Facial hair removal (18 year old w/ pics)

Hair Removal Methods Laser hair removal
#1

4 days ago I got a full face session because facial hair sucks, gives me zits, irritates my skin and well, does my face not look like shit?

Judge for yourself, comments about my skin are welcome as well. Be honest, even if the truth hurts.


Left cheek, 3 days after laser appointment


Chin, 3 days hair growth


Left cheek, a day after I shaved

I dont know which laser my technician used, but it was at 85 joules, hurt like a bitch but I didnt care because I want my face to be smooth again. She applied a cream after the session was over to sooth the irritation, I walked home in the freezing weather which I guess reduced the swelling and redness completely by the time I got home. I noticed some of my hairs were curled and pointing in random directions on my left cheek and some on my chin. Some were visibly burnt, though still growing.

Pressing my chin hurt up until today, probably because of the burnt follicles.

My question is, how much of my hair do you think will shed and be gone by 2 weeks?

Also, if the follicle is destroyed, why does the hair still grow? Shedding of the skin pushes the hair out, right?

#2

>how much of my hair do you think will shed and be gone by 2 weeks?

It’s been 2 weeks since you posted so if it worked, you should shed almost all that hair. Mine starts falling out after 10 days. Only around my lips or missed patched does the hair not fall out.

>if the follicle is destroyed, why does the hair still grow?

It is probably being just pushed out. You may need to go and fish for some after 2 weeks. Exfoliate with a loofa.

I am indian and have a very thick black beard, been dong YAG for 4 treatments, and I have a long way to go. I’ve noticed I get 0 zits now (I used to get plenty).

#3

lol I was just about to post an update. I only shed a couple patches of my hair, mostly on my underchin (I remember the pulses hurting right there the most) some patches on my cheek but thats it. Does this mean the settings were too low? Does this also mean that most of the hairs on the bald patches will grow back because only 10-15% of them are permanently killed on the first session.

I spent $240 on that session and its a lot of money for me. Damn!

On my next scheduled visit I will ask her to up the fluence, but I dont understand how 85 joules was not enough? Here I see veryone talking about 10 12 15 20 or 30 joules. I thought I was hardcore for being able to endure 85J but I guess i’m wrong. The laser head size was the size of a penny so I guess 15mm, I dunno. What other laser settings affects the effect of the joules?

Thanks.

#4

Hm, if the rest doesn’t shed shortly, definitely ask for a touch up. That is way too much to have paid without getting at least 90% shedding.

#5

Yes, definitely ask for a retouch, just tell them that you’re not shedding, a decent place should understand.

And get the low down on the laser type and settings. You have brown hair so maybe turn the setting up a notch.

#6

From my experience I’ve found the best results for face are going every 4 weeks for the first few sessions. For me my experience is basically that I’d go for one session have the whole face treated. After 3 weeks or so all the hair had shed that was going to shed. This was probably 80% on my cheeks and neck, but only 40% on my upper lip and chin, as these areas are the hardest to treat. So I went back right at 4 weeks exactly, did entire face again and now its all shed. If it’s patchy then you may want to ask about a retouch or retreatment. For me it wasn’t patchy, it was completely uniform across my face, it just didn’t have 100% shedding.

#7

We need more information. There are dozens of various machines and settings are not identical across them. It depends on the specific machine they’re using. None of the machines I’m aware of would ever be used at 85 joules though.

Please call your clinic asap and ask for: name of machine, joules used, spot size used, pulse width used.

We can’t help much without that information, except to tell you to definitely not go back until you figure out what you actually need to get results, which we can help you with.

This isn’t the type of industry where you walk in anywhere and get amazing results, especially on a hard to treat area such as a male face. You need a great machine, at great settings for your skin type, and someone who knows what they’re doing in terms of setting these settings and treating. It doesn’t sound like that’s what the clinic you walked into offers.

Please read the FAQs in detail as well. Link below.

#8

Thanks everyone for the replies. I have booked a consultation and I will get some answers, as wlel as the technical details of the laser and settings she used. The receptionist on the phone reminded me that it takes many treatments to shed all the hair, but i’m not dumb and I know that all or most of the hair should shed on the first treatment, and whatever grows back later is what requires the next treatment.

For now here are some new pics, both 2 days hair growth.

edit: Lagirl I already read the laser FAQ and learned plenty, ill come back with the info.

#9

I would call and ask for the information on what was used this time. It will help you figure out answers before you come in again, so you are prepared.

#10

She used a ND:YAG Sciton, at 85J/cm, with a pulse width of 25ms and a 5mm spot size.

The doctor told me that only the affected hair sheds, because hairs in the non-anagen phases are too far away from the follicle/blood vessels hence unaffected.

#11

Ok, now I see why it’s such a weirdly high joules number. They’re using a very tiny spot size. Someone there doesn’t know how to operate this machine for hair removal. It can also be used for other skin treatments and that spot size would probably be appropriate for that. But for hair removal, that spot size is useless (and on all lasers, as spot size is decreased, the joules are automatically adjusted up).

What the doctor is saying is not true. ALL treated hair should shed. That explanation makes no sense. Where are they? Laser works by reaching down to the follicle to heat it up and disable it. It’s attracted to pigment, i.e. DARK hair, so any dark pigment is affected.

Btw, doctors are not usually experienced in hair removal. They don’t teach hair removal in school. You need someone who does hair removal only all day long.

#12

Yes, that doctor is either lying to you, or ignorant. ALL the hair should shed. If it isn’t anagen it might grow back, BUT IT SHOULD STILL SHED. Shedding just means the hair was treated, not necessarily that the treatment worked. If a hair does not shed, it wasn’t even hit with the laser (the hair phase is not related to this).

I agree with LAgirl. Medical doctors are not good at this sort of thing since med school doesn’t focus on this sort of thing. You need a specialist in laser hair removal.

#13

What the doctor is saying is not true. ALL treated hair should shed. That explanation makes no sense. Where are they? Laser works by reaching down to the follicle to heat it up and disable it. It’s attracted to pigment, i.e. DARK hair, so any dark pigment is affected.

Yeah but if the hair is not attached to the follicle anymore, what good does it do heating up the hair when the heat wont reach it, at least not enough to destroy it?

Btw, the said doctor is the owner of the clinic, and he specializes in laser applications. He told me he attended the earliest meetings and commercial practices of laser hair removal in Vancouver in 1994.

When I entered his office for my consultation, I was really skeptical and had a lot of questions (such as the laser settings) which he gave accordingly but he thought I was gathering info for a lawsuit, LMAO. All I can say is that ive learned alot from the meeting about LHR, IPL and all kinds of things we talked about.

I shouldve asked him to elaborate more on this, but he said something about the laser doing a “scan” before it targets the hair. And I think that scan differentiates hairs in the anagen phase from the other 2 useless ones. I have some bald patches on my face, and I remember precisely those spots hurting the most, and some areas totally painless (like my upper lip which both me and the technician expected to hurt like such a bitch that she even offered me a mouthpiece to bite down on.) And to date none of the hairs on my upper lip have shed.

I also think some hairs have shed uniformly while other areas are patchy, because shaving is a bit easier now. What do you guys think from the pics? Do my hairs appear less dense?

Not saying i’m dismissing you guys (LAGirl and Magicalprincesskitty especially) and your experiences, but for now the Doc has me convinced, and he assured me that I can get my cash back if it doesnt work out, so i’m satisfied with the service for now. We’ll see how it turns out.

Should I keep a “diary” in this thread? If anyones interested i’ll continue it.

Oh yeah, I live in Canada in a small town, we have free health care here and the government doesnt allow you to operate a laser without extensive training and certification. Non-physicians arent allowed to use anasthesia either, so yeah.

#14

You’re right that if the hair isn’t in the anagen phase, it won’t disable the follicle. Nobody is saying it will. But the hair itself will still be burned and ejected (what we call “shedding”) even if the root system isn’t destroyed. Even a very weak laser (home lasers like tria and silken for example) cause shedding, even though they don’t actually destroy the follicle. So you can see that shedding happens even if the treatment doesn’t kill the hairs.

I don’t know what this “scan” thing is on the laser, or how it works. So I will refrain from commenting on that. Perhaps that is why if didn’t target certain areas, I dunno. LAgirl probably knows more.

#15

That’s actually really interesting the whole scanning thing, I’ve never heard of that then googled their website and it definitely looks like it does that: http://www.sciton.com/treatments/hairreduction.html

However from the video on there, the headpiece looks a bit touchy, like it has a huge spot size but when you see the laser jump around firing it seems to miss a lot of spots. Even if it does hit them all, I don’t see how that can be effective on the face or upper lip unless there’s smaller pieces they can use or something…

#16

I think the scanning is for detecting anagen hairs, so it focuses the beam onto them and ignores the other ones to reduce discomfort, but I dunno, im just assuming. Ill ask the doc on my next appointment.

edokid, the laser used on my face didnt look like that one at all.

#17

I wonder if anyone else here has had this scanning technology… It seems unnecessary because there’s no real harm in targeting non-anagen hairs. At the very least they will shed and the client will have a month of hairlessness. shrug It seems like a frivolous feature… Is it to prevent over-treatment or something?

#18

Well if less hairs are hit then its less painful. Why zap hairs that will grow back?

#19

Oh, I see. It’s a way to lower the pain. Hmm…

#20

Sciton scans in order not to miss hair and avoid patchiness. This has nothing to do with all hair shedding after treatment. All lasers work in the same way - they target dark pigment. This means that any dark pigment that is touched by the laser is affected, i.e. if it’s dark and is affected by enough laser power, it will shed. There is no reason for everyone here to be able to experience 90%+ shedding and for you not to. The concept is the same.