skin reaction similar to acne

why do i get acne immediately after treatment? my electrologist said it has very rarely occured to her, 5 out of 100 women and that there is nothing she can do about it. it is my skin that reacts this way probably because it is oily and prone to acne. but i have never had any acne in my life! is there anything i could do about it or should i give up electrolysis? because my skin is already damaged, those acne pimples are leaving me with scars.

I would wonder if you are using Tea Tree Oil overnight.

If you ARE using Tea Tree Oil overnight, and this is still happening, you need to check other practitioners in the area. This would either happen because you are making puss overnight in the treated area, which Tea Tree Oil would eliminate, or because you are having High Frequency Blowout, which a better practitioner, or better equipment would eliminate.

I have not come across the person I could not treat with electrolysis. Some people need different treatment protocols, but everyone can be treated if one is skilled enough to know what they need, and how to deliver it to them.

she is using Apilus senior II, pro-tec stainless steel needles, size K3. i told her to change the intensity settings, but she told me that if she lowers it, it won’t kill the hair. also, i get some pink dots around the insertion point, but they don’t fade away. it is as if the upper layer of epidermis is being scratched. i don’t know if another practiotioner would make any difference. i have seen results of her job on other clients’s faces. they look as if nothing has been done. it looks to me like a high frequency blow-out, but why is it happening only to me?

That is strange. I am prone to acne. As in - I actually have acne. And I have VERY sensitive skin. I am being treated with the same machine as you (the Apilus) and I don’t get any pimples. As a matter of fact, since I stopped laser on my face and started electrolysis, my skin looks much better and I haven’t been breaking out. I got those little dots you described under my chin ONLY and they disappeared in like 3 days.

Maybe you should find a new electrologist.

Some other thoughts:

Is your electrologist cleaning your skin well with an antiseptic before and after treatment? You may want to wash your face before going to your appointment to make double sure you’re starting off clean.

Does the hair slide out nicely most of the time with a full root structure? If part of the ‘root’ is left behind in the follicle, then the body will send the “little soldiers” to fight this foreign matter, THUS THE PUS or pimple.

Are you touching or rubbing your fingers or letting a cell phone rub over the freshly treated area? Again, do not touch a freshly zapped area. Remember, you have several to hundreds of tiny wounds still vulnerable to baterial invaders.

Aloe Vera gel and tea tree oil are simple and pure, but are truly powerful friends for after care for 99.9% who use them.

Dee

i used to get acne in the treated areas, white heads and just general breakouts. mostly in my eyebrows and upper lip. my electrologist told me these were moist areas and that’s what lead to it. i tried tea tree oil and it didn’t help at all, it also made my skin feel greasy. being that i am prone to acne and used to have SEVERE acne, i didn’t like that and stopped using it. i found by accident that if i used aloe vera it solved the problem. what i do is, when i get home i clean the area with witch hazel and then apply aloe vera. i do that for at least 24 hours and don’t wear makeup for 24 hours either. maybe longer, depending on the skin. at any rate the aloe cleared it up for me. don’t know if you’ve tried that yet, maybe you have. possibly my skin just got used to the electrolysis also, who knows.

yes, hair slide out easily. she doesnt even use tweezers to remove them, just pulls the hair out with her fingertips. she uses tweezers only when hair is very short. is this a good thing? i mean not use tweezers at all? she washes her hands with anti-bacterial soap and with rubbing alcohol. she wears no gloves because she says she cant work. like i said, i have seen many of her clients at her office. their face looks perfect. it is only me who gets that kind of reaction. she told me it had happened to one of her other clients in the past, but only during the first treatments. then the skin reacted normally. i use all kind of anti-bacterial ointments. nothing. not tea-tree oil though. i did a test on my hand, and my skin went red.so i am scared to use it on my face.

Have you always used anti-bacterial ointments after treatment instead of just plain 100% Aloe Vera Gel? If Neosporin is or was one of your choices, I would not use this product as many people are allergic to this particular brand.

Gloveless hands still have resident bacteria present no matter how many times you wash or use alcohol on them. For many years electrologists did not wear gloves and most people were fine, but this is a standard for care that one should follow today. This barrier reassures both the client and the practioner for obvious reasons. Maybe you wouldn’t break out if gloves were worn??? Hopefully, you are not allergic to latex gloves. Many electrologists wear vinyl gloves to avoid that problem. Doesn’t sound like she would be ammenable to wearing any kind of glove even if you bought her a box for your exclusive use.

I can’t imagine not using tweezers to lift the hair out. It seems that this finger stuff would waste time and would hinder one from observing the root structure from time to time.

Is this the only practioner you have tried?

Dee

i thought it was a good sign hair can be pulled out that easily with her fingers. and i can see the hair, the root is being removed as well. she says that tweezers delay the whole process, she works a lot faster with her fingers. the point is that i cannot continue with electrolysis now. my skin looks horrible, i am all red with acne zits. i tried another electrolysis before. he wore gloves and ballet gold needles and i still got pimples. i thought that was happening because he did blend, which is a lot heavier, but i get the same skin reaction with thermolysis too. i am sure that no matter the practitionner, my skin will react the same. that is very depressing, because another problem is added to my hair problem. i think those zits worry me a lot more than hair. it takes so long to heal and i will definited be left with pits and scars. i wish i had never started electrolysis in the first place.

We all have our practicing preferences, lifting the hair out with tweezers is not more time consuming if one has been taught correctly. I guess she is on her own path. I would NOT want my open skin constantly touched by ungloved hands. It’s unsanitary.

Washing your face with antibacterial soap before a treatment, sanitizing the skin before and after treatment, washing ones hands with actual sudsing soap and water for at least 10 seconds before donning a fresh pair of gloves and watching the intensity of the current may contribute to a better skin reaction afterwards. I will also mention, that your practioner should be following other proceedures in between clients like wiping everything she touches with a disinfectant during a treatment - the light, the bottles of alcohol, the epilator controls, the needle holder, the handle that adjusts the chair height, her magnification equipment, the knob to the music selector, the drawer handles, etc. Disinfecting between clients doesn’t take long to do, but your skin is obvious sensitive and I can’t think of anything that would cause acne-like pimples other than the introduction of bacteria into hundreds of tiny open wounds.

Maybe switching to a Ballet gold probe is the ticket? It will work fine with her Apilus. Is she ammenable to trying other strategies, or is she stubbornly inflexible because that’s the way she has done things for years and everybody is just fine - except vanessa80? Of course, I know you aren’t contributing to infection by touching the area with your hands or adding medicants that just irritate an already irritated area.

unrelated to the electrolysis, i had VERY severe acne from ages 18-21 and from 21-27 occasional acne that was much worse than average. acne will not necessarily leave pits and scars. sometimes it takes weeks/months for them to really go away though. just to let you know there is light at the end of the tunnel for the acne. make sure you use completely oil free make-up, moisturizers, and cleaners to help with that. also taking vitamins and drinking plenty of water will help. i know you probably hear all that all the time and are tired of it but trust me, when i say SEVERE acne i mean it. at this point my face looks fairly normal. i do still have some scarring but nothing like what i expected and some of it did take a pretty good while to fade but the point is that it DID fade. another thing that i noticed, when i got rid of some of the hair on my face, it got rid of some of the acne. a lot of what looked like acne were actually hairs, ingrown and what not.