Has anyone gotten rid of melasma?
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free skin care · Fri Dec 13, 2013 3:18 pm

Mariav wrote:

The ONLY thing that has absolutely worked for me is Pycnogenol. My melasma is completely gone on the right side of my cheek and slowly but surely has diminished on the left side though you can still see it....but so easy to cover up (I use Illuminare liquid mineral makeup)... Now, could it have been a combo of the Pycnogenol and me finishing up meno these past couple of years? Possibly? Maybe my hormones sort of righted themselves and my skin started to behave again... Not sure... but I do know that after almost 10 years of it, to see it finally go away is wonderful.

Maria Smile

Maria- What dose of Pycogenol were you taking? Also, how long after starting the pycogenol did you begin to see an improvement? How long until the melasma on your right cheek was completely gone?

free skin care · Fri Dec 13, 2013 3:39 pm

Dcbroom wrote:

Immacolata wrote:

Rebecca1 wrote:

Dcbroom wrote:

I would really like to try Silymarin. If I ordered this from SkinActives, does anyone have any suggestions of what to mix with it? I am pretty clueless as to making homemade creams or serums, so any help would be greatly appreciated.

I would also like to do this if anyone can help!

thanks rebecca

This was on the SkinActives site:

"Each tube is enough for 16 fl oz of cream or lotion at approximately 1% concentration (5 g in 480 mL cream). Use in your favorite cream or add to our Canvas Base Cream or a Sea Kelp Bioferment base."

So I was wrong - it's not 4 oz of cream, it's for 16 oz.

Thanks Immacolata! I noticed that also on the SkinActives website. I am just wondering if 1% concentration would be strong enough? Looking at the study from biomedcentral, I can't seem to find the percentage they used to obtain the positive results. Maybe I am just not seeing it? Also, would I just mix the powder with the base? Quan Yin mentioned that they dissolved the silymarin in an alcohol base, is this necessary? Sorry for all the questions!

I tried adding the Silymarin directly to the cream base and it ended up gritty ie not dissolved. So back the the drawing board.

free skin care · Mon Dec 16, 2013 1:36 pm

h.kitty wrote:

Mariav wrote:

The ONLY thing that has absolutely worked for me is Pycnogenol. My melasma is completely gone on the right side of my cheek and slowly but surely has diminished on the left side though you can still see it....but so easy to cover up (I use Illuminare liquid mineral makeup)... Now, could it have been a combo of the Pycnogenol and me finishing up meno these past couple of years? Possibly? Maybe my hormones sort of righted themselves and my skin started to behave again... Not sure... but I do know that after almost 10 years of it, to see it finally go away is wonderful.

Maria Smile

Maria- What dose of Pycogenol were you taking? Also, how long after starting the pycogenol did you begin to see an improvement? How long until the melasma on your right cheek was completely gone?

Hi H.Kitty - I am/was taking a Source Naturals 50 Pycnogenol and 50 Grape Seed Oil tablet - and now, for about a year, I've been taking a 75 mg Pycnogenol - again, Source Naturals. It's NOT cheap by any means...

I want to say it took a good year b/f my right cheek completely cleared up. My left is still stubborn, but I have all sorts of clear skin with the brown blotches now where it used to be just all solid brown blotches.... I think if I were to gauge an overall timeframe - I'd say close to two years before I could look in the mirror and not want to scream at it! I focus concealer on where the brown stops and my regular skin begins...and that pretty much does the trick. I would also say, that when I started the Pycnogenol it seemed to stop the spreading... there was a time when I just felt like the blotches kept getting bigger and expanding everywhere. I wish someone could get to the bottom of why some of us are more prone to getting melasma than others. I never was on birth control for any length of time, never got it when I was pregnant - then all of a sudden I get hit with it at 40...

Unfortunately, I feel that those of us who have or had melasma are more knowledgeable about it than the dermatologists that we wait WEEKS to go see. When I first got melasma, I waited 6 weeks for an appointment and she saw me for literally five minutes and sent me on my way with an Rx for Triluma and told me to stay out of the sun.

Embarassed

free skin care · Sun Jun 26, 2016 10:15 pm

Bumping this up to see if anyone has made any progress

free skin care · Mon Jun 27, 2016 6:41 am

My SIL went to the derm for hers and she recommended the Melange(sp ?) peel at 1000.00. Very deep peel followed by their products. I had posted to see if anyone had ever heard of that. I told her not to do it until I could find out more about it.

Mon Aug 01, 2016 6:08 pm

Great to hear that some people are getting good results with Melasma. I'm definitely looking into Skin Actives, I hope it helps, been dealing with it for a couple years now and seems to get worst with peels and laser treatments.

Tue Aug 30, 2016 8:10 am

I have just started using one of those home microdermabrasion devices (one that has a vacuuming action as well). It seemed to me to be a bit too abrasive at first, and my skin was very tender and sore for a couple of days, but then I was amazed to find that after a few more days a long brown mark I had on my face has almost disappeared.It wasn't a very dark brown mark, to be honest (it appeared after I had a course of progesterone a few years ago), but it was resistant to any creams I had tried in the past, and the fact that the mark has now lightened so easily was encouraging.

free skin care · Fri Sep 02, 2016 8:12 pm

I now got a large patch on my forehead, sigh. Trying everything and anything including peels, PMD dermabrasion, etc. I'm perimenopausal and all of the sudden it appeared. Oh, I also got some of my cheeks but they're slowly getting better. My forehead is the tough one.

free skin care · Sat Sep 10, 2016 10:57 pm

The only thing that worked is Obagi Nu Derm but that system was so harsh, I can't do it every year and look like a scaly red mess for 6 months. I still get melasma but treat it with Pycnogenol, Heliocare, tretinoin 0.1%, MSM, azaleic acid, vitamin C and alternate 4% hydroquinone with kojic acid and arbutin.

I was hoping to get Fraxel laser but now read that it can make melasma worse. I would love to hear if anyone tried laser and what kind and what their results were after a year (did it come back).

Wed Sep 21, 2016 5:05 pm

I just got my silimarin powder and base crew
- I'll report back soon. Not an expensive experiment and there's a lot of research and lab work behind it.

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