Cocoa butter acne

[Disguy]

Hi,
I'm new to soap making and I have very acne prone skin. I've read a couple articles on cocoa butter and many claim that cocoa butter is very comedigenic and will clog pores. Will soaponified cocoa butter clog pores? If anyone has any experience or information on this I'd appreciate it.
Thanks

 

[Millie]

I don't know if saponified cocoa butter is comedogenic, but I would worry more about what is left in the superfat. Have you made a face soap before? If you have a recipe you've been working on you could post it here for feedback, or if you are searching for a starter recipe just ask. Many long time soapers have shared their favorite recipes and could post links. Unfortunately, real soap can be irritating to facial skin because of the high pH, but for some people it seems to work well. Just a heads up

 

[Disguy]

Not really looking to make face soap. I'm more worried about clogging pores on arms and shoulders. I was curious if I should avoid cocoa butter altogether or if its not an issue after personification.

 

[Millie]

If you can cover it up with a shirt it's worth some trial and error. I'd still keep it on the low side. Have you tried a salt bar? From what I've gathered on the forum it seems to be popular with teen boys, who likely share your condition.

 

[Arimara]

I'm going to say this once (here): It's soap. Any soap that clogs your pores is not soap but perhaps some weird lotion or an abomination to soapy syndets. Saponified oils almost NEVER have the same properties they would if they were still in their natural state. This is due to oils undergoing a chemical change instead of just a physical one.

Now if you had mentioned a body butter or cream, I'd see your concerns a bit better.

 

[BattleGnome]

I'll give an example of the changes an oil goes through: coconut oil is a 2 on the comedigenic scale and from what I understand it means coconut oil causes as much acne as you seem to be worried about coco butter. Coconut oil is one of the most cleansing oils in soap making and is often used to help with breakouts (like Arimara was mentioning with the salt bars). Castor oil is another that changes drastically with the addition of a caustic solution, there are benefits to straight castor oil (it's a humectant with possible antibacterial properties but it sounds weird to slather yourself in castor oil). In soap making castor shines by helping boost the bubbles from other oils.

Cocobutter is often added to boost hardness in soap, especially useful if you don't want to use palm or animal products. For what it's worth, I have a history of shoulder/back acne but just switching to making my own soap helped a ton regardless of what ingredients I used. Some people react differently to synthetic detergents (aka: most store bought body washes) - acne was my reaction but my husband has no issues and still uses a commercial wash

 

[The Efficacious Gentleman]

For what it's worth, I have never used cocoa butter in soap - if there is a question mark over that ingredient, there are still plenty of amazing soaps which don't contain a single gram of it.

 

[dixiedragon]

There aren't any good hard-and-fast rules - skin is SO different. For example, some people swear by the oil cleansing method and some swear it has made their acne much worse.

I suffer from acne and I can't say using cocoa-butter soap made it worse. I second the salt bar - those are nice. It helped me for about a month, lol.

 

[Arimara]

There aren't any good hard-and-fast rules - skin is SO different. For example, some people swear by the oil cleansing method and some swear it has made their acne much worse.

I suffer from acne and I can't say using cocoa-butter soap made it worse. I second the salt bar - those are nice. It helped me for about a month, lol.

My skin hates high coconut recipes so adding to what Dixie is saying, salt bars don't work for me. I can use soaps with clays to clear and curb my breakouts. Other soapers find such soaps to be overly drying.

So in truth, you really need to test the oils on your skin yourself to see what works best for you. Dermatologists have told me not to apply oils to my skin or scalp due to possible pore clogging however, my skin is great if I use coconut, shea butter and/or cocoa butter on it.