Hi… I had a SINGLE clearing done on a large area of fine dark almost vellus body hair and now THREE YEARS LATER there are STILL ingrown hairs there. They feel like hard bumps and I’m 1000x worse off than what I started with. This has made me basically depressed. I had NO idea something like this could happen.
It is clear to me by now that they’re not coming out on their own. I’ve tried topicals and exfoliation, yes. I avoided seeing any more electrologists for a long time because I had frankly become afraid of the whole process. I just hoped this would ‘resolve on it’s own’. Well, that clearly isn’t happening. So I am overcoming my fear of electrolysis and asking all you guys for advice.
So, have you ever seen anything like this before? Am I the lucky victim of the single worst electrolysis session ever in history? How could this happen?!
And, importantly - can ingrown hairs like this even be removed with more electrolysis? Wouldn’t it be hard to see the follicle lumen if you first have to dig out the hair? I’ve no idea btw how deep they’re stuck. I’m afraid there might be hundreds of them… It’s like the person didn’t actually destroy a single hair she touched???
P.S. I am in Europe, so if anyone has any contacts with Josefa I would be eternally grateful if you could tell her about my case because my understanding is that she’s the electrolysis God. I’ve seen her results too and they were beautiful. Sigh. I of course wish I’d gone to her from the start. I know I would feel safe in her hands.
This was a difficult post to resist responding to. I’m actually not doing much on hairtell at the moment however,I will say the following:
As a friend of Josefa I can tell you that she is not practicing anymore. Yes she was very good. 3-4 years ago she went radio silent. I dont know if she is retired, or something has happened to her. Either way she cannot give you an opinion.
Second, it is highly unlikely that these ingrown hairs are the result of a single electrolysis clearance. These things just cant happen in that instance. It is more likely caused by waxing or other temporary methods used prior to receiving electrolysis.It may be that the electrologist you saw didnt feel comfortable treating ingrown hairs however and so they were more apparent to you with the other hairs removed. This type of distortion of the follicle is the result of months to years of ripping the hair out by the root and a single clearance with the worst electrolysis possible could not achieve that.
Hey Seana! Very grateful you replied. I’m considering even going to you if you think you could help… But I would prefer to first inquire about this and try going to Geri Panyotova as she’s much closer to me.
I was holding out hope in my heart that Josefa was still active because she made some Instagram posts in November of 2024 so really only like 1.5 years ago over here:
Sorry, but this is absolutely from the single electrolysis clearance…In fact now I’m concerned that you haven’t ever seen anything like this after electrolysis. Ha. I had normal hairs there before. Sure, they were too many and too dark but at least skin felt smooth not disgustingly bumpy. And it may have been overtreated since I had scabs and hyperpigmentation that lasted for a WHOLE YEAR after. And the treatment was the worst pain I’ve ever felt. Unsure if that’s the norm?
I never waxed or epilated or even shaved the area before so that’s absolutely not the explanation.
I did NOT have large patches of hundreds of ingrown bumps on the area ever before this single clearance so it’s not that the person removed all the healthy hairs and now the ingrowns have become apparent to me.
This weighs heavy on me and I’m going to definitely have to find someone who can help within this year because I just can’t live with a bumpy gross skin like that anymore.
p.s. sorry for making new microposts I just couldn’t find the edit button anywhere.
Oh, maybe it sounded like the scabs lasted a whole year. They did not of course! Just the pih did. I later saw Josefa’s pictures where there’s zero PIH after three months. Oh man.
On one hand, it’s reassuring to hear you say electrolysis shouldn’t cause this, but…I truly had normal hairs there before so that’s apparently what has happened. My electrologist did work with magnification but she did also mention to me that she finds it ‘more difficult’ to work on the small vellus hairs rather than on big thigh hairs. Oh yeah, btw she also did my thighs which had large black hairs and that actually seemed to work alright with about half removed and nothing is ingrown.
I’m not sure that these are ingrown hairs. Your skin pushes out ingrown hairs on its own in most cases, so I would expect to see some of these creating more inflammation as they come to the surface - especially after three years.
Based on your description of the initial treatment (painful, lots of scabs, lots of pigmentation), it could be that the treatment was too aggressive for such small hairs. In fact, on hairs like yours, I would expect the scabs to be so small you can only barely see them.
You could see a skin doctor for a better answer, but my suspicion is that these are little spots of fibrous tissue. Basically an overgrowth of collagen and fibroblasts as a result of minor trauma. It’s been known to happen from bug bites and small cuts even, but it could happen from poorly performed electrolysis in rare cases. The likelihood of getting fibromas from any sort of trauma is also very genetic. While I’ve never seen one on my clients, I’ve personally had one that I believe was from electrolysis.
I actually think that Thermo may be on to something. I cant say that I saw any ingrown hairs .It’s difficult to tell from the picture. I’d love to get you under the microscope to really see what is going on .Actually I think Geri would be a good choice I’ll make a point in asking next I speak with her but yes Ibelieve she does use a microscope also. I also dont think that visiting me would be worth the trip. For one I’ve moved to Eastern Canada in New Brunswick but I’m only useful if you have hairs, ingrown or otherwise to remove I see many bumps but I’m not seeing hairs in the majority of them a few coincidentaly yes but most of the bumping no. I think thermo is bang on and you’ve got some scar tissue from the treatment. So that being the case I would refer you to a qualified Dermatologist potentially for something like a fractional laser treatment.
As for ingrown hairs developing it takes many years of waxing or plucking to distort a follicle to become distorted. An electrolysis treatment, would not suffice to distort the follicle in that manner.
I know, the pictures are hard for me to decipher too…
Yes, please do ask Geri what she thinks about this. That would be amazing.
So then I may have after all been the lucky victim of the worst electrolysis ever, huh.
In any case, thank you both so much for your expertise. I feel some relief now just for not being alone with this mess anymore haha.
