Hi- can anybody help me with this question- I went for my first laser treatment 2 weeks ago and I still have many black dots underneath my skin.
In other’s people experience, how long does it take for these to fall out completely?
(I am thinking about switching to electrolysis, so it is important for me to know when I can begin that).
Thank you!
Those little black spots are nicknamed “tombstones.” It can take time for them to work their way out of your skin. The best thing you can do to help is hot showers, saunas, exfoliating with something like Tend Skin and a mild scrub and plenty of moisturizer. Do not pick or squeeze them!
Another treatment can cause thermal and mechanical damage to the dark stuff in a tombstone, but I have not seen any studies on whether this speeds resolution of this side effect.
It can sometimes take as long as a hair growth cycle for a tombstone to come out, but usually exfoliating and moisturizing can improve things in a few weeks. Some impatient people squeeze them a bit or use those blackhead remover devices, but I don’t think this is a good idea, since you can break capillaries if you are not careful.
Hi Andrea- you say that the hairs can take a whole cycle to fall out- how long is a cycle?
Thank you!
A growth cycle for hair depends on what area of the body the hair is located. For example, coarse hair on the chin goes through a 5-6 week growth cycle and fine hair on the cheek may not peek through for 9-12 weeks. Generally speaking, we define a hair growth cycle as 3 months without getting into specifics for vellous verses terminal hair verses location.
Those tombstones will work their way to the surface as a wood splinter would. Helping it to get there faster by exfoliating will truly speed up the process, as Andrea said.
Dee
Oh dear- are you saying it might take THREE months for those hairs to fall out!
Yikes!
And now I am very confused . . .
my laser place says that the tombstones will stop appearing after the third treatment, but then some techs who had done their legs still had tombstones after around 5 treatments!
I am thinking of switching to someone who uses the Lightsheer laser- it does not leave tombstones so you can shave in between. Much cleaner and saner I believe.
But again- THREE MONTHS?
Three months is only a window of time that is about as close as one can get when generally describing a hair growth cycle. Hair growth cycles are not too specifically scientific. The data can be different from author to author. Don’t hang on the number three, but just know that you need to be patient in order for the tombstones to resolve.
Dee