Laser vs Electrolysis

[Guest Elizabeth2014]

I recently met a wonderful girl who has been having electrolysis sessions on her face for over a year now The results are pretty amazing, but there are three downside, pain, redness and having to grow the hair before sessions. I contacted a local electrolysis practitioner and she recommended laser treatment as it is faster and cheaper in the long run. I've looked into both and know that laser treatment is more expensive per session, but it seems like it's not as permanent and needs topping up. On the other side, electrolysis is permanent, but is likely to take several years of weekly treatments, which ends up to be more expensive. It's really important to me to remove all the facial hair to feel right about myself,

Can I ask what anyone else has gone for and how it's turned out?

Thanks

Elizabeth

[Guest lostflower]

Hi Elizabeth

I started IPL in 2011 I paid for six sessions myself and then I got told my clinic would cover them after that and had another 15 session on the NHS the results are amazing I can go weeks without any noticeable hairs I still have the odd one under my nose that the IPL laser head couldn't get but a half hour or two of electro will sort that when I get the money/time for it

I would suggest going for IPL it will give you results quicker and over a larger area and yes some hairs might come back any that do come back will be thinner and lighter and easier for the electrolysis to get

Whatever you pick though you should know it really hurts especially in the pre surgical area.

Hannah

[Guest meagan]

I did mostly laser to get things started. I have some hairs that can not be lasered because they are reddish and many more that at 40 are white/grey. Those ones will need electrolysis and my electrologist tells me she can finish the rest in about 60 hours. So far I achieved a really great result. Majority is smooth and I asked for the focus to be the lip, chin, cheeks area since that is what is most open to the world. It has been about 5 months since my last session and I have not seen any dark hairs come back. Shaving sucks but is not the chore it once was and I stopped using concealer/foundation a long time ago and get told often how radiant my skin looks and I love that it remains super smooth for more than a day( exception to some neck area that has the greys, but they stay invisible).

[Guest Jamiexo]

I went in for electrolysis and I lasted about 5 hairs..... My electrologist then recommended me to have laser done instead, and I am very satisfied with the results. You start seeing results after your first treatment which is amazing!! I have one more treatment left and it will be my eighth and my hair is pretty much all gone. Laser may be more expensive but it only takes about 15-30 minutes to do one treatment and you only have to do it every 4-6 weeks instead of weekly, plus! the pain is not that bad!!

I hope this helps with your decision!

[Guest April.]

Hi Elizabeth

I started IPL in 2011 I paid for six sessions myself and then I got told my clinic would cover them after that and had another 15 session on the NHS the results are amazing I can go weeks without any noticeable hairs I still have the odd one under my nose that the IPL laser head couldn't get but a half hour or two of electro will sort that when I get the money/time for it

I would suggest going for IPL it will give you results quicker and over a larger area and yes some hairs might come back any that do come back will be thinner and lighter and easier for the electrolysis to get

Whatever you pick though you should know it really hurts especially in the pre surgical area.

Hannah

IPL or intense pulsed light is not laser, nor is it as effective as laser. IPL is far more painful than laser and takes longer, laser does hurt but is totally bearable. I have had great results with laser on the face, less than great results on underarms with IPL. I have had results but no where near what laser would give. If you are of fair skin and dark hair, then definitely go for laser first. It takes 5-15 minutes to treat your entire face and neck, versus about what would be a 5 -10 cm circle in an hour of electro. So knock out the density with laser then electro the remainder of red/ grey/ blonde or not quite dark hairs.

[Guest LizMarie]

Don't ask here. Talk to the respective technicians.

Point #1: Only electrolysis is FDA guaranteed as hair removal.

Point #2: Laser is only guaranteed as "hair reduction".

Point #3: Laser is best suited to dark facial hair and light skin. It can work on other combinations but is often less effective.

If you can afford to be wrong, definitely try laser first. If you can't afford to be wrong, just go straight to electrolysis to be sure.

[Guest April.]

If you can afford to be wrong, definitely try laser first. If you can't afford to be wrong, just go straight to electrolysis to be sure.

laser is not wrong. Yes it is effective only on certain hair types, but no laser tech will treat someone who is not a good candidate. Yes you should speak to professional members of their respective fields, but asking here is not a bad thing. The majority of mtf's have experienced hair removal of some description. Laser is permanent reduction, because it does not remove light hair but people achieve permanent results with dark hair. Electrolysis is permanent removal because it removes any hair you choose to target even peach fuzz velous hair by destroying the follicle not allowing hair to regrow.

[Guest Ashlieeee]

I'm wiping out as much as I can with the laser then cleaning up the rest with electro. The laser is never 100% effective and the needle is always 100% slow so you should definitely combine them.

[Guest Melissa~]

It's more like laser AND electrolysis, at least I have plenty of hairs that are laser proof. Yet, the overall effect was 85% reduction via laser. My electrolysis lady has put in <30 hours and is mostly done by her own measure. She says the typical pure electrolysis patient is indeed in the hundreds of hours to completion.

In other notes laser had no effect on the south pole(two laser treatments were tried,) so there has been a requirement for electrolysis down there too, my pending visit to Dr Bowers was what really pushed me into electrolysis.

[Guest Elizabeth2014]

Wow, I didn't expect so many replies on this, thank you all. So, I now think that laser will probably be best to start with but I will eventually need electrolysis for those stubborn hairs. Thanks for the advice everyone.

Right, where can I get laser treatment...google here I come lol

[JenniferB]

I've had success with laser, although I do have a lot of gray hairs too, so will have some electrolysis also. If laser works, it can be far less costly in the long run. And doesn't take an hour per session.

Jenny

[Guest sydney]

I am doing both laser and electrolysis at the same time. (Recommended by my electrologists.) The electrologists is working ONLY on the light colored hair not affected by laser with is about 30-40% on my facial hair. I've done 3 full face laser treatments and I can already skip shaving a few day before you can see any hair, but you can start to feel it in 24 hours. The laser technician said that I'm doing extremely well and I'll only need one more laser session. I only have about 18 hours of electrolysis in. She can clear all of my upper face and is working on the neck with only the center part around the adams apple left to clear. In 2 or 3 more session she will be able to keep clearing face and clear the part left. Then it will be clearing at every visit. What's nice now is due to the laser speeding things up, it has (according to my electrologist) reduced the time by 60-70% and she has been delightfully surprised how fast it's going for me. She believes that by next November, I should be totally done with the facial hair. Fortunately I never had a really thick beard as I did try to grow it out once and it was very splotchy looking. My electrologist thanks the Native American genes for the good result. For her (she is also transgender) it took her 2 1/2 years to clear and laser did not work with her reddish hair and she had an italian heritage.

She told me that the average beard has 30 thousand hairs and the average hour session treats about 400 hairs (depending on method). Doing the math, it can take quite while to clear them all ( at least 75 hours to hit them all, plus some you have to hit multiple times.) So even just reducing my hair by 60% can reduce that number to 30 sessions to hit every hair at least once.