How bad is the initial breakout from birth control pills?

[chyna_dawl]

Hi everybody,

I am thinking of starting Ortho Tri-cyclen in a few days (period is coming up)....
About a month or so ago, i went on Alesse and it wreaked havoc on my face.
I'm pretty convinced it was Alesse itself that caused the trouble.
I'm hoping not all birth control pills will do this to me.
I hear there is an initial breakout from any birth control pill? How bad is the initial breakout, and how long does it last?
I ask this because I'm hoping that Ortho Tri-cyclen does not do to me what Alesse did.
I took it only for two weeks because my skin was terrible!
I could deal with an initial breakout, but not to the point of making my acne from mild to moderate-severe!
Any comments would be appreciated.
I'm so scared of the first few months - I hear at about 4-6 months, the acne usually clears somewhat.

[BorderGirl]

Granted, I'm on topicals which help a lot. But the most I've broken out when starting the pill (which I've done like 4 or 5 times) is a zit or two. My dermo says it takes 5 months to see improvement.

[skimom]

Originally Posted by chyna_dawl

Hi everybody,

I am thinking of starting Ortho Tri-cyclen in a few days (period is coming up)....
About a month or so ago, i went on Alesse and it wreaked havoc on my face.
I'm pretty convinced it was Alesse itself that caused the trouble.
I'm hoping not all birth control pills will do this to me.
I hear there is an initial breakout from any birth control pill? How bad is the initial breakout, and how long does it last?
I ask this because I'm hoping that Ortho Tri-cyclen does not do to me what Alesse did.
I took it only for two weeks because my skin was terrible!
I could deal with an initial breakout, but not to the point of making my acne from mild to moderate-severe!
Any comments would be appreciated.
I'm so scared of the first few months - I hear at about 4-6 months, the acne usually clears somewhat.

My daughter cleared in the first month of ortho-tricyclen and that was cool but then she broke out in month 2 and it got worse and worse until she quit in month 4 when she started accutane. It got really bad. We didn't want to stick around for 6 months to see what would happen. She was going to stay on it but I didn't want it to still break her out when she went off the tane.

[chyna_dawl]

Thanks for the comments...

I'm so scared my acne is gonna get really bad like with Alesse.
I'm pretty sure it was that particular pill however.
I heard it is pretty androgenic.
I'm just hoping my initial breakout isn't horrible - since the reason I want to go on it is to CLEAR my acne (not make it worse).
Arrrrggghh... this is so frustrating.
Wish this acne would just go away.

[amy07]

I know how you feel! I'm about to start Yasmin on Sunday and I'm kinda sketched out about the whole "initial breakout period". I've been on 100mg a day of Spiro for about a month and a half, and my face is slowly getting better (still getting pimples, but at least they are smaller) and I don't want Yasmin to mess that up! And yes it is beyond frustrating, I've been doubting that my face will ever get better.