[Alicia]

I know it sounds weird and nasty, but for the last year or so I've had blackheads on the areola of my right breast, they're very, very tiny blackheads, and there's only three or four of them but they make me feel a bit dirty lol. The problem is that there's no way of making them go away. I scratch them sometimes with soap when I'm in the shower, trying not to hurt the skin, and they seem to go away, but no, they reappear a couple of days later. Has this happened to anyone else? Any ideas on how to get rid of them?

[spanishgirl]

I'm not exactly sure wether or not we're talking about the same thing. However, are you sure you're not simply looking at hair folicles? Does anything come out of them if you squeeze?

I think it's rather normal to have big pores around the nipples, so if that's the case you shouldn't worry. I've looked at mine a few times and thought they were blackheads. Or well, I guess they coulda been but I didn't get anything out of them, and I never do. Also they are ridiculously unnoticable unless you look super close. So I don't really worry about them. I kinda think they're just regular big hair folicles though. Since I have this kinda ghost (invisible) hair around my areola. But that's really hard to see as well.

[Bibi]

Alicia, maybe you should go see a doctor about them, just to be on the safe side. There´s some skin diseases that start out looking like blackheads, so you might want to check that first. Personally I wouldn´t think there´s anything wrong, especially if they haven´t changed in all those months, but better to be safe than sorry. And a doctor can prescribe something to make them go away if it´s just acne.

[Alicia]

Bibi, I know, I know... I get very paranoid every time I find something unusual about my breasts, for example they're very lumpy and I had them checked in the past because of that, and when I perform my monthly self-examination I'm always scared of finding strange lumps! I'm a bit of an hypochondriac. Also many years ago I had one BIG blackhead in the same areola, but it went away very easily, so this time at first I didn't give them a second thought, what drives me mad is that I can't get rid of them. But now you've scared me, ha ha, I just "scrubbed" the area again and now the skin looks pretty clean, but if they appear again, as they always do, I'll ask the doctor. Argh I'm not only an hypocondriac, I'm also afraid of doctors so please bear with me lol. But yeah like you say, even if it's only acne there must be some treatment for it.

And Angelus, you made me doubt. Yeah I've squeezed them sometimes but what comes out looks like very little pieces of dirt, very similar to the blackheads I get around my nose when I don't exfoliate , so I'd say they're not folicles. But there might be some truth in what you say: I suffer from mild hirsutism and I have a few hairs around the areola (not ghost hairs like yours, but very tangible hair, lol!!), so it might be a hair which has got clogged up, or which has grown inwards and caused a little infection...

Thanks much for your answers Bibi and Angelus, it's cool to have place for sharing these little scary secrets