Now, I don’t know if you know this, but there is a whole subset of YouTube whose sole purpose is to celebrate dermatological gross-outs—namely extracting weird, nasty gunk from your skin. Blackheads, whiteheads, long coils of ingrown hairs, botflies (I wouldn’t recommend Googling it if you’re squeamish), 25-year-old zits so crusted and hard they’re basically mummified—all are there for your viewing pleasure, if you’re so inclined.
A few months ago, after becoming mesmerized by one such video of a man having the blackheads on his wrinkled strawberry of a nose excavated by a dermatologist, I wound up researching the metal tool used to make yellow gunk ooze out of his skin, as if it were tiny strands of angel-hair pasta. I figured: My skin is oily and prone to breakouts. (As a teen, I was perpetually the Before picture in Proactiv ads.) So, two days and one Amazon Prime purchase later, I was the proud owner of a primitive-lookin’ tool that wouldn’t look out of place on a dentist’s side table. It’s called a pore extractor, and it costs just about $11.
Remember those Bioré pore strips that everyone would apply and rip off? And then you’d gawk at all the little alien creatures that were living in your pores? This is basically that. Except 1. It’s cheaper, and 2. There is less forceful—and potentially harmful—tearing of the epidermis involved.
The pore extractor works like this: Basically, you drag the skinny little hoop at the end across your nose—or wherever your clogged pores are—while applying a tiny bit of pressure, as if you were spreading cream cheese on a bagel. If done right, the pressure will help your pores expunge all the trapped sebum stockpiling under your skin. (You can use it to pop pimples, too, but that is for another day.)
Here’s how to use it:
Step One: Wash your face.
Step Two: Open up your pores either by using a warm towel or by standing over some steam for a few minutes. A hot shower works, too.
Step Three: Get your pore extractor out! Clean it with some rubbing alcohol, and, uh, start extracting stuff! Drag it across your skin slowly. Not too hard now—you don’t want to burst any blood vessels and bruise your face.
Step Four: Little pieces of booger-like gunk will begin to collect on it. Don’t panic. Rinse it under running water or wipe it off with a clean tissue. Keep extracting.
Step Five: Ta-da! Gunk removed. Rinse your face off with some cold water. If you want, you can apply a pore minimizer or something with skin-tightening retinol to make those puppies look smaller. Repeat every few weeks as necessary. (This is definitely not an everyday sorta thing.)
Now, it’s worth mentioning that there are two firmly divided dermatological camps here. Some skincare pros are firmly against using physical pressure to unclog your pores (some spas in Paris refuse to do it, for example). Others say it’s perfectly fine, as long as you’re gentle and practice good hygiene. For me: It works. And unlike with the disgusting corners of YouTube I can’t help but frequent, you don’t even have to skip any ads to get to the good stuff.
