The Bizarre Hack
to Rid Yourself of Acne

All zits suck. And while the little pimples that pop up can be annoying, it's the deep lingering monster zits that really bring you down, right? Swollen and inflamed, they're painful and refuse to come to the surface—which often means they take forever to heal. Known as cystic acne, it can be tricky to treat but it turns out, a counterintuitive hack using an OG drugstore skin product is the answer.

Over the last few years, the internet (Reddit's Skincare Addiction group especially) has been singing the praises of simple Vaseline's ability to quickly clear up those deep-rooted breakouts. “My pimples have been relentless for months ... but the Vaseline has been a dream,” writes one satisfied user. “Besides [making my skin] smooth and less red ... it keeps the skin so soft that whiteheads rise to the top of the skin, and, after a while, can literally be wiped or washed off.”

Of course, when something seems too good to be true, we have to try it out. Before bed, I washed my face and applied some benzoyl peroxide cream on the monster zit on my chin. I then dabbed a thin layer of Vaseline over it and went to bed. The next morning, the pimple's size was visibly reduced and instead of a red, dry patch around the zit, I had smooth hydrated skin (which also made the zit less noticeable). I repeated this for a few more nights until the bump disappeared. So it worked like a charm. But how?

“If you have acne, you want your skin to be well-lubricated at all times to help your skin barrier repair itself,” says Yale dermatologist Mona Gohara. “Otherwise, you're just going to create more acne and breakouts.” Counter to conventional thinking, slathering skin with such a heavy salve-like product won't cause you to breakout. The Journal of Cosmetic Science (PDF) concluded years ago that petroleum jelly is 100% non-comedogenic, meaning it will not clog or block your pores.

According to the dermatologist, the petroleum jelly not only seals in the medicated products you applied to the zit, it also creates a barrier on your skin which traps moisture within and prevents the skin from drying out and flaking. It all adds up to helping the skin heal itself at a faster rate. And isn't that what we're all looking for when we've got a zit bringing us down?