Lightsheer Experience - Normal or messed up?

Hair Removal Methods Laser hair removal
#1

Hi,

I have used the alexandrite GentleLase for 2-3 years, and I decided to try the lightsheer for dark / coarse upper back & shoulder hair on very fair skin. I am really concerned that the person did the treatement wrong…but perhaps the after-effects are just supposed to be totally different than the alexandrite?

#1. The hairs (7 days later) are still there - AND they are growing. They have not fallen out. A few are singed…not many. With the alex laser, the hairs no longer grow after the treatment… and I even go back to get touched up in any missed spots.

#2. She did not administer the laser as I have had it done before with the alexandrite and with the IPL. She did not stop, apply the pulse, move, and apply another pulse. She just kept sliding it around and it kept beeping over and over again. It was 3x faster than the alexandrite process and there was far less pain - but was she doing it right? I had needle/rubberband snapping pain in the exact area where the hair is…but that same hair is actively growing now.

#3. She used ultrasound jelly…which was only used when I had IPL. I thought lasers didnt require this.

She also told me to but on bacitracin which is just bad advice… You do not put vaseline on a fresh burn and bacitracin is mostly vaseline (and the laser essentially burns the hair follicle). Oh - and she did a bait and switch on the price. I was quoted over $100 less on the visit before my actual treatment. She said it was “miscommunication” (despite the fact I have been to over a dozen hair removal treatments and know precisely how to communicate!).

I really need to have a hairless back on Labor day weekend… but now my hair is already growing back (unless it will fall out… but why would it be growing then?) Why wouldn’t the growth be stunted like it is with the alexandrite?

Thanks for any advice. I really appreciate it after this experience.

#2

It is 100% normal for hair to appear to be growing at the first week. It’s being ejected. Alex lasers are strong so you may have had the hairs burned off entirely (or maybe they popped from the follicle during treatment) so you are not familiar with the pseudo-growth that precedes shedding. Even with alex lasers this happens (in fact it is considered standard, and your first experience was a little bit unusual).

If by the third week you aren’t getting serious shedding, then there’s a problem and you need to complain. I answered you in a bit more detail in your other thread, but hopefully this helps. All you can do now is sit tight and cross your fingers for shedding.

#3

  • Shedding takes 3 weeks to happen. You need to give it more time.

  • Gliding is fine. They just need to apply pressure while doing it, which some don’t when gliding.

  • This machine uses that gel. It’s normal.

  • The main question here is why you’re trying LightSheer if you didn’t have results with GentleLASE. If you had GentleLASE treatments at good settings, you should have gotten results if the hair is coarse enough. LightSheer is less effective, not more.

  • Can you post photos? I suspect what you consider coarse may not actually be that coarse in laser terms.

#4

Lots of lasers use ultrasound gel, even alexandrites like Apogee Elite.

#5

Hi all - thanks you so much for your replies! I really appreciate it. I am usually not one to go into something like this without extensive research online & with references, etc… but I’ll explain more below about how I came to do this treatment.

I can post some pictures later on today. I don’t have my regular camera to take current pics (well - I have the cell phone camera, but it is not great) but I can show some pics before the treatment(s).

Here’s a brief history & explanation of what/why I am doing this:

Age 25- Increasing number & density of wirey dark hairs on upper shoulders and back of arms. Sparse / thinner hair in middle of back.

10 IPL Treatments until age 26: Result - nothing really - except it may have thinned the hair or destroyed only coarse hair. Also, more thin hairs appear to have emerged. The company went out of business and I got 1/2 my money back.

Age 27-29: 6-9 GentleLASE treatments (have to check exactly how many). Result: Good clearing of hair per session with some reduction. Mostly, I like that it stays away for a while & is very smooth - but sadly it mostly comes back within 4-6 months. The hair in my lower back is gone for good (and btw- that was light, fine hair! go figure - gone for over 1 year though). However, the backs of my upper arms are very hard to treat - despite being very dark. The hair is still dark & coarse (not finer and thinner really). Also, note - I used EMLA for every treatment (I think I would’ve died without it - as it is very painful IMHO - but I read somewhere that EMLA blunts effectiveness…not sure if that is a myth).

I do not know spot sizes & fluence but I absolutely love my technician. She is extremely honest about what I can expect & has been doing laser & electrolysis for decades. I screened 4 people in the entire city before choosing her. She’d tell me the spot sizes & fluence if I asked. Her theory is to use the highest energy with the smallest spot size…so the treatment takes longer (costing her time) but she said she has better results that way than with people who try to use big spot sizes and rush through the treatment. Also, she said some other people don’t use enough energy so you don’t need EMLA - which another GenteLASE tech was trying to sell me on at the same time (saying it’s painless)…so that’s why I ended up with her. I was not going to go to someone who was going to make the treatment “pain free” - when that really ment “no real treatment happening”. She explained all of this to me back when I first started going.

My last lightsheer treatment (last week) - I am not at home right now… I am staying with family for a while in another city and I really needed a treatment, especially with my labor day plans. So, I did what is highly atypical for me – I went (without extensive research) to the most convenient person. This person happened to have a lightsheer and INSISTED it was better than the Alexandrite GentleLASE. I had no idea (until now) that it is inferior to the Alex. She also thought she could do a better job getting the fine hairs that are still there. I suppose she was just making all this up.

I hope this helps - but I know pics will be better so when I have a minute later to go looking through my picture folders, I will try to post them.

#6

Larger spot sizes aren’t “rushing” anything. They simply penetrate much deeper (laser fires in a cone shape, the wider the base, the longer the cone the more likely it is you will hit the deeper hairs). This may explain why you had better luck on the little fine hairs than the actual thicker hairs, the laser wasn’t even reaching the bottom of the big hairs.

Anyway, you’re right that it should be painful. Anyone who promises a pain-free treatment (especially with a powerful laser like an alex) is either lying or using bad settings.

#7

Wow - i totally had no idea this is how it worked. I am really shocked she never mentioned this in all the years I went there (for the GentleLASE). She literally just said large spot sizes are for larger areas and small spot sizes are for areas like the lip… and this whole time I never questioned it (seemed intuitive). And, she said she can deliver the most energy to the hair by using the highest setting and the smallest spot size. She said if she uses the highest energy setting and the largest spot size, the enregy would be too “spread out” and would not kill the hair. I had no idea about the laser firing in a cone shape / not penetrating to the bulb…Wow - now I really wonder how many of my treatments have been wasted. This is really scary as I have paid over $3000 in IPL and laser hair removal over the years and still have most of the hair.

#8

Here are some pics from today taken w/ my cell phone camera. It was a little tricky to take these but I wanted to give you a sense of the hair thickness, color, etc… My back is sort of a mess right now w/ scabs and some acne, but whatever - here it is. I think the shoulders may be redundant…but I think you’ll get an idea.

If this doesn’t work try this link

http://img695.imageshack.us/gal.php?g=backmx.jpg

#9

There is a theory (unproven either way) that the smaller spot size is better for reeeally shallow hairs than the larger spot size, but this has no evidence, it’s just a judgment call. I have seen it used after the 18mm treatments kill all the normal hair and only a few really shallow baby hairs remain so the 18mm is overkill.

However, smaller spot sizes actually have far less energy. That’s why the 18mm spot size is more powerful at 20 Joules than the 15mm spot size is at 30 Joules. 20 joules with a 15mm head is not “more concentrated” than the 18mm head, it’s just weaker. It’s not intuitive, I know. It’s the sort of thing someone has to tell you because you’d never just guess it.

The 15mm spot size will still get the job done for most medium-depth hairs, but it’s definitely not ideal for most areas. Plus, there is more chance of bad overlapping with such a small spot size.

#10

Interesting. Thank you, I am learning a lot. I wonder why she thought it was a more concentrated way to deliver the energy? Strange. I will try to find out my fluence & spot size when I can call her. The other thing is I have a wide array of thick and thin hairs - so in the same session - I guess you can’t use a big spot and a small spot on the same area… so maybe she is using a medium one - I never really asked. (All I know is that it always hurts…) One thing I have noticed with all of this is that the hair has started tho straighten…like as if it were relaxed. It was sort of more unruly before - but it’s still there.

#11

It’s just better to go with the larger spot size. LAgirl actually knows way more than me about the differences and can probably clarify the points I’ve tried to make, but there is seriously not any reason to use 15mm (even if some hairs are thin) in my opinion.

#12

There are varying opinions in the industry on this issue. Some think that smaller spot size helps target finer hairs and some think largest spot size is best regardless. Either way, if smaller spot size is being used, joules need to be increased to compensate because the overall power dinimishes as you decrease the spot size. It would help if you called your GentleLASE provider and asked for spot size and joules that were used.

I see three photos on imageshack (the links on this forum don’t work). None of the hair is what we would classify as “very course”. The first photo has mostly coarse “enough” hair and it’s pretty dense. So this area should get good results with GentleLASE at good settings. The second and third photos show areas with patches of some slightly coarse hair and lots of finer hairs and patches with little or very fine hair. I would make sure to treat ONLY patches with coarse hair to avoid stimulating more growth on the other areas. I would also have low expectations for most of this hair. You will need to finish with electrolysis on a lot of it.

Upper arms and upper back and shoulders are the hardest areas to treat on men.

#13

Thanks for checking out my pics & your thoughts… I can’t imagine how long electrolysis would take on all of this hair. But, yeah - it might be getting useless to keep getting laser. It is a proxy for waxing at this point, really (since waxing just gives me breakouts and other problems). My tech also does electrolysis so I can ask her what she thinks. Due to the hours involved, my guess is the time & price will skyrocket.

She also mentioned that she has the hardest time w/ upper shoulders and back & some men never lose it from laser…and they just come back for treatments to get rid of the hair for 3-4 months, like I’ve started doing at this point. It did seem to slow the growth cycle…i think.

Oddly enough, the fine hairs in my lower back were fully treated with the gentlelase. Those were hairs that she even said were just “being thrown in for free - since I don’t want to charge you or something that has little chance of working - we’ll just do it since you’re here already”… and lo and behold it’s gone.

#14

Upper back, shoulders, and upper arms are hardest areas on men to treat.

A good electrologist using a fast thermolysis method easily removes 5-10 hairs per minute. So as long as you can find a good one, invest time and money into getting a clearance, it will be easy from there to keep up the clear look by coming in every 2-3 weeks to clear the area of any new hairs that popped up.