This one’s a bit long, so grab a snack.

This has been a long and strenuous process…but I have FINALLY found some relief and some progress in my rosacea healing journey! It started a little over a month ago, when I came across some YouTube videos (while I was endlessly googling ways to heal my rosacea flare again). The first one I came across was a girl talking about how she healed her REALLY BAD rosacea by using this internal skincare from the brand Osmosis, and her face was 10 times worse than mine was when it was at its worst so I immediately clicked on it and devoured everything she said. Here is the video if you wanna watch her talk about it. It literally changed the trajectory I was on in my healing journey.

Osmosis is a holistic based skincare/ wellness brand that helps you with your skin using internal and external treatments and supplements. I had heard of them before but I had never looked into them. Mostly because they are pretty expensive and until now I never had any skin issues.

I watched a few more videos of other gals saying they completely healed theirs using this brand as well, so I took that and ran with it. In her video description, she shared the email of the dr. who created Osmosis (Dr. Ben), and said he does email consultations and face mapping so I headed right to the website and browsed around. Feeling satisfied with what I was seeing, I reached out to Dr. Ben and explained how I found him and why I was reaching out.

It took a few days but he replied to my email! He said he needed to see photos of my skin, and what medications and/or supplements I was taking because I let him know I was also experiencing reflux as of last year. I was shocked when he told me the reason for my rosacea yall. FIRST though, he said the vitamins and Reflux Raft needed to be stopped IMMEDIATELY because they “were making my condition worse”. I was confused about this because I was rarely taking reflux raft and my vitamin was a C,D, zinc, selenium immunity vitamin…but I listened and cut them out. ALSO, the reason FOR the rosacea was candida (causing the acne bumps on my cheeks), and H. pylori causing the redness around my nose! Say what??

I looked farther into both conditions and found out more and I totally agreed with his diagnosis. On Osmosis’s website, they have a section to read about face mapping for different conditions, so I read through them and learned what the different areas on the face mean with rosacea and it was exactly what he told me. He said I needed to buy a few of their products, one to clear candida from my gut, and the others to eradicate the h. pylori. I looked at the products and saw the prices…and I was reluctant to shell out $400 for something I wasn’t sure would help me. I sent them to my naturopath and asked his opinion and he told me it was basically some zinc and digestive enzymes with mullein leaf and plantain in one of them.

So, I felt I needed to get online and do some shopping around for similar ingredient products I could actually afford, and THATS WHEN I FOUND AVENE REDNESS EXPERT, and my new non-negotiable superfood: BROCCOLI SPROUTS.

The main ingredients in the Skin Clarifier Dr. Ben said I needed to do first to get the candida out of my gut were 2 digestive enzymes called lactase, and serrapeptase. From what I learned is that they break down the biofilm that candida builds up in your gut so they can hide behind it and make it harder to fully get rid of all the bad bacteria. SOO being me… I went down the rabbit hole of digestive enzymes and biofilm and came up with a solution. I started taking some very potent digestive enzymes from Enzymedica that had a full spectrum of enzymes in them. I started taking these daily on an empty stomach. If you take them with food, they will just break down your food instead of the mucous and bacteria. Certain enzymes are able to break down the structure of the biofilm and allow you to pass it out with your bowel movements.

This is a little gross and tmi, but VERY necessary to explain. You will know it’s working because biofilm is essentially…mucous. You will pass mucous out in your stool. That’s how you know it’s working. And it did.

The second thing I did was start oil pulling every day when I woke up because (this news was a shocker), h.pylori and candida can come from the bacteria in YOUR MOUTH. I recently discovered a biological dentist on an episode of The Model Health Show with Shawn Stevenson…and the mouth is the beginning to all things in your body. As someone who has had dental problems, I wanted to make sure I was doing everything I can to get the bacteria out of my body. He recommends oil pulling and I started it the next day. Another shocker, my gut and skin started getting better a couple days into this new routine.

The 3rd thing I started doing was adding broccoli sprouts to my diet. They are hard to find good quality where I live, but I came across a brand called Koyah that makes freeze dried broccoli sprouts and other super food powders that are tested to make sure they have glucoraphanin, and myrosinase which are the reason they are so nutritious.

From Koyah’s website

” KOYAH’s broccoli sprout capsules contain organic, freeze-dried broccoli sprouts that are rich in glucoraphanin (the precursor to sulforaphane) and myrosinase (the enzyme needed to produce sulforaphane). In contrast, sulforaphane supplements typically contain an isolated or synthetic form of sulforaphane. Our capsules provide a whole-food option, preserving the complete nutrient profile of the sprouts.”

The reason I started incorporating these superfoods into my diet are because studies show that taking broccoli sprouts on an empty stomach for a certain period of time can eliminate harmful h.pylori from the gut! I also found several reddit threads and YouTube comments from people saying they used them to eradicate their h.pylori successfully. Do you know what the “standard of care” treatment is if you were to go to the doctor for it? 4 different antibiotics. I was not about to put my poor gut through that, so I went deep into finding a natural solution. Here’s a link to one of the sites I found this information on, it’s really fascinating!

Other superfoods I am currently taking in daily are wild blueberries, and Golden Bliss from Sarvaa Organics which is an anti-inflammatory turmeric/spice/superfood powder you can use to make golden milk or add to anything really. I add it to my oatmeal or yogurt daily. It also has their own spore biotics in there (I’ve been using it since 2017!). Turmeric is supposed to also help get rid of candida in the gut.

In addition to all the in internal work, I started following the diet guidelines from an expert on the candida diet, Canxida. I learned alot about foods to eat and avoid and that you can actually eat things like oats and not have to almost eat keto to heal from candida. Basically no super starchy vegetables like sweet potatoes, or fruits like banana, but you can have whole unrefined grains and foods like butternut squash. No processed foods and no sugar or dairy or CHOCOLATE. That one was a bummer but even the most pure cacao can aggravate candida so they recommend avoiding it for a few weeks. I have been doing all of these things I mentioned here in this post for about a month now and I have seen and felt such drastic changes in my gut and skin. I can even have coffee without any rosacea flares!

The last thing (and one of the most important findings for my skin healing) has been this face cream from Avene, called Redness Expert. I found this by accident but it looked like it was promising so I ordered it and when I say it is a miracle worker, I mean it!

This face cream had a lot of claims, and I was hopeful it would live up to them, and IT DID.

From Avene’s website

An intensive redness-prone skin solution co-developed with dermatologists to help reduce appearance of visible redness, soothe sensations of overheating while hydrating skin for 24 hours to restore skin comfort. Fragrance-free & formulated with respect for sensitive, reactive skin. ​Clinically proven to reduce visible redness intensity by 48%.¹

I started using this toward the beginning of November, probably like 2 weeks in, and my skin has changed so much! In a positive way. The heat and flush I use to get when anything triggered it is almost gone, the bumps on my cheeks are nearly gone, I get one here and there, but they are very small. The constant redness on my cheeks and chin had gone down to a pink hue.

Another thing is that my cheeks where the bumps would happen AREN’T FLAKY ANYMORE! That was a big issue I was having too, was extreme dryness on the areas where the flare would happen. Now my skin feels normal and stays mostly hydrated throughout the day! It’s really a miracle and I’m so grateful for Avene for making this product for us rosacea sufferers.

Now I know that was long winded, and a very wordy explanation of how I am healing my gut and skin, but I had to get it out there in hopes it may help someone else who is going through what I am. If you made it all the way through this blog post without getting bored or falling asleep, I appreciate you taking the time to read this. It means alot to me.

I have more product reviews coming the next few weeks and my goals for the new year as well. see you then.

Shauna