The only thing my face needs right now...

Quite a few of my friends have amazing skin. I literally cannot tell when Hannah is wearing foundation - she seriously needs to be in a MaxFactor advert or something.

If you’re lucky enough to be one of those girls who can put body fake tan on your face and wake up beautifully glowing instead of wondering how you could have contracted chicken pox overnight, then you probably won’t get much out of this article.

But if you’re like me and suffer from seriously pissed off skin – I swear I just look at a bar of chocolate and I get a spot – then you may appreciate this.

I’ve just started using Clinique’s anti-blemish range – maybe I’m a bit behind and maybe you’re all like – I tried that ages ago, catch up – but up until about a year ago, I could leave a full face of make up on for an entire night and it wouldn’t make a difference. Not that I practiced that regularly, but we’ve all been there after a night out when you don’t even have the mental capability to peel off an eyelash never mind the risk of breaking your neck looking for make up wipes. I’m a newbie. I used to watch my best friend Catherine spend 45 minutes before she went to bed, cleansing, toning and moisturising and I used to think…wow, I’m so glad I don’t have to do that! Usually I don’t go to sleep until I’m physically exhausted so I couldn’t imagine anything worse than setting to at midnight. A quick Tesco value make up wipe suited me fine, but one day my skin had had enough and everything changed.

I’ve been trying the Clinique range and I’ve got to say it is amazing. Their 3-step anti-blemish routine is exactly what I needed. After being on anti-biotics for a while, I didn’t want to carry on – something felt weird about being on anti-biotics for a whole year? There was a whole host of problems so I sacked them as soon as possible. I’ll be honest I don’t think I could have gone straight onto Clinque. As anyone with acne will know, cosmetics and topical treatments are good but they’re not powerful enough in a lot of cases, especially in the early stages.

For anyone with bad skin who just uses make up wipes (I’m hoping I wasn’t the only person doing this), it really is a fact that they do not remove all the make-up. Once I started with Clinique, I couldn’t believe how much make-up I still had left on my face after only using a make-up wipe, sometimes even two just to be sure.

I highly recommend this range by Clinique, especially for fast results. It is amazing, but one piece of advice which is crucial when using this collection, is that for the first week, you’re skin will get worse before it gets better - this is because it draws everything out of your skin now rather than later; everything that would become a spot or a blemish eventually. This terrified me at first but please persevere because it is worth it.

I really feel the star of the show goes to their moisturiser, ‘Clinique Moisture Surge Intense’ RRP £32 per 50ml. A bit pricey for a moisturiser yes, but SO WORTH IT. If I’m honest I wouldn’t describe it as a moisturiser; it’s so much more. The problem is, the 3-step leaves your skin dry. It’s not so much a problem because the 3^rd step of the 3-step is a moisturiser, but as the lovely Clinique lady told me (and I personally don’t think she wasn’t just trying to sell it) you really benefit from this extra product, especially if you have dry skin anyway or combination skin (oily and dry in different places). It feels amazing; more a gel than a cream, it leaves your skin feeling sublime, completely hydrated and it doesn’t clog your pores like a lot of thick cream moisturisers. Honestly, 10/10.