Naturopathic Beauty's Clear Skin Sessions
Clear skin and aging beautifully conversations, trainings and challenges by Dr. Stacey Shillington ND.
Naturopathic Beauty's Clear Skin Sessions
Healing Acne After 35
The journey to clear skin takes a different path after 35. As women approach perimenopause, persistent acne and rosacea signal deeper imbalances that require specialized attention – not just hormone therapy.
Drawing from two decades of clinical experience testing thousands of patients, I've discovered why skin issues become more stubborn in midlife. Your body carries the cumulative effects of long-term imbalances: nervous system dysregulation, chronic infections, poor detoxification, compromised gut health, and metabolic changes that create the perfect storm for inflammatory skin conditions.
By age 35, a remarkable 95% of your thought patterns are hardwired into your subconscious, making nervous system healing more challenging yet profoundly transformative. I know this firsthand – after experiencing four stress-induced heart attacks in my forties, I had to rapidly rewire my nervous system or face life-threatening consequences. While it requires dedication, achieving this nervous system balance creates an extraordinary sense of freedom and resilience.
Most women don't realize that progesterone doesn't just "naturally tank" in perimenopause – it drops because multiple bodily systems aren't functioning optimally. This explains why bioidentical hormones alone often disappoint women with persistent acne. Hormones can certainly help, but they work best in a balanced body.
At 51, I've sailed through perimenopause with minimal symptoms because I've addressed these foundational issues. Midlife can actually become your most vibrant period once these imbalances are resolved. Your skin will clear, your energy will soar, and you'll be positioned to avoid the "crash" many women experience at menopause.
Ready to understand exactly what's happening in your body after 35 and how to fix it? Join my free Clear Skin After 35 Masterclass through the link in the show notes. The clock is ticking – healing these imbalances now will determine whether you struggle or thrive in the decades ahead.
Sign up for my FREE Clear Skin After 35 Masterclass:
Learn what is going on in your body and how to heal your acne after age 35. Click here to register now.
Get my FREE Lab Testing Guide:
Click here to get access to my free lab testing guide, where I evaluate the most common tests for acne and which ones give the most valuable information.
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Welcome to Naturopathic Beauty's Clear Skin Sessions, where we heal your acne from the inside out. Hello, beauties, and welcome to the Clear Skin Sessions. I'm Dr Stacey Shillington, naturopathic Doctor, and this podcast is for you if you are suffering with acne or if you are suffering with rosacea. It is my mission to help you on your clear skin journey. I have been there. I've experienced acne. I've experienced inflamed skin. I've stayed home from important things because of my skin. I've wanted to curl up in the fetal position and ignore the world until my skin cleared up. I have been there. I get how mentally and emotionally exhausting acne can be, and that's why I do what I do and that's why I've created this podcast to help guide you on your clear skin journey.
Speaker 1:Now, this episode is a little bit personal, because I'm going to be speaking to a specific age group in this podcast, and that is women that are over the age of 35. Now, why this age group? Because this is an age where we're at a crossroads. We're at a crossroads because we choose whether or not we're going to heal our bodies and get our bodies to a place where we can sail through perimenopause and menopause, or if we're going to continue to struggle with our skin if imbalances in our body are going to get even deeper and we're going to have a lot of difficulty with perimenopause and menopause and I can speak to this directly. I'm 51 years old, so I've been sailing through perimenopause, I have to say, with barely a symptom, and this is because I've done the work to balance my body and to heal it, and I'm going to share how I do this and, of course, I do this with all my patients as well. I get many patients that are over the age of 35. And we do have to address these patients with special tender, loving care, because their bodies have been through more and for a longer period of time and imbalances are more chronic and you know we need to do deeper work.
Speaker 1:So I want to talk a little bit about this, and especially in relationship to hormones, because I know there's a huge you know discussion right now about bioidentical hormone therapy, which is wonderful when used correctly, but we want to put hormones in a healthy terrain, in a healthy body. When we put hormones in an unhealthy body, that's unbalanced, we don't get the results that we could, and this is especially true for a woman that has acne, that has rosacea, that has skin issues. Often, hormones do not act in an acne prone body the same way they act in a body that's not prone to acne, and that's to do with androgen levels. So, oh my gosh, this is such a huge topic. There's so much to unpack when it comes to acne and perimenopause and menopause, but I just want to give you a basic overview right now of what's going on in the body and why the skin is more difficult to clear after the age of 35. And yes, this is absolutely true when I have patients that are over the age of 35, we have to do more work and it's going to generally take longer if we really want to get down to the root and we really want to heal the body and clear the skin. And we want to do this because this is how you're going to look your best, this is how your skin is going to clear optimally and this is how you're also going to reclaim your vitality, your optimal health, and this is what is going to allow you to really enjoy the upcoming decades instead of feeling really crap as you sail through midlife.
Speaker 1:So what is going on in a woman's body? She's 35, maybe 45, maybe even 50. She has acne, she has rosacea. What's happening? Quite simply, there are long-term imbalances that are present in the body, and the longer these imbalances persist, the deeper they are.
Speaker 1:So let's start with nervous system dysregulation. So by the time you get to age 35, 95% of our thought patterns and behaviors are hardwired into our subconscious. This is huge. So this means you're 35 years old or older, your nervous system is not in great shape, meaning you're stuck in your survival nervous system and the thoughts that keep you in that place. 95% of those thoughts are hardwired. So that means extra effort has to be put into healing the nervous system. It's not as easy as it is when you're 20 years old and you're able to rewire your thoughts quite easily. It takes extra effort. Now, believe me, this can absolutely be done and I have to say this is one of my specialties I'm going to share with you. You know, in my forties I had four massive heart attacks, and these were stress induced heart attacks, and I had to learn very, very quickly how to rewire my nervous system so that I would no longer be experiencing these heart attacks, obviously because they were life threatening. So I understand how it can be done, and it's not easy. It takes a lot of awareness, it takes a lot of practice, but it absolutely can be done.
Speaker 1:And rewiring the nervous system and shifting our thought patterns so that we're able to get into our parasympathetic nervous system is one of the most critical pieces to healing the body in midlife. And not only is it critical but it feels wonderful. It's so freeing to let go of the thoughts and the behaviors that are keeping us trapped in a survival state. It takes a bit of effort it does to get rid of them, but once you manage to shed these thought patterns that are keeping you down, it's like a weight is lifted from your shoulders and you're actually able to fly. You're just so much lighter. Things tend to just roll off your shoulders a little bit more, and, especially because you have so much accumulated wisdom, it makes achieving this state. You're just, you're freed. You're really freed, and to be able to reach this state in midlife is just so very gratifying. So that's one of the things that really needs to be addressed when you're over the age of 35.
Speaker 1:The other thing is that we have to talk about infections. Often, when your skin is inflamed, there's deep infections going on in the body, and I know this because I've done the testing with acne patients for many, many years, for 20 years now, and there's rarely an acne patient that does not have some type of infection, whether it's a bacterial infection, whether it's a fungal infection, an exposure to mold, a parasitic infection, candida infection you name it. They are there and when you're 35 and above, these infections have likely been around for a long time, so they're festering. It's not like they're disappearing on their own and we have to reduce this overgrowth burden. It's going to reduce a lot of inflammation in the body. You're going to feel so much better. Nutrient status is going to improve. So relieving the body of these infections is incredibly important.
Speaker 1:And similarly, acne patients are incredibly poor detoxifiers and again, I know this because I've done the lab work. I've tested thousands of patients over the last 20 years and I know that most acne patients are poor detoxifiers. And when you've been a poor detoxifier living on planet Earth in the time that we do, you're going to be exposed to an incredible amount of toxins. If you're a poor detoxifier, what's going to happen is these toxins are going to start to accumulate in your body and when we have toxic accumulation, it's going to affect the way that our mitochondria operates. It's going to affect the way that our cells operate and ultimately, we're going to increase more oxidative stress, we're going to experience increased aging and, of course, our skin is going to flare even more. So teaching the body and guiding the body to be able to detox properly is one thing that's incredibly important, but then we also have to deal with all the toxic accumulation that has been piling up over the years, and by the time you're in your late 30s and in your 40s, believe me that toxic accumulation is real, and once we're able to deal with it, you feel so much better.
Speaker 1:So another thing that we have to talk about is gut health. So the gut skin axis is simply the. The state of the gut is reflected on the skin, and this has to do with the microbiome, and the microbiome is the balance of microbes in our gut. It's incredibly important. You know. Some sources say that 90% of all chronic disease can be traced back to the microbiome. It's so important to make sure that the microbiome is healthy, and when you've been dealing with lingering skin issues for years and maybe even decades, there's often a very strong gut component there, and the longer your skin has gone unhealed, probably the worse your microbiome is.
Speaker 1:So after age 35, we need to do a deep dive into gut healing, and often we have to do this after we've eliminated a certain amount of infections and also after we've opened up some detox pathways so we're able to really do this properly. We're able to really do this deeply when we heal the gut. Then you're able to actually absorb your nutrients properly, you're able to reduce inflammation in your body, you're able to manufacture fat-soluble vitamins properly, you're able to digest your foods properly. So so many things hinge on the optimal health of the gut, and when we're able to fix the gut, you are going to feel amazing. So at this point I've discussed a few things that really are important to address in midlife, things that perhaps have gone on longer than we would have wanted them to go on, but these are things that we have to take a look at when you have skin issues and you're over the age of 35.
Speaker 1:Another thing that's very important is metabolic changes. So often when we have acne, when we have rosacea, there can be insulin resistance. More often so with acne, and when insulin resistance lingers, when we don't catch it in the early stages and support the body so that we are able to utilize insulin efficiently, these metabolic changes continue and they get worse, and so we need to be able to understand why there's insulin dysregulation, and often it does have to do with inflammation in the body. Once we do clear up that inflammation, you are going to be more responsive to insulin, which is amazing, but left unchecked, I mean insulin resistance. This is one of the things that can lead to diabetes and other chronic conditions. So at this point in time in midlife, this is when you need to address these health imbalances, because if you allow them to linger, they're only going to get worse. They're going to put you on the road to chronic disease, and not only that, but it's going to lead to a profound hormonal imbalance, and that's what so many women are dealing with at this point in their lives. They are dealing with progesterone, especially in perimenopause, progesterone that has completely tanked, and it hasn't tanked because that's normal and that's what happens to women at this age. It tanks because there's so many systems in the body that are not operating optimally, and when we can heal the body, when we can balance these different systems, then the body is going to be able to produce progesterone.
Speaker 1:You don't have to be as reliant on bioidentical hormone therapy to feel good. Now, that being said, if you need some, there's no shame in that and that's totally fine, but you don't want to be completely dependent on it. To feel good, we need to heal your body from the inside out to avoid a lot of chronic diseases, and we also want to avoid a complete crash when you hit menopause. A lot of women, when there's a lot of imbalances in the body, they hit menopause and they have a serious crash. Hormones can help somewhat, but hormones are not the solution. So if you're just like holding on until you get to menopause so that you'll no longer have to deal with hormones, that's definitely not the way to look at it. There's so many other things going on in the body other than hormones. Hormones can be incredibly beneficial, but they are not going to solve all of the imbalances that you may be experiencing if you have skin issues and you're not just going to feel better miraculously. So I want to really share that with you and hopefully that makes sense to you, because I want you to feel wonderful, I want you to thrive, I want you to feel and look your best in midlife, because I honestly have to say, this is turning out to be an incredible time in my life, like things are just magically falling into place for me, and you know, it feels really wonderful and if I had known some of the things that I'm sharing with you now, they probably would have fallen into place for me even sooner.
Speaker 1:But I really had to get my nervous system under control and I don't think I really realized that as much as I needed to until a few years ago. I was kind of dealing with some stresses in my life. You know some relationships that weren't great. I didn't realize how deeply they were impacting me, but when I managed to heal my nervous system, things really fell into place for me. And, of course, for many years, as a naturopathic diet, I've been working with my gut, I've been working with my detox, I've been keeping infections under control, making sure that my metabolism is working well, so I've been doing all these things. For me, the key piece was really getting my nervous system, you know, to a place where my body was able to relax, because I would say for many years I did not even know what relaxation was, and that's probably why I had all these heart attacks and I'm also genetically susceptible to it.
Speaker 1:It's a condition called SCAD spontaneous coronary arterial dissection which is rare, but it's becoming more recognized. It is stress induced, though, so hopefully this makes sense to you, and I'm actually doing a masterclass on all of this. I'm going to break down exactly the different things, the different conditions that women are dealing with if they still have skin issues after the age of 35. And I know this because I've worked with thousands of patients. I've done the testing, I know what shows up on these tests again and again and again.
Speaker 1:I want to share this with you. I want it to be very clear to you what's going on when you're still experiencing skin issues after 35. And, most importantly, what you need to do to solve these skin issues, what you need to do to balance your body so that you can achieve optimal health, so you can clear your skin and, most importantly, so you can enter midlife with optimal vitality, feeling beautiful and really owning these years, because they are the start to the best years of your life. I'm so excited to say that. I think I was in denial for many years, but now I'm fully on board, I'm fully into midlife and it's fantastic. So hopefully this has made sense If you're interested in attending my clear skin after 35 masterclass.
Speaker 1:There is a link in the show notes. Definitely join. It's completely free. You don't have to pay for this masterclass. I want it to reach as many women as possible because this is important information for my women with acne, with rosacea, with any type of skin flare after the age of 35. We need to understand what's going on and we need to solve it now. The clock is actually ticking and it can be the difference between you experience an absolutely glorious midlife and really struggling with symptoms and hormonal imbalances and the beginnings of chronic disease. So this is the time we need to catch things. We need to turn things around so that you can look and feel your most beautiful. So the link to sign up for the masterclass is in the show notes.
Speaker 1:I hope that this podcast has been beneficial and informative for you. If it has, I would be so grateful if you could leave a review. There's a link in the show notes to leave a review and if you do, I'm going to invite you to join the first module of my Clear Skin Transformation program for free. So don't miss that opportunity. It's a really great one and thank you so much for listening me to rant on what is quickly becoming my very favorite topic in the world helping women in midlife heal their acne and their rosacea. Because the clock is ticking, we need to do this. So thank you very much, have a beautiful day and I will see you in the next episode of the Clear Skin Sessions.