Dunno if anyone still reads this thread but I too, dealt with--and sometimes still deal with--the development of orange peel skin. I didn't have laser or the V-peel (though I have had a glycolic peel), and my skin developed the same kinds of textural problems as shown in the OP's picture, so I can totally identify with everyone's complaints and fears in this thread. Unlike others though, I believe that this textural problem is actually due to an EXCESS of collagen and keratin. The reason I came to this conclusion is that my textural problems only started to develop after I suffered some bad break outs and, in an effort to improve and possibly stave off any shallow scarring, I started using/trying all the expensive/active products that are supposed to improve skin texture and collagen production (retin A, vitamin c serums/creams, also made sure to take lots of oral vitamins and veggies). To be clear, I did not overuse these things (in fact I have never been able to tolerate using even the suggested amount of retin a), and I did not just suddenly try it all at once--i too, was trying to "baby" my skin. While I did and still do have some shallow acne scarring, I definitely did NOT have orange peel skin before I became obsessed with all the antioxidant/resurfacing treatments. My skin texture was at it's absolute WORST(roughest) following the month that I let an esthetician advise me on products (she mostly preferred vitamin c serums and acids in addition to the retin a I was using every other night!); she also administered a facial with a "light" glycolic peel...and it only made my skin look worse... The thing is, collagen thickens your skin, and when you treat your skin with all these products/peels/lasers and take an excess of vitamins, well it's all with the aim of stimulating more collagen growth. Maybe that's not such a good thing in certain people's cases? Maybe at some point, it just ends up being overkill for some of us.
Anyways, I found that when I quit using all the vitamins and vitamin c serums/antioxidant creams and cut down the retin a usage to 1-3x a week, my skin texture improved CONSIDERABLY (i cannot believe how much it affected my self esteem, so I hope this helps someone else!).
I still experience it occasionally though, and what do you know? It's almost always after I use retin a too much or too frequently (like I said I have some shallow acne scarring and it's actually helped with that). Also, I have found that mechanically exfoliating at least once a week actually helps a lot, so I would say consider whether your skin is in fact "fragile" or if it might be actually be thickened and/or inflamed due to whatever kinds of products you use. To me, orange peel skin almost looks like ketosis pilaris (look it up) so I think anyway you treat it, you just have to reach a certain balance to get results.
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Anyways, I found that when I quit using all the vitamins and vitamin c serums/antioxidant creams and cut down the retin a usage to 1-3x a week, my skin texture improved CONSIDERABLY (i cannot believe how much it affected my self esteem, so I hope this helps someone else!).
I still experience it occasionally though, and what do you know? It's almost always after I use retin a too much or too frequently (like I said I have some shallow acne scarring and it's actually helped with that). Also, I have found that mechanically exfoliating at least once a week actually helps a lot, so I would say consider whether your skin is in fact "fragile" or if it might be actually be thickened and/or inflamed due to whatever kinds of products you use. To me, orange peel skin almost looks like ketosis pilaris (look it up) so I think anyway you treat it, you just have to reach a certain balance to get results.