I’m a Caucasion 19 year old male. I started electrolysis on my eyebrows close to three years ago. I started with sessions that lasted about 20-25 minutes, spaced two weeks apart. The sessions went to three weeks apart, and now they are four weeks apart. They last about 10-15 minutes now.
The problem is that I find it difficult to trust people when there is money incentive for them I’ve been ripped off before and mislead, and I’m pretty tired of it… I also don’t want to suffer from any permanent damage that would be cosmetically worse than what I had to begin with.
My electrologist is quite nice to me, in fact she even set up cheaper sessions for me since there was some money concern (paying $25 / session). When I asked her how long I should expect this to last she said that it varies from person to person… which of course makes sense to me. I would just like to know if this amount of time is even reasonable… I don’t think she likes to be questioned about her practice, so I tend to not express my concerns with her. I don’t really want to be a nuisance if there may in fact be nothing wrong.
Now my concern is the amount of time/money this has taken vs. the amount of progress I’ve seen. Also, I think there’s some scarring around and in between my eyebrows. Unfortunately I never took a photo when I started sessions, I was tweezing a bit at that point. I can’t recall what the full growth looked like, it’s been a long time and given my age I guess there’s just too many things that could have changed as well. In fact, I think the area between my hair and the ends of my eyebrows near my ears has started growing more hair than before…
I’ve read a lot of contradicting information from various sites as to what the best treatments are, what to expect and so forth. I’d like to finish what I started, assuming this is ever going to finish - with hopes that I won’t be left with scarring worse than the hair situation to begin with. I’m not sure what information to include (I don’t want to ramble more than I have…), I don’t know what devices she uses and such. What about the scarring, is that going to get any better? It would be kind of disappointing if it’s going to stay with me…
The pictures included are eight days after my most recent treatment.
Could you please re-submit your pictures? You can upload them at www.photobucket.com .
Are you receiving blend for your eyebrows? Are you getting cleared of the hair you want gone everytime you have a session?
You are 19 years old and you are not in any way finished developing NEW hair. Your hair pattern will not calm until you are in your late thirties. Scarring? What is your healing situation? Do you heal well within a week, better yet, do you go back to normal within a few hours or a few days?
“blend”? Most of the thick hairs are cleared every time yeah, when I look there may sometimes be one or two in between my eyebrows that haven’t been cleared. Also I remember her saying that there is no point of clearing the hairs at the outside edge of my eyebrows (second picture).
I figured my age would have something to do with developing hair still. Does it make sense though to be doing this now? Is that the reason for why it is taking so long?
The scarring I’m referring to should be most visible in the first picture, I’m not sure if it’s actually scarring though.
Well, these pictures are taken within a week. The area will sometimes be red for a few hours after treatment. I sometimes do get a bit of scabbing the day or even two days after, which usually gets better 1-2 days after. It’s hard to judge the complete healing of it though, since the “scarring” I mentioned is usually the most visible, and is persistent after treatments. The scabbing used to get a lot worse before, but the scarring wasn’t present until a few months into treatment I think. It seems to be more visible some days than others.
I could probably take a before/after treatment photo next time, but that won’t be for another 3 weeks
I see what you mean after viewing the first picture. Hmmmm. Those are indentations. I don’t know if they will fully smooth out or not. If you were overtreated several times in the past and were not allowed to heal fully before the next treatment, then that can be troublesome. Time will have to pass before you know how this will settle. I just don’t know what else to say. Do you still have a lot of hair growth after three weeks? You have been going for quite awhile so I would think the hairs would be much less even if new hairs were comong on the scene because of your age.
I have said it before, I don’t like scabbing on the face. If is happens occasionally and the scabs are very small, that’s acceptable. It the scabbing is everytime and are big or even interconnected, that’s not acceptable.
Electrologists that can’t see well, often make their own holes and cause unecessary healing problems. The follicle is a natural pocket in the skin and the probe should follow that pathway to the hair growing “factory” below the skin. Do you think she can see well? What was she wearing for vision aid? I really hate to ask these questions about other electrologists, but sometimes this part of the hair removing equation is not too good and problems arise.
If you could submit another before and after picture in three weeks, that might be helpful.
This is taking a long time for you and I don’t have enough information as to guess why. Ask her what kind of electrolysis she is using, thermolysis? blend? galvanic? for curiosity sake. What is the name of the epilator? Size of probe? The probe should match the diameter of the hair.
I really like witch hazel, tea tree oil and aloe vera gel for aftercare. I really LOVE tea tree oil for young, oily skin for nighttime use. Posts like yours are important, but frustrating to me because I always feel it tough to comment with assurity, not knowing all the facts. I just know it is highly possible to remove hair in the eyebrow area in less than three years! I also will report that it can be done without scabbing.
Ahh… that’s a bit disappointing to hear… What I found especially strange about the indentations was that they didn’t show up gradually but rather quite abruptly if I recall correctly. If it doesn’t settle, then I’m left with it as it is? That kind of sucks. My mother suggested putting stretch mark cream on it… haha, not sure if that would do anything, but it can’t hurt can it?
I usually don’t have to look when my next appointment is as I can tell by my eyebrows. There will usually be some pretty thick ones that show up / grow. It’s hard to gauge since it’s been so long to know if things have improved. If the look stayed the same as it did right after the treatment I would be pretty happy with the results.
Not sure what a small scab would be… they are usually something like 1mm in diameter. I can’t recall if I’ve ever seen them interconnected. I was told that it’s a result of the capillaries feeding the root of the hair being damaged.
I do put on aloe vera gel, though I was only told to by someone who was waiting in the office. I didn’t think of it as having healing properties to my skin until later, so I usually used it only for comfort. Even now I usually only remember to put it on the same night. I’ve never been instructed on how to deal with it…
From what I know she uses an integrated magnifying glass / lamp head that’s on an arm kind of thing. I have no idea if she can see well… or what she uses. It’s hard to know since, she’s been the only one who does the treatment on me, so if she’s doing it wrong I’m not sure what right is…
I suppose I should look around and ask when I’m there next time about those details. I wonder how that will go… hah. Not really sure how to approach it, if I should just ask that, or ask how much longer she thinks this should last.
I’ll definitely try to remember to post those before/after pictures when I can, instead of relying on my poor descriptions.
I apologize for the lack of details… she has never volunteered to talk about those things, and when I tried she seemed to act a bit strange when I asked.
Thank you for following through with posting despite my lack of answers / details
She is using what is called a “circle lamp”. There are plenty of good electrologists who use them and do good work with them, but there are better options such as surgical loupes or a microscope (I use a microscope, and I can say from experience it is a huge upgrade from a circle lamp.)
As James and Dee noted, aloe vera gel is excellent. I apply it before bed on areas that have been treated and it really helps with the healing. Even areas where I have had little indentations, it seems to help the area heal and smooth out in the end.
What would concern me most is her unwillingness to answer your questions and discuss your treatment with you. She should be willing and happy to discuss things such as the modality she is using, the machine she uses, treatment time and so on. It is not unreasonable to ask such questions. If you can get her to discuss your treatment, the machine she uses and the modality (or modalities) uses might be helpful for us to discuss your treatment and any issues you have.
This advise is good for your situation as well, so I am reposting it here.
From the vitamin therapy side of the equation, you can help improve the healing by getting 5 to 15 grams (yes, I said grams, not millagrams) of vitamin C per day. Dr. Linus Pauling advocated for that dose daily, for everyone (15 grams) and he and like minded collegues found higher doses to be beneficial for high stress, and healing situatoins.
You can’t zoom up to that high a dose unless you are in a high stress situation, so you have to start slow and ramp it up steadily. If you take more than you can stand, you just get diarrhea.
Burn patients have healed super quickly when given 50grams per day for 3rd degree burns. I would not imagine you would need more than 20 to 25 for the type of healing you seek. Of course, skin also likes to have plentiful Vtiamn A, E, and the full B-Complex. Use mega doses of these, and you will get your skin back, and maybe fis some sub-clinical problems you did not even know about.
