Trials in the oil field... more skin stuff

I feel like I've become a bit of a one trick pony, but I guess after 10 years of crappy skin, when you finally find the answers you want to share them with everyone!


I've been trying out some different oils with the oil cleansing method lately.
I liked the pumpkin/grapeseed/EPO combo I was using, but it wasn't quite right. I was still getting the odd little spot in places, particularly around my cheeks close to my nose. Turns out pumpkin seed oil here in Austria is much more balanced between oleic and linoleic acid, which makes it ok, but not optimal. Of course combining with grapeseed helped a bit, but it still wasn't enough. The way I see it for my skin, cleansing needs to be as LA rich as possible.

So I thought I'd give a sunflower/walnut blend a go. Both oils are really high in LA (sunflower can be a bit iffy depending on where it is grown and whether it is organic, but here in Europe it is rich in LA).

Unfortunately this didn't seem to work out too well. My face didn't exactly erupt, but it wasn't happy either. The reaction took time to build up. I'm fairly certain that it was the walnut oil as my day moisturiser contains sunflower seed oil and it is fine. Apparently nut oils can be sensitising for acne sufferers, which I did know, but I had assumed that the problem was that most nut oils are rich in OA. It appears the problem may be something else in the nut. The first batch of oil I did was ok, but it was mostly sunflower oil with only about 10% walnut oil. The second batch was where it went wrong, and that was 50/50 sunflower to walnut.

Oddly the worst of the reaction was on my neck and jawline, which tells me that it was some kind of sensitivity to nuts, as that is where I tend to get my food sensitivity reactions. So I've switched back to plain grapeseed and that seems to be doing the trick; my skin is calmer and no more spots are appearing (I'm also taking a few days off work, which will probably help a little; I'm convinced some of the spots were in part stress related!).

So, grapeseed it is. Nice and simple!