Featured Reviewer

How Thankful-and-Thriving Cured Her Acne Using Drugstore Products

Sep 09, 2019

"For the longest time I was angry at my skin, not at myself for having acne, but literally at my skin," says Thankful-and-thriving. "I was resentful that I had acne that never seemed to go away. One day I watched a skincare video by Tati Westbrook and she said how she really takes the time to massage her products into her skin. The way she talked about her skin and how gentle she was made me look at my skin like a baby-something that needs love and care." That's when she realized that she needed to turn her anger into compassion. "Once I stopped blaming my skin, it actually started to heal." We don't want to be too punny here but, once she became thankful, her skin started thriving.

Before and after

This Supergreater was born in Montenegro and immigrated to the U.S. when she was 6 years old. If you're thinking to yourself, "wait, isn't fellow featured reviewer Ajla also from Montenegro?" you would be correct. These two amazing reviewers are actually sisters, and Ajla introduced her to the app. "At first I was nervous because I felt self conscious about my makeup and skin care knowledge. But once I saw that I was surrounded by everyday people like me I decided to give it a try," she says. "The Supergreat community always embraced me warmly and I never felt embarrassed or judged. You guys made me feel like the new kid at school who met their best friends, like in Mean Girls when Cady met Janis and Damien.

Thankful-and-thriving is a medical assistant at the United Nations headquarters in New York, so if you want some free medical advice, it's to not make a homemade mask using lemon. "Would not recommend," she says, "it gave me a chemical burn."

Her HGs include Hourglass Ambient Lighting Powders, Charlotte Tilbury Filmstar Bronze & Glow, Bite Beauty Agave Lip Mask and NUDESTIX Intense Matte Lip + Cheek Pencil in Kiss. She would NEVER dare use a dirty makeup brush ("just thinking about it makes me shiver") and she describes her skin as similar to sour patch kids. "My skin is great until it decides to erupt into a million under the skin cysts—sweet gone sour."

Here's the moment you've been waiting for, when Thankful-and-Thriving shows us how she's managed to keep her acne at bay using affordable skincare products that are mostly available in a drugstore near you.