Healing Adult Acne Through Holistic Practices - Leigh Brandon

Ever wonder why those pesky acne treatments just don't seem to work long-term? Join us as we unravel the mystery behind adult acne with holistic health expert Leigh Brandon, who shares his personal and transformative journey of healing from within. Leigh opens up about his battle with severe cystic acne that began at age 13 and the emotional scars it left during pivotal moments in his life. He candidly reflects on the frustration of conventional treatments like creams and antibiotics that promised relief but often fell short. Through Leigh’s insights, we examine the societal pressures tied to skin appearance and discuss why traditional medicine sometimes fails to deliver lasting solutions.

Discover how Leigh’s story highlights the importance of addressing the root causes rather than masking symptoms. Much like tending to a car's engine warning light, understanding the underlying issues is key. Leigh sheds light on the crucial role nutrition plays in skin health, with individual dietary needs affecting hormonal balance and gut health. He shares eye-opening case studies, such as mercury toxicity, emphasizing the impact of environmental toxins on acne. Leigh's experiences offer hope and fresh perspectives, encouraging a shift towards holistic practices for clearer skin and a healthier life. Whether you’re struggling with acne or simply intrigued by this holistic approach, this episode promises to enlighten and empower.

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Chapters

• 0:00 The Transformative Journey of Overcoming Acne
• 12:15 Treating Acne at the Root
• 16:27 Optimizing Skin Health Through Nutrition

Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:00

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Speaker 2: 0:59

Hey there, everyone, welcome to Pleasure Principles. I'm your host, avik, and here to dive deep into the elements of life that shape our confidence, happiness and vitality. So today we are unlocking a topic that's more than just a skin deep. It's all about tackling adult acne in a way that's natural, empowering and truly transformative for your confidence, attraction and self-esteem. So joining us today is Leigh Brandon. So welcome to the show, brandon. Thank you, abik. Thanks for having me on the show, lovely, lovely.

Speaker 2: 1:33

So, brandon, like before we start, I'll quickly love to introduce you to all of our listeners. Brandon is a holistic health expert with over two decades of experience in uncovering the real solutions for the issues that modern medicine often fails short on. So, after battling severe cystic acne himself, he found his way to clear skin, confidence and a fulfilling life through natural, holistic practices, and he's here to share those insights with us. So let's get ready to challenge conventional wisdom and get inspired to heal from inside out. So are you ready? Let's jump in, wait, wait. Welcome to the show again, brandon. Yeah, again, thanks, thanks for having me. Lovely, lovely. So, brandon, like um, I'll quickly start with your story. I mean, what's your story with the acne? I mean, how did it impact your confidence and self-esteem?

Speaker 3: 2:34

yeah, so at the age of 13 is when it really started for me, and you know I can remember. Yeah, a sunday evening at home I was sat between my parents and they kind of noticed that I had blackheads on my nose.

Speaker 2: 2:50

And.

Speaker 3: 2:50

I had my dad on one side, my mom on the other side, and they were squeezing all the blackheads on my nose and that was the start for me and I kind of thought you know, you start going through puberty, it's kind of a normal thing, right? That's kind of what you think.

Speaker 3: 3:04

You start going through puberty, it's kind of a normal thing right that's, that's kind of what you think, and I I wasn't really prepared for what was to come. So it got worse. It wasn't just black heads, but I started getting white heads and they were quite inflamed and nasty, and so my mum took me to the doctor and the doctor said don't worry, worry, we can solve this for you. No problem, here's a cream and here's a cleanser. Go off, you'll be fine. And I started using those and nothing really happened, apart from my skin got even more red, it got dry, got flaky, it was painful.

Speaker 3: 3:39

And the acne actually, if anything, got worse. So after a period of time, my mum took me back and she said look, you know it's not working. What can we do now? And so the doctor said oh okay, don't worry, I've got the solution. Here's some antibiotics that will sort it, you know, absolutely no problem. So I was very optimistic and felt really good, you know, leaving the doctor's office and I started taking the antibiotics and, to be honest, honest, it cleared very quickly and I thought, great, I've solved the problem. But about six weeks in, it came back and I'm still taking the antibiotics and the acne came back and it came back even worse. So so that was pretty bad.

Speaker 3: 4:21

And then, you know, I got a little bit older and you, you know, you start to go out with your friends and you go to pubs and clubs and you start, you know, meeting girls and things like that. And there was some Friday or Saturday nights that was, my skin was so bad I could not even go out, I couldn't face the world with. You know, I had acne the size of like a ping pong ball on my forehead, you know, and several of them. So that was pretty depressing because, you know, again, when you're young and all your friends are going out and having fun. You know, staying home in your bedroom on your own was pretty depressing. And then you know, I leave school, I start work, and you, you go for a job interview. And what tends to happen is, you know you've got a job interview coming up and you're saying to yourself, oh please, please, please, let my skin be good on this day, right, and you start stressing about it. Well, one of the things that can cause acne is stress. So, you know, you wake up in the morning of a job interview and you go and look in the mirror and it's oh no, this is my worst nightmare. And what I found was, first of all, my own confidence is knocked because of the way I was looking. But I also felt and I don't know if it was just my interpretation of the situation or whether it was real, but I felt like they were looking at me as if to say what are you doing here? You're a teenager, you know. And even though I was going for jobs, or even job promotions, that I felt, you know, I was probably the best candidate for the job, I wasn't getting a job, so it was costing me money, or at least I felt it was costing me money and a lot of money.

Speaker 3: 6:00

And then, of course, you know you're in your 20s, you might be in a relationship. And then, of course, you know you're in your 20s, you might be in a relationship, and then your skin gets really bad. And then next thing you know you're not in a relationship anymore, right, and you kind of think, well, to be honest, I don't, I don't blame her for dumping me, look at the state of me. I look terrible. And so that that was pretty much my life from the age of 13 to 31. Now, when I was at school just go back to school days. So everyone had a nickname at school, right? Well, my nickname was Zit, because I had the worst acne in my year at school. So, yeah, the 18 years was on, the bad days was terrible, but I also had good days, but most of those 18 years I had some, some level of acne. The summer times were better for me. The more sun I got, the better my skin was.

Speaker 3: 6:56

I basically spent 18 years of my life stressing, probably spending an hour in front of a mirror every day. You know, you kind of look at yourself and think should I squeeze that spot? Should I not squeeze it? And you know, it's kind of a real mental trauma that you go through each day, worrying about how your skin's going to look like and also how other people are going to perceive you. I think that's probably almost the worst thing. It's like how are people going to perceive you as well? Because sometimes it'll be so bad. You know you walk along and you can just see everyone looking at you as if to say, oh my god, look at this guy, it's terrible. You know so that. So that was really my story of you know my experience of having acne myself.

Speaker 3: 7:40

And at the age of 31 I was. I've been working as a personal trainer for about five years, so I was into nutrition and I would turn up for work and I'd feel like a fraud because I should have been the pinnacle of health right, and my skin on my face wasn't projecting that. And my skin on my face wasn't projecting that. And luckily I went to a conference at Loughborough University, which is very famous in England for being the best sports science university in the country, and there was a guy there that I knew of him. I'd been reading many of his articles before this, but he was doing a lecture on nutrition and he was saying that you know, the foods that you eat affect your hormones. Your hormones affect your skin. Things like food sensitivities can affect your skin and they can cause things like acne. Yeah, and I was, and I was thinking, hang on a minute.

Speaker 3: 8:42

I've asked my doctor so many times as to is there anything I'm eating that's causing my acne? My doctor would say, no, it's got absolutely nothing to do with what you're eating. And there's this guy saying the complete opposite. So I went back home after the conference and I went to see a guy locally to me and he ran lots of tests and after I've been there a few hours, he came in and he said right, the first thing you need to do, you've got to stop taking those antibiotics because they're not doing you any good. He said, the next thing is you've got a fungal infection, so we need to deal with that. And finally, you're intolerant or sensitive to all these foods. And he held up a list of all these foods that my body was basically having an inflammatory response to. So he said well, the good news is, these are the foods that you can eat.

Speaker 3: 9:30

So what I did was I switched my diet pretty much overnight and within about two weeks my skin cleared up. So I'd had acne for 18 years and purely by changing what I was eating solved my acne very quickly. Now I'm not going to say that's going to be the case for everybody, because everybody's different, but that was really my story. And then when I went through that experience myself and I was already working in health and I went on to study other things like functional medicine, and I just thought I need to help other people that were in the situation that I was in for 18 years. So that's pretty much what I've been doing. I mean, I work with different types of clients, but I've been working, I would say, helping people with acne since about 2008. I've been working, I would say, helping people with acne since about 2008.

Speaker 2: 10:30

So it's been about 16 years that I've been helping people overcome acne. Wow, that's a lovely journey. Thank you for sharing and also like let's address the skeptics right. So is it really possible to cure acne naturally without relying on harsh medicines?

Speaker 3: 10:50

Absolutely. I mean, I I've helped I don't know how many people, probably close to 100. And what they all have in common is that they've all, before they came to see me, they've all tried other methods, whether it's cleansers, acne creams. A lot of women use birth control pills. There's Accutane, there's Spironolactone, there's all these what's called acne products, and they've already tried all that and it hasn't worked. Now some of them might work temporarily. So for women, the birth control pill is relatively effective. It doesn't work for all women, but it can be effective at getting rid of the acne. But it comes first of all, it comes with side effects, and pretty serious ones as well if it's used long term. But the other issue is, as soon as you stop taking it, the acne comes back and it comes back a lot worse than it was before. So you know, with any, with any approach, you've got to look at the, the risks and the benefits. But you know, the key thing to the approach that I use with people is that you've got to get to the root cause of the problem and that and that isn't the approach of pharmaceuticals. The pharmaceutical approach is to treat the symptom.

Speaker 3: 12:15

So the analogy I like to use. It's a bit like you know when when you've got acne. It's a bit like you know if you're driving your car and the engine warning light comes on the dashboard. It tells you there's an issue with the with the engine. So if you, if you were driving your car and you saw the, the warning light on the dashboard, the sensible thing to do would be to take it to a mechanic. They would look at the engine, they would fix the engine and then you take the car back and off, you go and they've solved it at the root cause. Now that's how I work with people. I look under the bonnet, I try and find out the root cause of the problem and help the person reverse that the way the medical system works.

Speaker 3: 13:02

In the analogy, if you imagine your engine warning light comes on in your car and you take it to a mechanic, the medical approach would either be to put a piece of black tape over the light or to cut the wire to the bulb of the light on the dashboard. So it's not treating the engine, it's treating the light, just making sure you can't see the light. So you know. Imagine if you did that. What would happen eventually is that your engine would probably blow up. And now that car's no good in the human body. If you're masking the symptom of acne, you're not dealing with the root cause. What you're doing is you're kicking the problem, or you're kicking the can down the road, so to speak, and maybe 10, 20, 30 years down the line you might get a very serious illness that could be life-threatening, because you didn't deal with the acne at the root cause level wow.

Speaker 2: 14:02

So that means you're saying like, uh, if we are not, um, uh, taking care of this at the uh very soon, or maybe at the root cause level, then definitely it will come back again in the near future yeah, yeah, or I mean you can.

Speaker 3: 14:21

You can deal with the acne symptoms in some instances. So for some people, the treatments that they use, what can work? I mean again my experience most of the time they might work for a very short period of time, but but the key, the key issue with it is is that, yes, the acne could come back, but you could get a much worse condition. So a lot of the same things that cause acne also cause very serious diseases, so diseases that you know can be fatal all right, got it lovely.

Speaker 2: 14:56

And um also, like listeners, often feel hopeless with the adult right. So what's the first mindset shift that you would suggest for taking control?

Speaker 3: 15:10

I think the first thing that people need to do in terms of a mind shift is to appreciate what I've just been saying is that you really need to treat it at the root cause level rather than treat it at the symptom level. Because, again, what I've seen time and time and time again is people trying all of the let's call them traditional treatments the creams, the cleans, the antibiotics, the birth control pills and they're at the end of their tether because it hasn't worked. And I hear a lot of people saying, but I've tried everything and nothing has worked. Now, most of the time, when I hear people say I've tried everything, now, if I speak to them and I say, okay, so you've tried everything, but what are those things? I speak to them and I say, okay, so you've tried everything, but what are those things? Now, those things are normally, again, the acne creams, the cleansers, the spironolactone, the Accutane, all those kind of treatments, and I say, well, you might feel like you've tried everything, but it sounds like you haven't tried anything that I would do with you. Right? It's a completely different approach. So there is always light at the end of the tunnel, but you do need to treat it at the root cause level.

Speaker 3: 16:27

Now I guess the downside to finding out the root cause is that you often need someone who knows what they're doing to help you find the root cause of the problem. Okay, who knows what they're doing to help you find the root cause of the problem? Okay, so you know, and I can remember when I was about 25, 26, and I just bought my first home in London and I remember I was so desperate. I remember thinking I would remortgage my home if someone would say I can guarantee I can help you get rid of your acne, right, so I was willing to spend £25,000 if someone guaranteed they could get rid of my acne. I was that desperate. Now I'm not saying it costs that much to find out, you know. I mean for me. You know I went to a conference, I got some information, I went to see one guy, I got some more information and that was enough for me. Now, again, I'm not going to say that that's going to be the case for everyone, because there's lots of different potential things that can cause acne. There's nearly always a nutritional component. Now, what you eat affects your hormones, as I mentioned earlier. Now people talk about hormonal acne. I don't like to give acne specific names, I actually think there's a hormonal component to all acne, so you know food is key.

Speaker 3: 17:51

I mean it's quite interesting you mentioned mindset, because mindset is the most important thing, in my opinion, when it comes to reversing your acne, because for some people the changes that you need to make in terms of nutrition lifestyle can be quite challenging to do. So if you don't have the right mindset right from the beginning, it can be very difficult to go through that period of change because, as humans, generally we don't like change. Generally we like to stay in a comfort zone. But, as I say to a lot of my clients, no one's ever really achieved anything substantial by staying in your comfort zone. It's getting out of that comfort zone that you actually achieve amazing things. So for me, number one thing people need to address is their mindset, and I go through a whole series of goal setting and setting core values and identifying potential obstacles even before they arise, and planning on what the person's going to do once those obstacles come up. Because if an obstacle comes up and they've already planned for it, it's not going to be a problem.

Speaker 3: 19:03

Once I've worked with someone on their mindset, the next thing is the nutrition. So eating good quality, eating right for your own individual needs. So I teach people how to eat right for their own individual needs, because we're all different, right? So you know you and I, avik, we're all different, right? So you know you and I have it. We we're very different. We've got different color skin. We're from different parts of the world. Our ancestors would have eaten very different diets, so our own nutritional requirements will be different once.

Speaker 3: 19:30

Once someone has, uh, got their diet right, the next thing I try and help people to do is to optimize their the microbiome in their gut so that the predominantly the bacteria in their gut because you know what goes in in your gut gets expressed on your skin. So if there's a lot of bacteria in your in your gut, that releases a toxin, so there's what there's a toxin called lipopolysaccharides, and if you've got a leaky gut, then what can happen is those toxins can escape into your bloodstream. They can overload the liver. Now, what can then happen is, because your liver is also a, it also metabolizes hormones, hormones. You can end up with an excess of hormones. Now, again, there are many hormones that can stimulate the sebaceous glands on the skin, which which secretes the oil or sebum that if there's too much of it, can cause acne. The other thing as well is, again, if there's too much toxin in the system, the body will try and release it through the skin and again, that in itself as well can cause acne. So balancing the gut microbiome is really important. And then, another thing that's very important is that toxins again, toxins is a big fact. Hormones are a big factor. Toxins is a big factor. Hormones are a big factor. Toxins are a big factor. So any kind of toxin that's in high levels in the body needs to be excreted.

Speaker 3: 21:04

So one that I find quite a lot in people is mercury toxicity. Okay, and I had a lady that came to see me a few years ago. She was 27. She'd had good skin her entire life. She was getting married six months later and when she came to see me she had a face full of acne for the first time in her life, just after she'd arranged her wedding. And of course she's panicking because she didn't want to have bad skin on her wedding day. You know, didn't want to be looking bad in all the wedding photos. And you know we changed the diet, we worked on the gut microbiome and things weren't really shifting, as you know, as well as either of us liked. And then I ran a test on her for toxicity and her mercury levels were literally off the scale. Now, all the other heavy metals were fine, it was just mercury. So I gave her some supplements to help release the mercury from her blood and within I think it was about six weeks her skin was back to normal. Within I think it was about six weeks her skin was back to normal.

Speaker 3: 22:18

So one of the things I help people do is identify the toxins that are in their environment, because, again, today we are bombarded by toxins, unfortunately and then, once we've minimized those, what I help people to do is to run detox protocols to really try and get as much toxin out of the body as possible. So that forms the majority of what I do with clients as well. I also teach them what they should or shouldn't put on their skin, but for me that's the least important thing, which is interesting when you think most people think that that's the first thing they should do. So I teach people to stop using toxic products on their skin, which, again, most people use, and just to give your audience a bit of an idea.

Speaker 3: 23:05

So, for instance, I try and get people to not wash their face at all, just water, and my favorite thing to put on the skin after you've, like, had a shower or a bath is aloe vera gel. And the reason that's good is because it's it's moisturizing, it's very cooling, it's anti-inflammatory and it's also it slightly acidifies the skin. So to have good skin, you want it to be slightly acidic, and a lot of these cleansers and creams and shower gels and things like that that people tend to use it. It alkalizes the skin and that's not good. That will actually increase the likelihood of acne. So, very briefly, that's kind of the steps that I take people through to get their skin back to how they want it to be wow, that's great lovely.

Speaker 2: 24:04

So, for someone who is starting out this journey, what's one actionable step they can take today?

Speaker 3: 24:11

I would say, for most people, the most most important thing is mindset, or at least that's the place people should start. So write down what goal you want to achieve, and what I mean by that is write down how you want your skin to be, not not how it is now, not what you don't want on your skin, how you want it to be. So, as an example, if you were to say I want my skin to be blemish free, or blemishes is what you don't want, so don't use that word. So I would tend to ask someone if you don't want blemishes, how do you want it to look? And most people tend to say something like I would like my skin to be clear, and I might say I want it to be moisturized, or or you know whatever words they use. And then, once you've got a clear idea of how you want it to be, ask yourself why do you want it to be like that? What difference is it going to make to your life? How are you going to benefit? How is it going to make to your life? How are you going to benefit? How is it going to make your life better? And you might say you know it might be. I feel more attractive, I feel more confident, I feel I've got more self-esteem and you say, great, okay, what's that going to do for you? I'll probably perform better at work, I'll feel more confident in my relationship, etc. Etc. Because it's important to understand the why. Why do you want it? Because that helps you to motivate yourself to do the other things that you need to do to be successful. So I'd say setting clear goals is the first thing. The next most important thing is changing your diet. So that could be trying to get food of the highest quality that you can get, so possibly organic, and try to buy foods of one ingredient. So what I mean by that is, if you're buying a you know something in a packet or a box and it's got multiple ingredients, the chances are that's not going to be particularly good for you. So buy single ingredient foods and, do you know, cook food yourself. Don't expect someone else to do it. Don't buy convenience food. Don't buy junk food. Fast food buy, you know, real food would be the place to start.

Speaker 3: 26:31

Another key aspect that I haven't mentioned yet and this is kind of why I was saying you've got to eat right for your own individual needs is because you want to balance your blood sugar levels. So after you've eaten, you should feel sustained for at least two hours. You shouldn't feel hungry in between eating and two hours afterwards you shouldn't have cravings, you shouldn't be wanting sugar, you shouldn't feel tired, you shouldn't be falling asleep. So if you monitor what you eat and you're feeling good after each meal, you know up to two hours afterwards the meal that you're eating is probably quite good for you. If, however, you are feeling sluggish or tired or hungry or you're craving other foods, what it's suggesting is that your ratios of fats, proteins and carbohydrates probably isn't quite right for you.

Speaker 3: 27:26

And when you get that right, it really helps you to balance your blood sugar. And that's partly why you know when you balance your blood sugar you don't feel like you need something sweet or you don't feel hungry, because your blood sugar is nice and balanced. And the reason that's important is, again, because one of the another hormone that can cause acne is insulin. So if your blood sugar levels are going up quite a lot, your pancreas will secrete insulin to bring that back down under control. But the insulin will stimulate your sebaceous glands and that will increase the likelihood of acne. So places to start mindset. Set some goals. Eat good quality food um. Buy single ingredient foods and make sure that your meals are making you feel sustained afterwards.

Speaker 2: 28:13

That's really perfect, great. So thank you so much, leigh, for taking us this eye-opening journey, and from rebuilding confidence to redefining the attraction, so that's really, really great. And for the listeners, I would love to mention that, remember that a clear path to the confidence and attraction is definitely possible and it doesn't have to involve harsh chemicals or one size fits all events. So, uh, thank you so much for joining us today. Until next time, take care and stay radiant. Thank you so much. Our pleasure.