Did you have a thought about getting rid of those dots on your skin? Yeah…We’ve all been there—standing a little too close to the mirror, tilting our face to the light, and thinking of how to remove every tiny dot on our skin.
“I have small black spots all in my pores – what are these things?”
“What should I do with these blackheads on my nose?”
“Does it really work?”
“Can I as a teen (16 year old male) get rid of blackheads on my nose or is overproduction of oil just gonna bring them back?”
“I‘ve had these pores, blackheads and redness on my forehead since my teens and nothing seems to work.”
These confusions and complaints are circulating on social media platforms such as TikTok, Instagram and Reddit almost every day. Blackheads and visible pores have become the first hurdle for many young people as they step into the world of skincare However, the more they try to solve the problem, the more likely they are to fall into anxiety, especially when the “pore purifier” and “blackhead vacuum” advertisements on social platforms turn “perfect poreless skin” into a standard that must be achieved. Many people start to wonder: is it that my face was never meant to be seen up close? Surrounded by such voices, the shame of pores has quietly grown in many people’s daily lives.
“I just can’t help thinking about it”
When I met up with my cousin at the cafe on a weekend afternoon as usual, I noticed she looked a little different. She was sitting on the couch, flipping through with her phone in her hand, but her eyes were always drifting in the direction of the floor mirror. By the time I had just sat down for a few minutes, she shyly moved two steps to my side as if she had made up her mind, her head lowered, her fingers twisting the corner of her coat, and asked: “Hey…Can I ask you something?
Chloe, 15, a teen girl in Leicester who just went to the first year of high school this year. She has not been particularly concerned about skincare, usually just washes her face, and applies some moisturiser. But the other day she said, she recently always can’t help but look in the mirror, especially after a bath, put her face especially close – “I found a lot of dots on my nose ah, it looks just…it just looks kind of dirty, you know?”
She added in a low voice that it was because once she accidentally glimpsed the nose of a boy in her class, which was densely covered with black dots, and felt a little bit disgusting (she also immediately said, ‘It’s not malicious.’). After that, she started to pay attention to her own nose, and the more she looked at it, the more anxious she became, thinking that she might have a ‘strawberry nose’ too. She told me that she always wondered if people secretly noticed her blackheads too, especially when she talked to them face-to-face in class. In fact, her skin is actually quite clean, with only a small blackhead on her nose, which is too normal to be true. But she had already fallen into a state of ‘being examined through a magnifying glass’.
After she finished speaking, she unconsciously covered her nose with her hand, as if to hide something. But I could tell that she really cared.
So, she began to frantically look for methods on the Internet: searching for ‘the most effective way to remove blackheads’, ‘how to completely remove blackheads’, ‘pores can be contracted’. …… She tried blackhead stickers, salt face wash, hot towels on the nose, and even almost bought a whole set of inexpensive ‘blackhead vacuum’. But each method has a different voice, some people say ‘super useful!’ Others commented, ‘Don’t try it, it will ruin your skin,’ and she was left in a state of confusion. ‘It feels like there’s so much information, I’m reading my head off, I don’t know which one is true and which one is right for me.’
She said while secretly watching my reaction. The feeling of confusion of ‘wanting to get better, but not knowing how to start’ was written on her face. I felt a pang in my heart, and my heart ached. I knew that she wasn’t concerned about the blackheads themselves, but rather about what others thought of her.
I wanted to say, ‘It’s not that serious at all,’ but I refrained. But I held back, because I knew that the feeling of uneasiness couldn’t be comforted by a simple ‘it’s okay’. What’s more, it’s not like I haven’t been there before – I’ve stood in front of the mirror all those years ago, checking my face inch by inch, brushing my nose, tearing the film until I blushed, excited and worried, thinking, ‘This time I’ll be able to get rid of it once and for all’.
I told her, “Why don’t we take a look at the current scientific claims and see what’s really right for her skin type. She nodded and leaned on my shoulder like she was finally unburdened a little. ‘You know more than me,’ she whispered, ‘I trust you.’
I didn’t tell her that, in fact, I wasn’t sure how much of what I knew was true. But I thought maybe we could talk to a trusted professional together, and hear what people who really knew what they were talking about said.
The moment she leaned on my shoulder, I suddenly realised – she wasn’t looking for a product answer, she was looking for a direction that would give her peace of mind. A compass that wouldn’t let her get lost between the ‘blackheads bucket’ and the ‘salicylic acid + niacinamide + A-alcohol bucket’.
“Learn how to be comfortable with them”
I remembered that there was a skin clinic that offered a teenage facial treatment programme, so I took her to meet Keeley Hadley, the founder of Skin Renew HQ. I briefly explained my sister’s recent concerns and anxieties about her skin. She immediately invited my sister to sit beside her and gently explained while holding a model to demonstrate the structure of the skin: “Blackheads, in fact, are the product of oil secreted by the sebaceous glands, aged keratin and air oxidation. It’s not “dirty” or “unwashed”, it’s just a trace left behind by your skin working hard.”
I could feel my sister slightly baffled – like it was the first time she’d heard someone who didn’t think of blackheads as ‘the enemy.’
Keeley went on to say that it’s normal for sebaceous glands to be active during the teenage years, especially in the T-zone areas like the nose, forehead and chin, which are more prone to clogged pores. The most important thing to avoid at this time is ‘anxious skincare’ – excessive cleansing, frequent exfoliation, blindly stacking efficacy products. “It’s not that you’re not cleansing enough, it’s that you’re cleansing too hard.”
She offers some skincare tips that can be done at home:
Choose a gentle, non-foaming cleanser and don’t over-strip
Use a salicylic acid serum 1-2 times a week to gently metabolise old keratin
Avoid strong peel-off blackhead patches, which tend to damage the cuticle
Focus on moisturising: ‘Dryness causes the sebum to secrete more oil for protection’
“Most importantly,”She says, “pores can’t be ‘permanently minimised’, but in a healthy state they’re not a source of anxiety.”
My sister heard the last sentence and gave a small “ah”, then asked, “What’s the point of this? My sister heard the last sentence and gave a small ‘ah’ and then asked, “So blackheads can be managed, but they can’t be can’t be eliminated. out, right?”
She nodded and explained, “Just like hair gets oily, nails grow. We’re not trying to eliminate pores, we’re learning to be comfortable with them.”
She was silent for a moment, like she was thinking hard, then said something that hit me particularly hard, “So …… isn’t it possible to not hate them so much?”
It suddenly makes me feel it’s not skincare tips we’re looking for, but a way to make peace with our bodies.
That night, she didn’t ask me again which serum I should buy, or if I should use acne needles, or look left and right at my nose in a mirror. She just leaned over the bed and whispered, ‘I think, like, it’s not that bad.’
At that moment, I suddenly realised that we have been taught to ‘defeat’ blackheads and “hide” pores, but we are rarely told that these ‘imperfections’ in our skin are never something we deserve to be liked or loved. These so-called imperfections in our skin have never been a reason to feel unworthy of love or respect.
Pores are not the enemy, they don’t need to be eliminated, they need to be understood. Just as puberty causes the skin to fluctuate, like every unstable phase of growth, these small changes are signals from our bodies. It’s not bad, it’s natural.
Of course we can take care of it, we can choose the right products and methods for us, but we don’t have to rush to ‘erase’ everything with a filter. As I told my sister: skincare is a gentle thing, not a punishment.
So the next time you get close to the mirror and want to stare at that little black spot, maybe pause for a moment, take a deep breath, and tell yourself: It’s okay to have a ‘strawberry nose’ once in a while, and then turn around and head out the door to get on with our more important lives.
