Accutane Side Effects Exposed: Side Effects of the Miracle Drug...

[Vee]

clearskin wrote:

accutane is great!! changed my life, im so confident in approaching and talking with people knowing that i have clear skin now. As before, i would hate to plan a date with a girl a week in advance, not knowing how much acne i would have at that time. NOW my skin is FREE of acne thanx to accutane!

Hello Clearskin,

So how long have you been taken on Accutane and did you get any side affect in between or after? Did you get your skin worse than before you were taking in the first month?

I have cancelled many of my dates because my acne face can't be presentable. I was being a very bad girl who is changing the plan all the time. NOw I rather to be quiet until I 95% clear my skin, then I will start to go out again.

The only thing I can't avoid is my family dinners every Sunday. That sucks, because all my brohter and cousins, they have beautiful skins. ONLY ME!

V

[Vee]

Joanne wrote:

Fran, thank you very much for your thoughts. I told my son of the potential side effects and he still wants to go ahead. So he is off his Doxycycline (learned from this site) and preparing for Accutane next week.
Good luck to you all!!!

Hello Joanne,

Usually the dr. will suggest your son to stop the Doxycycline for a couple of weeks before he starts on Accutane. Antibiotic and Accutane can't take together, it will give the brain badly pressues (headache). Check with his derm. before your son takes the action.

I waited two weeks after my minicyne. These two weeks without any oral medicine drives me nuts. I have about 200 bumps all over my face, plus my period just arrived, hormones raise....Well, thanks God, I will start a brand new me tomorrow!

[Vee]

Kay wrote:

Thanks everyone for ur answers to me. I do have plenty of time ::fingers crossed:: to clear up before february. The only other thing Im worried about is that my fiance wants to have a baby about this time next year. I know u only have to be off accutane for a month before you get pregnant and I will have been off it for 6 or 7 months by then, but it still makes me nervous. Has anyone taken accutane and then had kids kinda soon? My doctor knows im getting married and i told her i wanna try to have a baby next year and she told me to wait two months before i get pregnant. Every piece of information ive read tho says its out of ur system within one month and that it has no lasting effects on future pregnancy. Any input?

Kay,
Please worry one thing at one time. I do have a nice boy friend now at this moment. I thank for his patience to be with me still with my bad appearance right now. Actually, I can't even wait to become better and feel more confidence when we are together. He is always being nice to me, Do you have the same guilty feelings when you with your fiance? or he just simply not caring about your acnes?

[Vee]

NiCoLe wrote:

Hey Unknown- What can I do?? I wish I can get my refill earlier but I'm locked out of the Ipledge system until my month is up :(. Thats so good that you dont pick at your face because its so hard for me not to. The more stressed I get the more I pick at my face I suck!

Hi Nicole,
I do the same thing. I used to wash my face 10 times a week because I don't like the Tzone shining. Then I applied the strongest anti acne cream on my face and 2 minicyne a day to cool down my zits. Didn't help a lot, so this is why my Dr. decided me to use Accutane. In these two weeks without Antibiotics, my acnes are crazy jumping from here to there on my face. I will kill them all after 2 months.

[Vee]

Hi Everyone,

I am so anxious so this is why I am here to write a lot. By the way, I have a few questions wondering in my mind. Why we have dried lips/hands/eyes/face, but not the back and the feet or the legs?

Two, if we could get worse acne on the face, what about on the back too? or the chest? will they be cystic ones too? or small zits?

V

[Paul]

Vee,

in my experience... or well.. i'm in my 10th week.

i have painful cystic acne on my chest. today i woke up with my tshirt with blots of blood here and there.

there are several scabbing pimples on my back, they're not really cystic looking. look more like fat pimples. these usually dry up and have a flaky overlay, which i love to peel off.(which is probably very bad)

i think the jawline is affected by many people on accutane... mine's pretty bad.

if i had a camera, i'd show you... but i don't lol. even my cellphone, i can't bring the photos onto my computer.

i have several bumps on the back of my head as well, but i'm not too sure this is related to accutane, since i've had these before accutane. i had a boil on 1 spot of my head that i had excised by the dermatologist about a year before accutane... which began to uhm... i think turned into a cystic acne? not sure... but... yea.. that's about it...

beware of your pubic region, they will also have cystic acne... lots... painful and sore ones... red and glowing pus-filled ones. and i'm not talking about your armpit.

[Paul]

ive been wondering... about the severe side-effects of accutane.

like.. psychosis, schizophrenia, and depression...

i mean.. will accutane cause these chemically in the brain?

or is it something the medical society observed in people... because, i could understand psychosis and depression.... having the face look like it's been nuked isn't pelasing to anyone's ego. and surely, if accutane was prescribed to an immature emo kid, he/she would entertain the thoughts of death as a way out of living for 6 months through the course of accutane. this of course would be a very narrow view on life, limiting their entire life to 6 months of pimples.

i wonder where i can find some hard data on this stuff.... just out of curiosity...

i think ill go dive face first off a roof now.(just kidding!)

good grief... 4 more months to go...

[nath]

depressions caused by acne not accutane

if knoone ever said depression was a side effect of accutane it wouldnt excist..
everyone just blames their side effects on accutane.
ps. i also notice my tongue has grown since i have been on accutane..has anyone else experienced this??

[Paul]

lol how did you notice that?

maybe you're getting zits on your tongue?
(gross)

my tongue is fine.
my forehead is getting a little discolored from 3 cysts that's slowly beginning to disappear.

[Paul]

i have a question for you folks on accutane that DO NOT pick/pop your acne.

how do your cysts disappear if you dont ever touch it? do they somehow end up popping on their own as you wash your face or something? or ooze spontaneously while youre talking to somebody?

[nath]

lol i was bein sarcastic paul, but it doesnt show to good in writing

the cysts u dont touch stay around for ages...and they still scar...so its a lose lose situation

[Kay]

Cindy- Im wanting to know the same thing. Im getting married in Feb and my fiance wants us to get pregnant this time next year. By that time i will have been off accutane for 7 months. Everything Ive ever read says that it is completely safe to get pregnant 1 month after ur last dose. My doctor told me to wait two months just to be on the safe side. Im goin to double check with my obgyn but everything ive read says that accutane is out of ur system in a month and it has no lasting effects on furute pregnacy. I hope that helps. Im in the same situation. All the hormones that are goin thru ur system while ur pregnant make ur skin go crazy. I need to get rid of my acne before i have a baby!

[NiCoLe]

Paul_ I'd like to know the same thing!! If we dont pick or pop our pimples especially in our case(cystic) what happens?? Bceause I've tried that game before.. I leave them alone and see what happens if I dont touch it, well they just stya logged in my skin.. so what giveS!!

Fran- I actually had a good time.. I got in some pictures even though I didnt want to!! haha Ever just get so sick of hiding from the world? I just say screw it, alot lately. I dont want to look back on my life and have no memories because I spent half my life hiding.

Vee- I know what you mean about washing your face 10 times a day. It sucks. Its like whenever I look in the mirror theres 2-4 more pimples then when I last checked... i've had it! I explained to everyone and everyone has said the same.. we cancelled many dates, and events due to this situation. I never make plans in advance because I dont know what my face has in store for me week to week. Its rediculous. I have made every excuse for why I cant come out or do anything. I'm actually running out of good ones haha. I just dont answer the phone anymore.. or I just flat out tell them the deal.. and of course you get the "its not that bad" in repsonse!:( what kind of acne do you have??

[Fran]

Nicole -
Glad to hear you had a good time :) I'm proud of you for taking on the positive attitude, and I absolutely agree with you that we should not have to look back and feel we missed out (we've done enough of that already, haven't we?).

I think I'm going to be straight forward w/my friends in the future when they invite me out and I'm having a bad "face" day (as opposed to their bad hair day they dare to complain about - lol). I'm tired of lying and definitely ran out of original excuses at this point. Next time, I'm just goint to flat out tell them, "My skin is breaking out like a rash, so I can't go. Please think what you would do if you're having a poison ivy rash oozing all over your face, and respect my position". Amen!

[NiCoLe]

You could of said it better Fran! No matter which way we explain to them about our situation.. they will never know what it feels like. There are no words to describe!

[Stephie]

NICOLE, FRAN-
That's exactly what I do now. When my good friends call me, I tell them "My face looks crappy today, I'm not going out." Then I get the "It's not that bad. I saw you on Tuesday and it looked fine." Well guess they have no idea how unpredictably fast breakouts happen.

PAUL and NICOLE-
I try not to pick at my acne. Like you guys said, before I started accutane, if I don't pick at them they tend to stay swollen for a long time. So when it gets too painful, I have no choice but to pop them. After I started accutane, I noticed that they deflated pretty quickly even if I don't pop them. So I tried to leave them alone, and I found that the discoloration from the acne goes away much quicker if you don't pick at it. So try to bear it! It pays off =) Now when I get new pimples, they go away usually within 3 days. The color goes away in less than a week! If you pick at it, it'd probably take a month to heal completely. So it's not worth it in the long run!

VEE-
Your story was quite intense. I think a lot of us here can really relate to it. I only got 3 needles in total, but that's because my family doctor is one of those people who believe in not using any medication or taking any action unless you HAVE to. So for her to put me on accutane means my face was really horrible o.O Hope accutane works for you, and don't give up in the middle even if it gets frustrating!

[Vee]

Hello Stephie,

Thanks so much for sharing your experience. I will always remember your words and try my best to hold my hands from picking or popping my acnes.

Well, my acnes are not cystic ones but those bumps and zits all over my face. They are not painful, but instead of being oily, they are very dry from my Benzon Jel.

I just started my med. yesterday, feeling very tired after so I took 2 hours nap. I am looking forward for the transformation.

It's a Thanksgiving weekend, I don't have a big planning. I give my hope to the Xmas. Now I will stay in and be relaxing.

V

[Shoaib]

5 months and god knows how many more days to go =P

[unknown soldier]

I've had acne (and now scars) for soooo long, but I've never been upfront about my appearance with friends and family. It's just been such an embarrassing topic for me that I've always preferred to avoid the subject and kind of pretend to just be "normal" in order to avoid the issue. It's kind of unbelievable that I've gone so long with this attitude, but I'm beginning to change this. Lately I've started to believe that it would probably be better for my own psyche to just be open about it; and hope that with the issue being out there and on the table it will make me a bit less insecure and ashamed. It really does help to get things off your chest, no matter what is troubling somebody. So I've started discussing how I feel about my appearance with my parents and close family, and it feels good. It makes me feel like I'm not dealing with this solely on my own, and their words of reassurance that nobody is judging me on my looks really help. I know that people who I meet for the first time may have to get to know my personality before they "get over" my appearance, but that's okay. Underneath it all I feel handsome, and if I carry myself with confidence and rely upon my personality then I'll be able to weed out the bad folks and find the good ones.

Those first-impressions, though, when meeting new people or when kicking it in a bar or club are still tough, though. Such situations can't help but make me totally over sensitive about what people are thinking about me, but that's the way things are and I can't change that. It's better to deal with it and still go out than stay hidden in my apartment. Above all else, I've stopped with the "why me?!" and wishing I could go back in time to when my skin was perfect. When life hands you lemons, make lemonade! I also know that there are guys coming back from Iraq missing arms, legs, and parts of their face, so if these brave individuals can go through such trauma then the least I can do is be a man about things and keep putting one foot ahead of the other and live my life.

Take care, all.:)

[NiCoLe]

Everyone- we'll get through this.. it sucks right now I know but we have to stay positive. The more we stress and get upset the worse our faces are going to get. Unknown Soldier is right.. theres people that handicapped, losing arms and legs in irag, even losing their lives and were on here complaining about our skin. But also screw the others who complain about one pimple when we suffer with a problem-Bastards!!! Lets stop looking in the mirror and checking our skin every minute we get. I just cant wait for the day were all on here obsessing how clear our skin is!! Ohhhh and that party in NY!! ;)

TRY to have a good weekend everyone! Know that your not alone, we have eachother. Lets not complain to people that have no idea what we go through on a daily basis and probably get annoyed with our complaining all of the time.. come on here and vent! thats what I do. Thanks to everyone!