I understand that to completely kill a hair follicle using electrolysis or laser they both need to destroy a hair follicle multiple time. So what if I had an electrolysis or laser treatment for several months then for some reason stop the treatment for a long period of time. When I resume the treatment again, do I go back to square one?
your statement is not entirely correct. it doesn’t necessarily take several times for both laser and electrolysis. however, with laser, this is less so. what you’re missing here is the fact that hair grows in 3 phases. please read the laser FAQs for the explanation of hair growth cycles. you need consistent treatments within 1-1.5 yrs or so to get complete clearance. But you can achieve just a reduction with less treatments. However, you will need more treatments with electrolysis up front because you would need to get to a point where you clear the area once and then only come in to get the new hair when it comes out while it’s still weak. If you stop mid-way, you would only get some hairs in certain phases. You’ll see a reduction if you’ve had a certain amount of treatments, but you won’t be completely clear. With laser, treatments are spread out. So you can get 4 instead of full 8 to achieve just a reduction, but you would still need to have them at 2-3 month intervals. Also, if you stop with electrolysis and decide to start over, you would need to have a bunch of treatments up front again to get to a clearance first, so it’s somewhat of a waste of money.
Not square one, but you do have to start over so to speak. Like Lagirl said, with electrolysis the whole area needs to be cleared again so you are working on small, actively growing hairs. Another thing, not all hairs have to be treated multiple times. Maybe a few sturdy hairs will come back with electrolysis, but they will be weaker and hopefully killed the second time around.
The thing about saying that the hair needs to be weakened or broken down with repeated treatments is something frequently said to get around the client’s misunderstanding of growth phases. It gives you an answer that gets you around trying to upgrade the client’s understanding of hair cycles.