Hi everyone.
I’ve been a long time lurker on here and thought I should finally get around to sharing my personal experience with the Tria since I can claim a true success story. I haven’t been lurking around here for a while now (I used to come on here obsessivly to monitor other people’s Tria experiences to see if there was any real hope for me), but I just logged in again tonight and saw quite a bit of Tria bashing so I decided I was almost obligated to chime in.
A bit of a disclaimer first: like so many of you on here, I’ve been plagued by an um CONSIDERABLE excess of hair in less than common places( well, I used to be anyways) and when I say my hair is coarse and dark, I mean it is really VERY coarse and dark, especially for a female UGH. I am also very pale, the so-called “ideal” candidate for laser hair removal. I’m also 99.9% sure that my hairy situation is hereditary and not caused by an hormonal imbalance. I have no doubt in my mind that my stats played into my success with the Tria, so I’m gonna have to stress that my results are NOT typical. And yet, I’m sure there are people out there who can now experience a little bit of hope when it comes to this thingy.
Anywaysss…
I’ve just been trying to find my “Tria calendar diary” I made so I can give exact treatment dates, but it’s most likely buried under a great many layers right now so I’m just gonna use rough estimates. I bought and began my Tria treatments right around the time when the Tria first came on the market, so let’s say Spring 2008 (I distinctly remember marking dates in July in the midst of my treatments, so there’s that). I decided early on that I wasn’t going to do my bikini line because 1). even with lido/prilo the pain was just too intense and the positioning on certain areas ahem behind would prove to be impossible, but mostly because 2). there was no freaking way I was gonna invest that much time and agony on an area that wasn’t gonna be permanently fixed (since I had no guarantee at that time and everyone was saying less than stellar things). I decided to just have my bikini line professionally lasered and actually that’s what I’m doing now! (see, I’m a total procrastinator when it comes to this sort of thing which is why the home laser angle appealed to me) And so, I decided to focus on my legs which were a primary source of long-time personal torment due to abnormal hair growth ;_;…
The fact is, all of the hair growth on my legs frankly sucks–scarily thick, coarse as brillo, and so dark brown as to appear almost black–but the absolute worst and most traumatizing was the hair growth on my thighs. Think…a bikini line that just never ended and you’d have the best approximation. And since the skin of my thighs is so soft and delicate, shaving was an absolute nightmare–horrible razor burn, thousands of big black dots peppering my pale skin, and eventual folliculitis equalled a shaved leg that wasn’t fit to be seen. Yes, and of course there was associated depression. And desperation. I began the treatments there along with my lower belly/happy trail, which was equally, if not more, distressing because of crazy hair growth. I was very, very meticulous…I was careful to section off small areas that I could successfully cover spot width by spot width before the Tria’s battery ran out on me. I also used the Tria’s highest setting and let me tell you, before I caved and bought numbing cream, the pain was absolutely excruciating on the tender skin of my thighs and belly. I’d experience not just the hot, stinging bite where the tip touched down, but this deep, pounding, radiating pain that would travel up and down my thighs. Like, I’d have to take deep breaths and use all my willpower to keep on going…I think I sobbed/cried out in agony and frustration a few times too. Later, when I got professionally lasered, I was so scared about the upcoming pain…maybe it was the super numbing cream my doc used but the pain was NOTHING compared to the Tria (I was relieved and amazed).
At just over a week, I’d experience virtually complete and total shedding in the areas I’d treated every time, especially on the inner thighs. I didn’t follow the Tria maker’s guidelines of zapping myself every several weeks or whatever it is they tell you to do, instead I usually let my hair grow back completely dark and dense again before I’d go for another round. I did come to notice that my right inner thigh, which I once treated before the hair was fully dark and dense again, did not have as good of a result as my left thigh which I waited to treat. Hmmm it’s hard to say how many full treatments of my thighs I did because I totally slacked off on my treatment diary oops…I know there were two treatments in every area where my thighs were fully hairy and then a third treatment where there was slightly lighter hair growth but after that, I forget.
Now for the results :). For whatever reason, my inner thighs show the most spectacular results. It seemed wherever there was super soft skin, the extra thick hair formation unique to those areas just responded better than anywhere else. My left thigh is now silky smooth, with not a visible follicle in sight. I have maybe just 5 SUPER fine (some almost invisible) hairs that pop up every now and then on my inner thigh that I just treat whenever I feel like it. My right thigh (remember, the one I treated a little differently) looks just as amazing but it does have quite a bit more stray hair than the left leg (say, maybe 15 or 20 or so?), though they are all so light and fine that I don’t even bother with them unless I am wearing a skirt. And it’s not like I’m not letting the remaining hairs finish their growth cycle so that I’m not getting an accurate view of their thickness/darkness…sometimes I go for months without shaving or bothering with them at all, and they grow into these super fine, light, 1/2" to 1" long hairs. So, picture a wooly mammoth man-thigh being transformed into a baby butt smooth thigh. Aaaand it’s been this way for nearly three years now sob!!!
My lower belly achieved the second best results: it is lovely and blemishless and smooth and there are only a dozen or so fine hairs that I treat every couple of months or so as needed. The under parts of my thighs are also pretty much smooth…I usually let the hair grow out (you can’t even feel if when you run your hand across it) and treat it as needed. Along with the super fine hair, there are about a dozen hairs on each under-thigh that grow out with noticable pigment (but not even a quarter of what they were before) that I treat, but I notice as time goes by, that they (along with all the remaining hair on all of my treatment areas really) are becoming fainter and fainter and sometimes never reappearing at all.
The tops of my thighs, which I equate in hair growth/texture and skin quality to that of my lower legs, did not achieve quite as impressive results. Granted, I also did not devote anywhere near as much time to them as elsewhere. Still, I’d say I achieved about a 75% to 80% reduction and the hair IS a lot finer though still more coarse than that of the other areas of my thighs. I do plan on working on them more eventually. Also of note: I did treat parts of my lower legs but ended up giving up pretty quickly. I decided that it was too much to keep up with both them and my thighs at the same time and that I’d just eventually get them professionally treated (again, not knowing at the time whether this was permanent or not). I did notice that when I treated portions of my lower legs that the shedding was not as dramatic as my upper legs…the hair did mostly shed but it just wasn’t complete clearance like my thighs (stray hairs here and there).
So, there you go. Sorry for this ridiculously long post but I wanted to be thorough. As I mentioned before, I am now in the process of getting professional laser treatments, brazilian bikini, underarms, and lower legs to be precise (just finished my second round of treatments and everything seems to be going great). The amount of time saved and pain avoided are astronomical but of course, it is also very expensive. So would I turn back the clock and just opt for professional treatments instead of torturing myslef with the Tria? I’m not so sure. For one thing, using the low powered Tria helped me determine that yeah, laser treatments are almost sure to be hugely successful for me and that I’m not going to be throwing away thousands of dollars for naught. Also, it took a lot to finally goad myself to laying out half naked in front of a stranger to have my intimates zapped…so before, the shame that came along with being so hairy was a little too much to overcome for me personally and being able to treat myself in secret meant a lot. And I saved quite a bit of money to boot. Still, considering the pain, the time, and the fact that there is no guarantee that the Tria’s results will be permanent for any one person means that in most cases, I’d say the average person should just opt for professional treatments if they can afford it. But for all those hopelessly hairy, financially strapped, and super determined folks out there…here’s a little hope for you…