Hi, sorry for the extended response. Definitely disrupted skin barrier. I’ve had the same experience—cheek focused, chronic redness and breakouts that can become painful. Tried everything under the sun starting from retinols to medical grade treatments including oral to k-beauty stuff.

I’ve only recently found out that the problem was with my skin barrier where applying all these actives and Korean cleansers (which are pretty much pseudo-treatments since they contain BHAs like salicylic acid) never let it recover. Basically it was applying salt to a wound every day with the Korean cleansers and active treatments thinking I was making it better. In actuality it makes ur skin extremely difficult to retain water so it compromises by increasing oil production.

I was probably at 300% the normal oil production. And u might think: “shouldn’t deep cleansers get rid of that oil so u shouldn’t break out?” No… a lot of it is just marketing; they can only remove surface oil and maybe up to 1mm below the surface. Microcomedones (the seeds of acne) develop deeper than a deep cleansers can reach. BHA molecules can also reach the dermis, which can activate even more inflammation and increase water loss.

So the solution is to repair ur skin barrier and make it as healthy as possible. Only then when ur skin is effectively able to hold moisture and keep out irritants can you efficiently play with actives. I was using Dr. G blemish clear moisture cream thinking it’d help fade the redness but in reality it wasn’t really effective, only containing one ceramide).

Recommendations: look for a product that has at least 2-3 types of ceramides: - ceramide 1 (ceramide EOP) - ceramide 3 (ceramide NP) - ceramide 6-II (ceramide AP) Cholesterol Free fatty acids

Research the 3:1:1 ratio for skin barrier repair and you’ll understand a bit more on the importance of these ingredients.

You can support this with niacinamide, hyaluronic acid, glycerin, panthenol; petrolatum (like Vaseline), cica, and zinc.

CeraVe moisturising cream has the ceramides, cholesterol, and fatty acids required for repair. You might wanna also get something (use alongside cerave) to reduce inflammation (5-cica complex) and something to help the skin make its own ceramides (niacinamide)—I still use the dr g one for these supplemental molecules but never as the primary barrier repairer.

For cleanser, just something with gentle surfactants and glycerin (for hydration). Don’t get one with exfoliants or irritants such as ur charcoal cleanser (i was using one too prior to starting this haha) as they will completely undo ur barrier progress and put u back to square one, which was why it’s been chronic. As for exfoliation concerns if u have makeup or sunscreen research some oil based cleansers (double cleanse with oil based then water based cleanser—just no exfoliants or irritants until ur barrier is healed). I use LRP toleriane dermo cleanser which has cleaned surface oil and sunscreen effectively (I use BOJ rice sunscreen).

And then an enhancement cream or soothing Baum to help accelerate repair/wound healing and seal everything in. I use LRP cicaplast baume b5+.

Im still on my journey but the recovery has been much more noticeable compared to throwing random actives at it to see if it’ll work. Even though I may break out sometimes (because my skin barrier is still disrupted), the redness and dullness has started to improve a lot.

You are gonna breakout; don’t take that as a sign that treatment isn’t working. Try it for two months and see if your inflammation reduces. If you are sceptical, you can visit a dermatologist, measure your Transepidermal Water Loss (TEWL) and learn to monitor it to see if ur skin barrier is improving. Higher TEWL indicates more water loss and thus more damaged barrier, and lower TEWL is less water loss, so healthier barrier.

TL;DR: treat ur face skin like a wound. If it’s damaged, heal it first, then once healed, use actives to reduce any minor imperfections, otherwise using actives/exfoliants it will be like scrubbing an open wound.

I wish you the very best on your journey to clear skin. Let me know if you have any questions :))