Hello everyone,
I’m a 23YO male with skin typeIII, In search of help curing my PFB. To be perfectly clear, I would like to remove most of my facial hair. Understanding that to remove all wouldn’t be possible with laser. I’ve also heard around that a Yag laser would be best for PFB.
I’m in search of a repetuable practitioner located in the San Fernando valley CA. Can anyone help recommend?
Ummm anyone?
For what you are searching for, it is MY personal experience that you are best off with a good electrolysis provider. I hope you can find one near by. (that is a good area to be looking, as California has lots of them)
If nothing esle, this post will prompt response from the LaserBlazers 
I’ve tried electrolysis, went to Layla’s out here in LA. Wasn’t a bad experience, just the pain was a bit much for the amount of hair I have to treat and the recovery took forever. Oddly, every zap she did left me with a pimple or maybe it was an infection?
Either way, I’ve heard good things about laser and want to give it a shot.
You have to keep your hands off of your face after electrolysis. You should not do anything that will cause sweating. There is a big list of “to do and not to do” after treatment. Therefore, it is hard to help folks determine if the treatment could have been administered better or if the aftercare was poor. Did you get aftercare info. at your session?
Yes, I did. I stayed away from sunlight and placed tea tree lotion on my face just as I was told. She had recommended a specific brand so I purchased it from her. I’m not trying to knock electrolysis or say her work was shady, I believe it’s just the way my face reacts to electrolysis. I’m hopeing to not have the same reaction to Laser.
I would really appreciate some help from anyone who can make a recommendation on a local practitioner?
If you have PFB, you probably have curly hair. Removal of large bulbed S shaped hair root structures, and J shaped root structures is a little more likely to leave scabs, and form pustules in the early going, however, if a full clearance can be done, the hair growing in the 2nd and 3rd clearances will be from straighter follicles and you will have less trouble with both the PFB and the continuing work… at least that is what happens in my shop.
Ever consider moving to LA? lol.
Whatever happened to LAgirl? Is she somewhere around here?
Bad Humor Alert. The following is a joke, it is only ment to make you smile:
LAgirl is now a denizen of The Naked City, I guess that’s why she wanted to complete her hair removal She is now “LAgirl In NYC” Perhaps the city has swallowed her up.
(This is extra funny to me, as people get really worried if I don’t poste or answer an email for 24 to 48 hours, when all that is going on is that I am in a non-net friendly place, or taking a real vacation for a change.)
Ohhh, thanks James. I wasn’t aware she was on vacation.
I’m sure she needs one after all the work she does on this site.
Her last post was October 12th - three days ago. Hardly a lapse.
Five days and counting, sorry I’m being impatient.
She posted on www.cosmeticenhancementsforum.com today, October 17th at 1:45 am, so the big city hasn’t swallowed her up yet. Maybe she didn’t see your post here. You can post on that website and see what happens if you like. Look for poster “blink888”.
I PM’d her, hopefully she responds.
still nada.
Well, maybe I should start my own journey. I’m being a bit too dependent and need to get my feet wet. I’ll start calling up some places and looking for samples.
Maybe she is teasing the posters on this board, saying, “Bet you can’t catch my post count.”
I’m around. Just really busy right now, so don’t have as much time to contribute. Hopefully, that will change soon.
Anyway, a YAG laser is a good solution for PFB. I would definitely go that route first and then switch to electrolysis. LAser works wonders for this condition.
A poster here “bryce” is going to a clinic in Downtown LA which uses GentleMAX. Look it up here and check it out. He seems to be happy with it.
Thanks LA GIRL!!! YOU ROCK!
An update. I went to “alaserinstitute” in LA as noted in “bryce’s” blog. I sampled both, the GentleLASE and GentleYAG on different sides of my face. Both were pretty painful and I explained that I would come back the fallowing week with some shots given to me by my dentist to help with the pain. The fallowing week I went to the dentist and was administered the shots, my face felt pretty numb except for the sides of my cheeks. I figured that it would need time for the full affect to take place. So I drove to the “laser institute” and had to wait an hour before they called me in (Even though I had an appointment). She sat me down and hit me with 16j 18mm on the side of my face…Bam! I jumped up and told her I couldn’t do this, the pain was too much. The numbing didn’t work on the side of my face and I told her that my dentist did a bad job. She understood and I left. When I got home I examined my face and saw there was a welt-looking patch on the side of my face. This welt didn’t go down untill two days later and on the third day little white pimples formed where the hairs would have escaped. I thought about what I might look like if they would have proceeded to do my whole face!..yikes! It’s now been 3 weeks since I’ve gone and the area where the laser was administered is slightly discolored compared to the rest of my face. The hair only took about a week to fall out in that area and hasn’t grown since. The strange thing was that first time I had the test patch, I didn’t have swelling or pimples. However, it was done on the lower part of my neck and the second time was on my sideburn.
I don’t think I will go back because I’m concerned about walking around like a swollen strawberry and then turning into a walking pimple. Instead, I’m going to give the Soprano XL a try. I have an appointment tomorrow with Flash Laser Aesthetics in Encino and another appointment the fallowing day with Tooraj Joseph Raoof, M.D. also in Encino. I will keep you up to date with how things are going. I doubt I’ll have time to start this week with treatments but the fallowing week I will schedual something if all goes well at the consultations.
This has nothing to do with the machine. I wouldn’t switch to the Soprano because of it. The issue here is twofold: density and coarseness of the hair and settings.
Also, you should be using a numbing cream like EMLA that is used in hair removal, applied about an hour before the treatment.
On a male face where the hair is coarse, GentleYAG would probably be the best way to go to start. When the hair gets finer, they can switch to GentleLASE.
Soprano is not going to do anything different unless you use much lower settings on it in comparison, which defeats the purpose.
Also, even with numbing cream, I would expect some pain. You’re killing dense coarse hair. If you’re not willing to do it, LHR may not be for you. There is no point of looking for painless or almost painless treatments on this area. This won’t happen unless they’re using ineffective settings.
Also, once again, due to the density of the hair, I would expect some side effects like redness and a bit of sweeling for a few days. It’s only an issue if it lasts more than a few days. Icing the area and using cold aloe vera and witch hazel will help.