Hello! My name is Kara, and I have been reading just about every single thread on this website for some time now. I am a 26 year old female who recently started noticing some unwanted hair growth on her upper lip.
I had my hormones checked and everything was fine (whew!). My periods are regular. I am not overweight, nor have I gained a significant amount of weight in a short time. I have had an ultrasound within the past year and nothing bad was found. I have never done any plucking, tweezing, depilatories, or waxing (except once, about 5 weeks ago). SO my hair on the lip is pretty virgin, so I am really hoping to have faster/better results with electrolysis because of this.
As soon as I noticed dark hairs, I searched vigorously for a long term solution. It messed with my self confidence something fierce. My boyfriend, my mother, and my friends that I have spoken to about this have never noticed anything except for ‘peach fuzz’ - but that really doesn’t matter, does it? It matters to me, when I look in the mirror while I do my make-up, while I take one of those stupid ‘selfies’ that are so popular. I am constantly thinking about it now and scrutinizing every single hair all over my body, wondering if it should be there or that long or whatever.
For the longest time I thought that I was sick. I was terrified. I didn’t really know if I had always had this dark hair and was just noticing it recently, or if it had shown up out of the blue one day. Everything I read online was terrifying. I was convinced that something HAD to be wrong with me - there was just no way something like this could be ‘normal’. And, as you all seem to be well aware, it turns out it’s very normal. Albeit inconvenient.
So, I went for my consultation. It is a place here in Barrie, Ontario - a small hole in the wall, and I was very nervous going to it. I told no one that I was going because I was embarrassed. My boyfriend thought I went to the mall - but nope, I was with Gail, getting my face zapped!!! She did about 10-15 minutes on my upper lip for free, and I went home super red. Well, I had to explain to my boyfriend at that point what I was up to, and he just laughed it off. God love him.
Anywho, the following weeks after that I was really unsure about electrolysis as a whole. I was red, inflamed, and got a few zits. The scabs irritated me, and I - gasp - ‘picked’ at them to try and make them fall off faster. Now, I have small scarring - but honestly, that was about a month ago and they are healing up alright now.
I then went on vacation for two weeks. I was so self - conscious about my lip hair that I went and got it waxed - and it was fine. It hurt terribly, but the smooth feeling and the confidence it gave me far outweighed the pain of it being done. However, quite obviously, about a week later it grew back. Shocking, right?! It was no worse than it had been before, but I knew right then that I just simply did not want to have to do that for the rest of my freaking life.
My vacation was absolutely ruined by my stress. I was so concerned/convinced that I was ill, that it was all I could think about. I went to the duty doctor, got my blood tested, and then I had to wait for my doctor’s appointment with my family doctor. I tried calling a few days before to hear the results over the phone, but was told that my doctor wanted to discuss them with me in person. I was so worried. Buuuuut it turns out that receptionists pretty much have to say stuff like that, and when I went for my appointment my doctor (whom I trust very much) told me my hormones were ‘perfect’.
It was such a relief to hear that I wasn’t sick. From that exact moment on, I stopped being stressed and sad and got ANGRY. Angry at my body for ‘betraying’ me, angry at myself for ruining my vacation with my family and my two new nieces, angry that I would let myself get so worked up over something that almost every other woman has.
I am going to rid myself of these hairs. I will not let it take over my life, ruining my self confidence. I was so worried that y boyfriend would see the hair and find me gross and leave me or something, but I realize now that the only way I would lose him over this is if I let it ruin my life and my happiness.
I came back from vacation, and immediately booked a session with Gail. That was yesterday. I thought I would never 45 minutes - I have hair on my upper lip, one of two on my nipples, and a few on my abdomen that I so stupidly shaved once and now are haunting me. These hairs (the nipple area and the abdomen) don’t bother me too badly, but I thought since I would be there anyway I would just have her take care of them.
She only did 20 minutes, cleared my abdomen, zapped the few hairs on my nipples, and got quite a bit of work done on my lip. I felt absolutely nothing on my abdomen and nipple area. Obviously I felt the warmth of the zapping, but when she pulled the hairs out I didn’t even know. From all the reading I’ve done that’s apparently a job well done.
One the upper lip, it was painful, but bearable. There was some tugging with the hair, but it was never painful - is that typical?
It is now 24 hours later. I have no worn makeup yet, and won’t for probably another 24 hours. I have been careful not to touch the areas, have applied aloe, iced it all, and just bought some witch hazel and applied that with a sterile cotton pad. The redness is gone down considerably since yesterday. You can still see tiny red dots, but they’re tiny - much tinier than during my consultation, and I feel like thats partly to do with the fact that I have been so careful about not touching it and because I’ve kept it clean.
Gail uses thermolysis. She has been doing it about 8 years now, and she is very encouraging. When I’m nervous, I tend to chatter - she dealt with that and my questions very well, and I look forward to working with her in the future. She cleared most of the dark hairs on the corner of my upper lip, and I’m very happy with that. I already feel more confident and happy, because I’ve taken one step closer to my goal.
I will keep you all updated as I go along. Sorry for such a long post!!! Like I said, I chatter when I’m nervous 
- K
