Sensitivity to SN skincare, reaction, help!

[carro]

Trying out some samples from SN skincare, not going so well so far. My skin is dry and sensitive, but I mostly react to products with purfume or other "strange stuff" in it.

When I tried the oatmeal and the green tea aloe serum on its own it was fine. Same with the daily defense and hemp, but when I wear a toner under and then a moisturizer my skin reacts and gets all red as you can see in the picture. In the picture I have a horisontal stroke of green tea and aloe on my neck closest to the chin, and a horisontal stroke of oatmeal serum further down. No reaction... When I then add vertical strokes of moisturizer, emu on one side and daily defens on the other my skin turns red and a bit warm. About halv an hour - one hour the redness dissappears without me washing it off.
I don´t know why my skin is reacting this way. It seems like I can handle them on its own (little unsure of the emu, maybe a bit red just of that one alone), but when layered on top of each other, not working (I let the serums dry before applying).

I did similar test on the insides of my arms but it was ok, but my neck is so much more sensitive. I did get the same reaction in my face, with oatmeal serum and emu.
Do you think it is sensitivity to your product, maybe my skin is simply to dry and reacting to the new stuff. Is it the serums or the moisturizer that is likely to be the "bad guy" when mixed together?
Where do I go from here?
Since I react this much to your "milder" products, is stuff like super serum, facelift, bha, aha etc. out of the question?
Could it be that my skin simply needs to adjust to new things or is it best not to even tempt to try again.

I understand this is very hard questions to answer, still interested in some brainstorming on what could be wrong, and suggestions on what to do next. I really need to find a moisterizer that works.

Tried the foundationsamples today, love, love, love, the formula!!! But since my skin is a bit too dry right now I need something under it that really works.

[JenW]

First of all, I am sorry this is happening. I need to read through what you wrote carefully to make sure I understand. Is it a combination of products? Can I ask what toner you used?

I will post more on this, but those are my first few questions.

Also, please don't try anything else new until we get a better handle on this.

[JenW]

The combination seems to be the problem. I am still curious about the toner. Also, did you change cleansers or anything else?

If things settle down and you are willing to try again, just go with one product at a time. What were you using before? Did you have a moisturizer previous to the ones you just tried? I know you tried all of the things individually, but did you try them for more than one day?

Two options if you want to try again:
1. One of the serums with your old moisturizer. This would be my first choice for you.
2. Skip the serums and just try the moisturizer that you reacted to the least. It looks like you reacted a little more strongly to one of them by looking at the pic.

We are all different in how our body reacts to things. Just when you think there is an ingredient that will work for everyone, you will find a handful that react to it. It is always best to start with one item at a time so it is easily determined where the problem lies. (I have to remind myself of this all the time when Karen comes out with new stuff!)

[carro]

No toner. The only toner I have in my "sample collection" is pore refining toner, but I did not use it on my neck under this. The only thing is green tea and aloe on the upper part of the neck, and oatmeal on the lower part and then emu on one side over both the serums, and daily on the other side of the neck on top of the serums. I did so trying to figure out wich combo was causing the redness. Sorry for the messy description!
Maybe I just tried to many things at once.

[carro]

apricot cleansing oil.

[carro]

Sorry for my many replies... I only tried them seperatly for a few hours before I combinated them. But I have not tried each product for several days. Stepping back a bit and will try them again.

Of corse not all product are suitable to everyone. I tried to choose the nicest ones first but.
So taking samples of super serum, facelift, aha, bha etc. is not to be recommended?

[karen]

Ouch! I'm very sorry that happened. I've only pondered it briefly, but my suspicion is that you're sensitive to our preservative. It's the only thing that's really common to all of those products. In theory it could be a combination of two things together, but most likely it's a single ingredient that's doing it, and the preservative is the common element. We use Geoguard Ultra- it's gluconoactone with a smidge of sodium benzoate. It's a really fantastic preservative, but not if you're sensitive to it.

Allergies are not fun, and preservative allergies in particular are troublesome (personally I'm allergic to phenoxyethanol) because they're in every product.

The prudent thing is to stop using them...allergies tend to get worse over time rather than better. Please keep us posted and let us know if you have any questions or need anything at all.

[carro]

Thank You so much for your answer!
Not that fun to hear but it makes sense even though I don´t really understand how the combo caused it (maybe it wasn´t the combo, simply twice the amount of the preservative or someting?).
I must say that I´m glad that You say that it+s someting in the product that might not be the best thing for me, not blaming it on someting else. I had a really bad reaction a few years ago with some toner that a sales person tried on me. She dabbed it on my face and eyelids, and when I came back with red and swallen face and puffy swallen eyes, she said it was because of someting I had eaten, It simply could not be their product. So all creds to you!

Say that it is in fact your preservative Gluconolactone, would it then be safe to use:

BHA Ingredients: Distilled Water, Aloe Vera Juice, White Willow Bark Extract

And the apricot cleansing oil:
Ingredients: Apricot Kernel Oil, Grapeseed Oi:l, Cromollient SCE

That is if I try them out carefully, so i don´t get a reaction to anyting else in them. The bha might be to strong for me anyway. I was thinking of trying it out as a spot treatment for blackheads on my nose.

Thank you for all your help!

[karen]

I'm so sorry again...I've been through it with sales clerks too. It may be the doubling up that's doing it to you, but when you have an allergic reaction your body makes memory cells. Memory cells are great for fighting diseases, but in allergies it makes each allergic response come a bit quicker and it makes each encounter with an allergen more pronounced. I know with my skin there are some things I can handle in very diluted doses, but with higher concentrations I get more reactive- with others I flare up on the spot regardless of the concentration level.

In theory you should be fine with the BHA and the Apricot Cleansing oil, but if I were you I'd stay away from BHA for another few weeks. Once skin is in that really reactive state it seems to take a while for it to calm back down...up to a month in some cases.

[Xarata]

that happened to me with the super serum (i'm very careful with that one now- i like the results but not a rash) and with the gumball of eyegel. At least it goes away...