Hello, it’s been almost a month since my last treatment. Ever since the first treatment I had this redness in the treated area but no scarring. These tiny holes started to show up after 4 treatments but my electrologist insisted to go on with it and told me that it will pass if I will take care of the area with the creams and the other products she sold me. I have done about 7 treatments, each one was between 1 hour to 2 hours (only the first 2 lasted 2 hours). I read a lot of posts here and started to worry. I don’t believe her anymore and am going to take a break. What would you recommend me to put on my skin to help it (as much as I can) to heal better? Do you think I am going to stay with those scars? Thank you.
Were you tweezing prior to electrolysis treatments? What was the condition of the skin prior to electrolysis?
Yes, before I started the treatments I was tweezing, waxing, bleaching my hair and even did one laser treatment which increased my hair growth, and that’s why I decided to go with electrolysis. My skin tends to be red, and is very sensitive, a lot of wounds I have on my body take time to heal. I have some pictures of the area before electrolysis. Thank you for your respond.
I recommend that you stop electrolysis at this time. Your skin needs time to heal. The redness will improve and the indentations should smooth out over time. Wait a minimum of one year before you attempt electrolysis again. You might notice an additional improvement if you wait 18 months. My best guess is that your skin has been subjected to overtreatment. Too much energy was used by the electrologist. You might consider using “Health Priority Vitamin E Enhanced” (Amazon) or a similar product designed to help reduce the appearance of scars. Do report back and keep us updated.
Thank you very much 
I will keep you updated of course.
For FACIAL hair, please don’t let anyone clear or treat every single hair if they are too close. Body hair can be cleared but not facial or front neck
Welcome to the forum, and thank you for posting. I’m sorry that your treatment has left you concerned.
The most important thing to do right now is to let the skin heal and do not pick any scabs or dig out ingrowns yourself. Continue to use a mild cleanser and 100% aloe vera gel with no menthol. Avoid sunlight in that area and consider using a triple antibiotic ointment to keep the skin as bacteria-free as possible.
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After the inflammation has gone down, I recommend getting some silicone sheeting to help mitigate long-term effects.
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Do you feel comfortable telling me how many years experience does your electrolysis have? This is severe over treatment and hopefully it will heal back to your pre-electrolysis pictures.
I routinely clear areas like yours and larger, but I know how to do it so the skin is not damaged. I’m not the only one. Many of us know how to clear difficult areas without any undue skin stress like yours. This looks like non-professional work.
Did you show these pictures to the person that treated you?
Hi. Well, first of all, the electrologist who did this supposed to be very experienced since she’s been doing it for 25 years. She had the best reviews in my area and not even one bad review, so I went to her first. That was my mistake, I should have tried to test and compare her work to others. And I feel so bad right now…
Secondly I showed her my skin when it first started to look like this, and all she said was that my skin tends to be red and that when we first begun I wasn’t gentle when I cleaned my face. I wasn’t gentle but I also wasn’t too hard with it. I guess she was just protecting herself. She said that we need to go on with the treatments and that I should continue to take care of my skin as she told me. Unfortunately, now I understand that my instincts were good and that I should’ve listened to myself when it first showed up…
I need to believe that I still have a chance to get my nice skin back 
Thank you all for your responds, I hope to see one respond from someone that saw a case like mine that managed to get out of this situation.
Just wait it out. Your skin will heal.
If you washed it too hard or exfoliated or picked the scabs off or used mendicants that interfere with healing, you could expect it to look like this. Not all unwanted healing outcomes are caused by over zealous treatment. Let time pass with no further insult to this area.
Thank you! My dermatologist told me that I can use an antiseptic healing cream which contains dexpanthenol, chlorhexidine and hydrochloride (I guess that doesn’t mean anything to you). In addition I used lavender oil, and I saw results within 24 hours, so I will keep treat my skin this way. I ordered the product David Hardee recommended me to use and I’m still waiting to get it.
I was really down because of this frustrating situation, so thank you all.
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Hi Mystic,
the advice you’ve recieved thus far, is bang on.
I think it would be very helpful for you to view this video on chin dents and scars by Michael Bono which relates directly to the type of skin response we are seeing here:
Essentially, we have 2 issues here. First, the plucking from before treatment will have left many small stands of wound collagen in the follicle, this inflexible material will build up in the follicle pulling inwards, at the same time that swelling and edema make the surrounding areas slightly swollen and inflamed,. This results in what we call the “orange peel effect” and it’s pretty likely the two patches on either side of the chin are exactly that. So does this mean it’s permanent? Absolutely not. We cannot for certain say that it WILL or WONT go away, but the best way is to give the area a pass for electrolysis for some period of time, anywhere from 6-18 months. This gives time for the healing process to finish in these areas and for swelling and edema to lessen. This is the only way to get some kind of reasonable way you will find out what the end result could be like.
One of the things you’ll note from the video, is Michaels admonishment to first of all dont pluck the area, but also to not overwork the area. The 2 patches left and right side are considered the “danger Area” as energy from one insertion can bleed over to the next adjoining follicle and lead to overtreatment. . I personally, dont like to clear these two patches in a single sitting such as a 1-2 hour treatment might accomplish ( and I suspect this is exactly what occurred) . Dont be tempted to do this again, rather you are better off to treat a percentage of the hair ( thin the area) each successive treatment . This can help alleviate concerns of overtreatment.
The plucking will have created many strands of wound collagen which are pre-existing to the treatment, the inflammation is not avoidable with electrolysis treatment, but it will go away. Therefore you will find that given time, the effect will lessen or disappear entirely, as long as we are not creating more inflamation. This will be the case every time you return to this area, and slowly correct in the 18 months post treatment. It’s entirely possible ( and I would say probable) that your electrologist is not responsible for this orange peel effect, it just happens to show up from the treatment but it will resolve afterwards.
Given the pattern of growth that I see has been treated, I can note the two patches on each side of the chin and the spattering of hairs down the neck. This is the hallmark of a hormonally induced hair growth pattern, that is to say usually a increased level of Androgens in the blood streat that result in this particular pattern of growth. There can be a lot of causes for this ( thyroid disorder, Tumours or cysts on the body, and quite often, poly cystic ovarian Syndrome ( PCOS). Many doctors are hesitant to prescribe or diagnose PCOS as they recieve minimal endocrine system training, and maintaining a proper balance of hormones in your body can be extremely difficult. Bringing these disorders to their conclusion with proper medication ( often antiandrogens such as spironolactone or finestride are used) is essential to preventing new hairs from forming.It wont however stop the already simulated follicles from continuing to produce hair. This must be removed with electrolysis.
I’m going to extend the unpopular opinion, and state that I think you should just continue. Any damage or surface irregularities are already there, beneath the surface, and WILL come out during treatment due to swelling and inflamation, but will resolve on their own as swelling and edema decreases. That said, care should be taken to not overtreat these two patches, and a thinning approach in these 2 areas will lessen the effect, and you will see the area slowly improve as the treatment comes to an end.
In rare cases, some pittiing or surface irregularity can persist after treatment. some people have seen great success with skin resurfacing techniques such as microneedling or fraxxal laser treatments after their electrolysis finishes.
I would say, given what I see here and the minimal amount of treatment that you indicate you have had, that the prognosis for this effect is good, and that you will likely see no long term or permanent effect. That said , like Michael, I cannot guarantee that. We dont have any idea how long plucking has taken place , not how much damage lies beneath the skin waiting to be revealed, but given enough time afterwards you should see a result with no orange peel effect, scarring or pitting.
In short, it isnt the electrolysis that likely caused this issue, it’s the plucking ( often for many years) that generally causes this, but in all liely hood you will see the area completely resolve post treatment.
I hope this helps,Dont Panic. Get the electrolysis. Wait afterwards for the edema to resolve and if necessary, investigate skin resurfacing techniques sometime after electrolysis treatment has finished.
Seana
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Never, ever go back to this person. You have been seriously overtreated and it WILL scar. Please seek out advice from a plastic surgeon to help treat the damage you already have, and let the skin heal before you have any more electrolysis (obviously with a different provider.) What happened to your chin is not normal in any way and will not vanish with time. I cannot stress this enough.
With all due respect to WerenotAfraid, a generally very level headed and reliable poster, I will come out and say I do disagree with the above statement. I Dont feel that either the electrologist who did the treatment is responsible for what we see nor that permanent scarring has resulted from what we see in the pictures.So I’ll just ask, What in your opinion leads you to believe this?
I’d like to point out that generally if damage of the sort WereNotAfraid has occured from electrolysis treatment, we generally dont know this until MUCH more time and treatment has passed, which puzzles me even further as to why you believe this to be the truth.
Seana
Thank you very much. I’ve seen your first comment and it’s full of details. You made me less stressed. I won’t come back to this electrologist because I’m still afraid that I am going to have scars and there’s still a chance that she used an energy that harmed my skin. I remember that after the second treatment I had swelling and redness that did not look normal. Plus the scabs weren’t small as I saw in pictures of electrolysis. I did a mistake and pre-paid for treatmens so I will have to claim the rest of the money for the rest of the treatments.
I would like to know either why WerenotAfraid wrote her or his comment. It made me a little bit scared and then I saw your new comment and relaxed a bit. So thank you 
well I will say that wereNotAfraid is an electrolysis client, who overcame a very difficult situation with the help of some of the finest electrologists here. She’s very “clued” as far as electrolysis clients are concerned, but her knowledge of skin healing concepts may be more limited than some of the professionals here. This I think is probably what lead to the comment above, as it’s probably outside her particular level of expertise.
You should relax. Part of the reason i went into such detail was to give you a firm understanding on which to base your emotions and response. I did feel some of what I was seeing in this thread before was perhaps a bit alarmist, so I was trying to give you the tools with which to understand just what the heck is going on with my chin? In general, if electrolysis caused damage to the extent you see in your pictures, we dont tend to know this for at least 9-12 months. It takes that long for electrolysis caused damage to become apparent. When we see little surface imperfections so early in the process it pretty much is NEVER what we see in the final result. The skin healing process takes a full 18 months to finish it’s process. Anything you see before a year has passed, most likely is a temporary manifestation and nothing more.
In addition to the above video of Michaels, I would also recommend viewing “The Healing Skin” 4 part series located here:
It goes into much further detail than the “Chin Dents and scars” video by the same author, and will give a fairly thorough understanding of the processes at play. The author of these 2 videos is very fond of the saying “What is this thing” when looking at minor skin issues such as yours, and his videos go a long way to describe what you are seeing, how it all works, and the probable timeframe to resolution.HE turned me down earlier this year when asked to return to hairtell to keep spreading the good word , I may point out this thread to him in the hopes he’ll see his opinions still have value .
If after all is said and done, you still dont feel comfortable going to this electrologist again, that is entirely your perogative .as you SHOULD see someone you are comfortable being treated by . I dont however, think that the treatment caused any permanent damage as is suggested elsewhere.
WereNotAfraid is one of my favourite people. A very supportive consumer of hair removal who has overcome great challenges. I dont think her opinion in this matter however is entirely accurate, and I do think it might have heightened your anxiety if left uncorrected.
Seana
You are great. Thank you, I appreciate your opinion and will try to calm myself down everytime a negative thought will come up to my mind. I will keep you updated.
Just to clarify, I was never an electrologist so I can only offer my non-professional opinions on electrolysis treatment itself. I am, however, a trained cosmetologist/esthetician (though no longer practicing) so I am pretty well versed in the structures of the skin, how it heals, and what is “good” vs. worrisome trauma manifestation. Seana is an amazing electrologist, and she may well be right that this will heal just fine. Dee is also amazing, and I agree with her that it looks like too much power was used here. Some redness and even slight uneven skin surface is to be expected, but this looks like much too much. Speaking as somebody who’s had a tremendous amount of electrolysis on both my face and body, if I saw results like that on myself I would run, not walk, to another provider and I suggest you do the same. I’ve only ever seen that kind of deep pitting and extreme redness on myself when I was with a provider who wasn’t well versed in thermolysis and who cranked up the current to compensate, which literally blew tiny holes in my skin and which, yes, did leave permanent scarring. For facial work there is just no good reason to have that much skin reaction. If nothing else, take a break from treatment for a while and see how things look.
Good luck!
WereNotAfraid,
I’m intrigued ! You mention permanent scarring from blowing holes with too much energy, this I think is very rare in electrology, and so I’m curious, do you have pictures from the time you can share (privately if you wish) and/or current pictures of the area you are talking about? I’d love to see what that looks like!
Seana
I will have to see if I have pics. I don’t think I took any but I might be wrong. Fortunately it was on my body and not my face! I was having little “accelerated vellus” hairs removed via thermolysis with an operator who usually used blend. I think their settings were very high in general because I found treatment overall much more painful than I usually did, but on this day it was in the “out of this world” category for what seemed to me to be tiny little shallow hairs. Anyway, I finally had to stop the session and when I looked down I saw to my horror that I had a bunch of tiny little holes oozing serum and blood blasted in my skin. It looked like somebody had taken a tiny red-hot icepick and jabbed me with it repeatedly. I felt like an idiot for sitting in the session as long as I did, as I should have known that level of agony should never happen with electrolysis. Anyway, I did the usual wound care stuff and it healed without infection, but I had hyperpigmentation for a year and I now have permanent white scars in the areas we treated. You might not notice them from a few feet away, but up close they are visible and when I look down at my tummy they are clear to me. I was told later that the settings were probably way too high and the timing was off, plus I felt privately the insertions weren’t great. I will see if I can find pics, which I am happy to share with you privately.