Spots, pimples, acne, breakouts, bumpy – uneven skin … it's a nightmare for anyone of any age.

I used to suffer dreadfully with it, nothing worked for me … apart from a small number of products (face washes, scrubs etc) – but only temporarily.

A reason that they do not work and why I no longer used them is because they drastically alter the PH levels on your skin, stripping away essential oils.

This leaves your skin sore and brittle; causing easy damage to it.

After using them, your skin is left without its natural oils and PH balance, and so your skin tries to compensate by excreting more oils .. in an attempt to re-balance them.

This means a higher level of oil / grease on your face, clogging up your pores and causing dirt to get trapped in them. This turns into sebum (the white substance which appears in spots) and contains bacteria which can spread – causing more spaces to form.

You're skin needs something which is not going to strip away any layers of skin or cause a sharp alteration of your natural oil level or PH balance.

This is where black tea comes in.

Natural compounds found in black tea are excellent for your skin, soothing but strict.

The caffeine content in the tea is high, meaning its a great source for you to use – especially on your eyes.

The skin around your eye area is thin, and I mean paper thin. This means it is easy for stuff to get absorbed into the skin and deer down – which can be both bad and good!

The bad is that any dirt or grease will likely get trapped quite easily here and cause spots to form. Not only that, but stress, lack of sleep, diet, skin care: these can all cause those dark circles under your eyes (usually called 'black bags').

The good is that the caffeine in tea can help promote and enforce higher levels of blood flow, meaning more blood to return to the eye and will flush out the darkness.

Tea is a natural astringent, meaning it will dry up and tighten skin. This is really important when dealing with spots, acne, pimples etc …

This is because, drying out the spot will effectively get rid of it and tightening the skin will cause the pores to close and prevent any dirt or grease getting into them, which gets trapped and causes more spots.

The other compounds in the black tea act as a soother, reducing and removing the blotchy / red patches which can appear on your skin; sometimes these are bumps on the skin which are not quite spots but are not flat.

Black tea is a great way to treat your stains because it works quickly and used as part of a daily skin care routine will leave you with cleaner, healthy and brighter looking skin.

How to apply black tea to spots

You'll need:

• A tea bag
• A cup
• Hot water
• Cold water

1. Find a cup, fill with warm water (A mix of 2 parts hot water and 1 part cold water works best).
2. Dip the tea bag into the water, leaving it to saturate the water for a few minutes.
3. When the water is a dark brown, take the tea bag out and a dab it onto the spots or acne area.
4. Repeat this for a few minutes; the tea will dry quite quickly and so you can use a lot of the water.
5. Leave overnight, do not wash off straight away!
6. In the morning you can now use a plain face wash to remove any tea residue which might be left.
7. You'll notice your skin feels firmer, softer, your spots will reduce and any red marks will fade.

* OPTIONALLY *

You can use the tea bag (or two) on your eyes after apply to the spots. You can do this by place them on your eyes and leave for a good 15 to 30 minutes.

Do this nightly and you'll see a big difference! The darkness will fade underneath your eyes.