When Your Esthetician has a Skin Condition: Autoimmune Progesterone Dermatitis

Hi everyone!

Today, I get personal.

And that’s okay- I expect you to be comfortable sharing personal things about your skin with me; it’s only right that I extend the same courtesy.

Before I go any further, I want to be clear: I’m not diagnosing anyone, prescribing anything, or telling you what you should or shouldn’t put in your body. This is simply my personal experience, and I’m sharing it in the hope that it might help someone else feel a little less alone in their own skin.

As some of you may know, one of the reasons I began my esthetician journey was to learn how to better understand and care for my own skin. I have a condition called Autoimmune Progesterone Dermatitis (APD). It’s been a huge part of my life for around a decade. When it first began, it was worse. It started as raised, itchy hives on my face and neck. As my hormones have changed, so has the condition. It no longer affects my neck; it’s mostly just my face now. The severity of the hives has also decreased, and now it mainly results in red, itchy patches instead. This is good, but still frustrating.

The science says that APD is a rare condition that, while not fully understood, can occur after taking certain types of hormonal medication. If this happens, the body essentially develops a sensitivity to progesterone, a hormone related to the menstrual cycle, resulting in this skin condition…month after month. For me, roughly two weeks out of the month, my skin will look and feel very different.

And honestly?

That’s been difficult to navigate. This is something my dermatologist said that I can’t fix unless I take birth control- which, for me, was why I developed it in the first place. I don’t want to put that back into my body.

Instead, I support my skin every other way I can.

But the part I wasn’t expecting was feeling like an imposter.

I have often wondered: how can I earn my client’s trust when the first thing they’re going to notice is my inflamed facial skin?

There’s a strange pressure in the beauty industry, isn’t it? We expect our hairstylists to have perfect hair and our estheticians to have flawless skin.

But here’s what I’m learning: having a skin condition doesn’t make me any less capable of helping you care for yours.

My skin doesn’t have to be perfect for me to be passionate about skincare, committed to continuing my education, or capable of treating you with care and consideration. In fact, living with a skin condition has given me a personal appreciation for how frustrating, uncomfortable, and sometimes emotionally exhausting skin concerns can be.

I know what it’s like to look in the mirror and wish your skin would cooperate for once.

I can’t tell you how many times I have had movie shoots fall on the days that my skin was flaring and all I could think about was how am I going to hide what’s going on with my skin.

And what do you do? Just the best that you can.

At this point, I have tried so many things that I actually have a decent system that I will share with you at the bottom of this blog post.

But before I get into that, I want you to know something else. I will never pretend like I know everything.

If you ask me a question and I don’t know the answer, I’ll tell you. I won’t guess, make promises I can’t keep or recommend something simply because I feel like I should have an answer. I’ll do my best to find reliable information and help you determine the correct next step- even if that means referring you to a dermatologist or another qualified health professional.

Because honesty is far more important than pretending to have all the answers.

I plan to be learning and growing for the rest of my life. I’m still experimenting with my own skin, just like so many of you.

At Skin and Tonic, I want to create a space where we can talk about skin without shame, where education matters more than perfection and where you feel comfortable showing up exactly as you are.

Your skin doesn’t have to be flawless to deserve care. And neither does mine.

Now, here’s my personal APD recipe.

Again, I am not prescribing anything to you; this is just what I have found works for my skin, and it’s always evolving.

Timing has a lot to do with it. I found that if I take Zyrtec or Claritin when my progesterone peaks, it lessens the severity.

In addition to that, I do the following twice daily:

I use Vanicream gentle cleanser when my skin is flaring. When it’s behaving, I use other cleansers.

I follow with La Roche Thermal Spring Water- I spray it all over my face, neck, and décolletage (always take care to cleanse and treat all of your body, not just your face)

After the spring water, while my skin is still damp (that’s important), I use Skin Script’s Ageless Skin Hydrating Serum (This is a dual-weight Hyaluronic Acid). I dispense it in my hand, rub my hands together and press it over my face, neck, and décolletage.

Then, I apply my moisturizer, the Skin Script Barrier Balancing Moisturizer, and I’m finished. For breakthrough dryness and itching, Vanicream Moisturizing OINTMENT is my holy grail. Unfortunately, it is being reformulated because of an ingredient shortage, but hopefully it will be back on the shelves soon- I will update you when this happens.

Until then, Aquaphor is our best bet.

I also recommend the Aquaphor stick (looks like a giant lip balm) to use on your dry skin BEFORE applying your makeup. This works exceptionally well- I still remember the first time I used this trick to prep for a film shooting day in Rutherfordton, NC.

I put my makeup on at set, and hours later it still actually looked good; you couldn’t tell when watching the movie back either :)

I know this has been a LONG post. I appreciate you hanging in there with me, and I hope you got something useful from it.

Until next time!

<3 EL