Am I being overtreated (sizzling and crackling galore)

[clairedelune]

I spent a year with my last electrologist. Hour and a half sessions, with very little pain from treatment, and a lot of pain from plucking. I discontinued treatment after losing confidence that I would see any results and grew skeptical every single hair should feel like it is plucked.

I was hopeful with my new electrologist. I actually felt very little plucking sensations, and a lot of pain in treatment. At first I was okay with this. I got a very strong BLT cream and applied it such that it was saturating my face. It does very little to help the pain usually but any little helps.

This last night though, it was horrible. I heard sizzling and crackling with every single hair. The pain was immense and it broke my will. Now I’m questioning everything, let alone whether this electrologist is okay.

More worrying is the fact I hear them constantly wiping the tip, and routinely applying paper towel to stop bleeding. I chalked it up to the cream, being greasy and making the whole treatment difficult, but now I’m not so sure after reading several topics. I’m fat and they seem to have a difficult time with insertion of the needle, stretching the skin out everywhere.

My face is swollen for days after treatment (especially my chin), and frankly I don’t go out in public. I’m miserable and I feel like I swung for the other extreme. I’m running out of electrologists to go to. (Only one picture due to new user restrictions

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[clairedelune]

[clairedelune]

Sorry, embedding isn’t working for some reason: Imgur: The magic of the Internet

[Thermo]

Sizzling and crackling is a sure sign that the electrologist is overcooking the hair. She either needs to turn the settings down, reduce exposure time or both. This might also be why she’s wiping the tip so much.

Bleeding can sometimes happen, but it’s not from the electrolysis itself. It’s possible that she’s inserting too far down and causing the bleeding. Since you said she’s having trouble entering the follicle, I think it’s more likely caused by her prodding and poking, trying to get in. Stretching the skin to enter the follicle is normal however, and should help to avoid this. If I came across this problem, I would just go down a needle size.

Looking at your picture, that level of swelling can be normal for some people in the first 24 hours following treatment. If it’s still that swollen several days after treatment, then it’s a good indication that the treatment was excessive.

Have you spoken with the new electrologist to understand her thoughts on this outcome? She may be willing to soften her approach.

[fenix]

How many treatments have you received with sizzling and crackling sessions? I hope it hasn’t been going on for a while because that would indicate that your electrologist doesn’t recognize it’s a problem that needs to be addressed with adjusting energy and timing and perhaps insertions themselves.

[clairedelune]

My jaw and chin are still somewhat swollen 2 days after treatment. This was taken yesterday.

It doesn’t look bad to me but I don’t know. As far as number of treatments where I’ve heard the crackling, I’ve heard it before, but never so definitively or painfully; I’ve seen her 7 or 8 times now I think.

She seems to know it’s happening, because when I broke down she told me there are some really tough hairs there. I am biased to believe her because as I said, I felt mostly pain from plucking with my last electrologist. With her I barely felt any pain ever with needle insertion, no bleeding, but I went with her for a year with basically no results.

It’s very disheartening.

[clairedelune]

This has me concerned. When I open my mouth I see these depressions/divots and the skin looks bumpy. I have to catch it with the light to see it but it looks unnatural.