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Have you ever been called horrible names because of your acne? Have you ever stayed home instead of going out with friends because of your acne? Well, you are not alone, when my sister was younger it was so sad, she was called the Acne Queen, King, she got so depressed. Her face was so bad, she had lots of black heads and white heads, and she was a walking talking running advertisement for acne. If the criticism and mockery of her peers (especially her so called girl-friends) was one thing, the impossibility of removing the ugly acne she had was another thing altogether.

Our family members didn't help much, the general myth about acne being a result of poor (or more specifically, junk) diet meant she couldn't eat too much junk food and had to 'eat more veggies'. A number of her friends ate out with her, and what's more, ate junk food even more frequently than she did, but they hardly had any acne. Something had to be wrong with that popular myth; I had seen the myth being busted right before her eyes. Another associated myth was about chocolate, and since she loved chocolate in any form or shape, she would have found giving it up an absolute nightmare, almost impossible. I even read & followed news and medical reports on the subject, I discovered to her relief that chocolate consumption had nothing whatsoever to do with acne.

Her peers were not much of a help wither, most of her friends, hinted with obvious sarcasm, that her acne advertisement face was a result of my excess chocolate.

Another myth that I did believe, and which sounded genuine and even scientific at that time, related to the assumption that acne was a result of dirt accumulation on the pores of her face. I never stopped to realize that id that was the case, how come she didn't have acne all over her body? She spent ages washing her face with all kinds of soaps and anti acne creams in a bid to eradicate acne but it didn't seem to work. In the end my sister decided to change her attitude, instead of freaking out and getting continually stressed, she decided that 'what will be will be' and stopped looking in the mirror every day and within a few months the acne was certainly subsiding, so much so that after about a year it had gone completely.