Had my first session of IPL and really need advice

Hello guys. I’m a male, in my early 20s and living in London. I signed up for a 6 session course for full back and shoulders at a clinic in London, and had my first session last week.

Before signing on for the treatment, I didn’t really know too much about laser treatments and naively placed a lot of trust on the clinic and the therapists. I found this forum literally a couple of days before my first scheduled session and I’ve been reading up on the different reviews and accounts since. Also read about the many different lasers and their effectiveness on different skin types. I feel a bit ridiculous now to be honest, and a bit worried about wasting my money or even making my hair problem worse.

Anyway, the therapists themselves have been great, answered my questions and have been helpful. The one that I had the session with told me my skin type was type 2-3. I’m Middle Eastern with fair skin and black coarse hair. He used a Plasmalite machine on ‘level 20’ (I’m guessing joules after reading up on here). Apparently we will be using higher setting as I have more sessions.

It’s been just over a week after the first session and I’m seeing my first hairs fall out. I’ve also got a lot of red spots on the areas that had most hair, something which I was expecting as I also had them pretty badly after waxing.

So I’m just a little lost at the moment and need a bit of advice on what to do from here. I’ve got 5 more session booked but haven’t paid the rest of my installments. Is the Plasmalite machine effective in my case? Or would I be making things worse? Which is my biggest concern. I’ve also done some reading on electrolysis now and wish I had considered it before, would that be a better option altogether?

I’ve uploaded some before pictures of my back and shoulders, I took them a few days before my treatment for my own reference -




This forum is an amazing place, just wish I’d stumbled on here sooner. Thank you for your time.

One word; IPL. Don’t worry i’m sure you’re not the only one that’s been duped into this ‘laser’ lie. Groupon is full of day spas and such that offer cheap ‘laser’ hair removal. They neglect to tell you the machine they’re using which more often than not is an IPL.

Long story short… IPL’s generally are not very effective. If you are bent on getting laser done (which i would recommend, given the amount of body hair you have) find a good dermatology office or some sort of ‘professional’ establishment that offers a Candela laser, not these fly-by-night operations.

If i were you personally, i would start with Candela laser treatments and finish with electrolysis.

Yeh I avoided all the Groupon stuff for that reason. I wouldn’t really accept discount ‘offers’ like Groupon, just wanted to get some decent treatments and don’t really mind paying a little more.

I went into this actually wanting to do get Laser treatments, and have come out with IPL. Like I said in the OP, my big mistake was not knowing what kind of lasers I should look out for due to lack of research.

Thanks.