clover may aid us.

Witch hazel is a cheap medicine that can help dry up acne and it has excellent astringent properties.

If scarring is really bad you can get acne laser surgery. This can help clear it completely. Laser surgery is very safe and there is next to no risk of damaging the skin surrounding the scar. This is important as acne scars can affect a person's self-esteem for a very long time in life.

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Managing Team Building

Bullying is a fact of life but that does not mean it should be 'just let go'. If your child is the one being bullied it can cause a lot of damage to his or her self-esteem. Nowadays teens and young children are experience even more violence than ever. My own personal opinion is that this is caused by stress and nervous tensions. Teens today have more reason to be depressed than ever. They have schedules as bad as we do. It also seems they are losing their innocence when they are younger then ever.

Bullying has even caused suicides in very young children and teens because it makes them feel so left out of their peer group. A kid subject to bullying may also see no recourse or no way out of the situation. With no way to fight they give up and become very depressed.

If your child's behavior shows any changes you should encourage them to talk to you. Often a sullen or withdrawn kid or one that looks depressed is dealing with a bully at school. Let's face it. If you own a child they will not always tell you what is wrong. You need to perceptive. I am an excellent min d reader.

One tip off is the kid that keeps trying to think of ways to get out of going to school. Teens may not sleep or act listless. There may be no engagement at all in any social activities. They may be irritable and even bully other children to kind of release the energy of what is being done to them all day. In some cases the bullying is so bad that your kid can't eat, develops an ulcer or becomes physically ill.

If you find out there is a bully you need to instruct your child on how to avoid it. Often that is all you can do to help them avoid it. Make sure that they know that it is the bully that has the problem or that is not good enough and not they. You can also teach your child to avoid bullies whenever possible without changing too much of their lives. The idea is to find a compromise between avoiding the bully and having the bully control your life.

Kids also have to know that violence also makes it worse. Tell them of the dangers of fighting fire with fire and how that can cause conflicts to escalate.

You should also tell your kid to stand their ground and walk away from bullies. This is part of a lesson about choosing your battles wisely. If a bully approaches you make sure that they aren't afraid and that you will not be pushed around.

I always contact the school officials when this sort of thing happens. They are more serious about stopping bullying then ever as they have figured out that this type of aggression can lead to something as severe as the Columbine high school shootings.

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