Acne rosacea is not generally associated with younger age groups. Rosacea most commonly appears in pepole who are 40-50 years old, according to the National Rosacea Society, with a significant number of cases developing after age 50. Which is why when rosacea develops in younger people, its often misdiognosed as normal acne or something allergy related.
Bianca Storer, 31, a mum of two and a store assistant from County Durham, began to get the first symptoms of rosacea when she was just 22.
“I had always had flawless skin until I got pregnant with my first child when I was 22, and then all hell broke loose. My skin started getting very red and sensitive and would flare up at random moments. Then I began to get rashes of small spots on top of the redness. My skin tone became uneven and bumpy. My skin just felt like it was all over the place.
This carried on through my pregnancy but then didn’t go away after I gave birth.
I sought medical advice from my GP but I was told there was nothing I could do for my skin except to try some creams they recommend from the chemist but nothing I tried cleared it up.
Over time I have seen multiple doctors but as rosacea is not classed as extreme circumstances, I was never given anything on prescription, only suggestions of over-the-counter creams which were of no help whatsoever. In fact, some made my skin even worse.
During the nine years since the first symptoms of my rosacea appeared, my skin went from having regular flare ups to becoming permanently red and bumpy across my cheeks and nose. I’d wake up every morning and just see this red, bumpy and blotchy face looking back at me.
It got to the stage whereby I couldn’t think of leaving the house without a thick base layer of foundation to cover up the redness.
I was I once asked by a customer what was wrong with my face, which was mortifying. Ever since that day I never arrived at work without a good covering of makeup, and I would have to re-apply it throughout the day.
When you have rosacea, you spend a lot of time looking for any suggestions about products to try to calm it down. Every spare minute I had I was always searching online for things related to rosacea which is how I came across Kalme Skincare on Instagram.
Someone around my age who was also mum like me had tried it after a back story very similar to mine. I just related to her story, and I felt like it was genuine, so I decided to try the Kalme products she had been using, which was a day cream and a treatment concealer.
Unlike anything else I had tried for my rosacea so far, my skin felt instantly calmer and more comfortable when I applied the day cream. Then when I applied the concealer over the top, which goes on green but changes colour as you rub it in to match your skin tone exactly, I was blown away. Within seconds I had this natural-looking coverage which cancelled out all my redness and made my skin look even. My skin looked almost normal immediately and felt calmer and less sensitive.
After a few weeks of using the two products every day my skin had calmed right down and the redness had started to recede. My skin was less bumpy, less tight and much less sensitive.
With just a scrim of the concealer on, which is much lighter than the thick foundation I used to wear, I can now leave the house feeling totally confident in my skin. It takes seconds to apply and gives a perfectly matched natural finish every time, even when y skin tone changes a bit from day to day. I absolutely love this product and can’t be without it. I still get little flare ups, and my skin can still get a bit sensitive, but as long as I apply the Kalme Day Defence Cream every day and then the concealer over the top my skin stays totally manageable. I once ran out of the day cream and didn’t put it on for a few weeks and almost immediately my skin started to flare red more often and felt itchy and sensitive. I know now to not ever stop using it.
These two products have made rosacea much less of an issue in my life. I still have it and I will always have it but now it doesn’t rule my life like it used to and most days I barely ever worry about my skin as I know I’ve got a way to keep it under control.
I want to put my rosacea journey out there, because the more people with rosacea get to read accounts from other sufferers and what they found helped improve their skin, the less isolated and hopeless they will feel. It was due to reading someone else’s experience of rosacea and what they’d found to improve their skin that I finally found something to help my skin. So, I now want to help others in the same way.”
