So I have hormonal acne (suspected PCOS), and I use maximum strength Stridex in the red box as a part of my skin care routine.

Oddly enough, the red Stridex seems to be hard to get ahold of around here. At least half the time, they are sold out, or they suddenly stop carrying it. This happens at multiple stores, be they "big box" stores or drug stores.

In any case, I'm not in a position to drive all over creation trying to find a single jar of red Stridex, so I have to find a suitable replacement at whatever store I am standing in at that point in time. I don't want to use a generic brand, so I usually end up using the Oxy brand medicated pads. Both have 2% salicylic acid as the active ingredient, so I figured it would be okay.

I don't know if there is a better alternative, but I legitimately hate this stuff.

See, I do have hormonal acne, but I also took 6 months of Accutane back in 2010 or so, and then I was on 2 years of a hormone-balancing medication called Spironolactone. As some of you know, Accutane requires monthly blood work, monthly pregnancy tests, screenings, signed waivers, iPledge certifications, monthly dermatologist visits, and the medication itself. And I had to pay for all if it out of pocket. It cost me well over $5,000 total. So while I still have hormonal acne, it's NOTHING like it was, and I can usually keep it mostly under control with a good skin care routine.

So back to the Oxy pads. I tend to stock up when I have to repurchase items, so when the store didn't have anything else, I stocked up on a few jars of the Oxy pads. I just used my last Oxy pad two days ago, and I have never been so happy to be rid of it.

When I use red Stridex, my skin is happier. I get fewer pimples, and the pimples I do get are smaller and less red and angry, and they heal faster.

But once I started using the Oxy, it was nothing but a struggle. Several times, I thought my skin was reverting back to its pre-Accutane days, and that legitimately scared me. About two weeks ago, I got a giant, tender, angry cyst on my chin that's still trying to shrink. If you look at it from the right angle, you can actually see the "height" of it. And I have another 3 or 4 fiery-red, knobby pimples on my neck. I thought maybe "shark week" was to blame, but I kept finding at least one new pimple every day. And the texture of my skin overall just wasn't as nice. And all of that is with me also using a Retinol and the rest of my skin care routine religiously on both my face and neck. All I kept thinking was, "I spent $5,000 on my skin - for THIS???" This dragged on for months.

I finally got my hands on the red Stridex again, and I've been using it for two days now. All my pimples have started trying out, and I'm not seeing new pimples every day anymore. I'm starting to feel much more relaxed about my skin. It had to be the Oxy pads, because nothing else in my routine has changed. I don't know what was in that stuff, but I hated the entire experience. The red Stridex is just so much better.

~ 10 CONTEMPLATIVE MINUTES LATER ~

So then I started doing some research. The Stridex website boasts about how it doesn't use alcohol in their medicated pads, which I thought was nice. And that got me thinking. Both have 2% salicylic acid, so I knew I had to dig deeper. I plucked the empty Oxy jar out of the trash (gross, I know), and looked at the inactive ingredient list. The first ingredient on that list? ALCOHOL. Not just alcohol, but FORTY-SIX PERCENT alcohol! Those sneaky, rat-faced bastards!!

The weird thing is, the Oxy wasn't drying my skin out, nor was it making my skin overcompensate with more oiliness. It just made me break out . . . so all I can think of is that the alcohol destroyed the healthy skin barrier and allowed bacteria to invade. I guess?

It felt good to get this off my chest. Learn from my mistake, ladies and gents! For the love of all things sacred, read the inactive ingredients list!!

TL;DR: Imposter acne pads bamboozled me into nearly ruining my skin.