Gels, lovely but?

[Charlize]

I went to the nail salon on Tuesday before a meeting i was to lead. I was glad to have a good excuse for a mani-pedi and an eyebrow wax. I've grown to love the salon and the pampering i get there. i've been often enough to relax. i'm not a trans* person i'm simply another woman and i enjoy chatting with the other women or just letting the message chair take me away.

i was talking to another woman at the market about how my fingernails always chipped and messed up quickly. She recommended getting gels. What's that? Well i have sprung for gels and i love the look! Deeper and shinier than my car when it was new. So far after chores and life on the farm not a chip either. That's good for me. I was going to post the benefits here but first i googled the process. Here is a doctors opinion. I will like she mentions get this again but it is worth noting the down side.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/dr-susan-taylor/gel-nail-polish_b_1333236.html

Otherwise all i can say is wow.

Hugs,

Charlize

[Cosmo]

So as a a cosmetologist I would not say the docs comments are not without some merit. I try to educate my guests so they can make an informed decision.

But seriously doing a comparison of services in the salon, I would probably rate hair coloring to be at the top of my list of concerns. Traditional hair color uses ammonia and it is in contact with the scalp for up to 45 minutes. Be smart, go ammonia free such as some using oil injection, those ingredients aren't any better, maybe worse. On scalp lifting uses bleach as in very strong clorox bleach. Mix some of that with water, it will kill and clean. Relaxer use sodium hydroxide to straighten the hair. Sodium hydroxide is another name for Drano. Getting my drift.

Yes there are chemicals in the gel thatsy cause irritation to the skin or eyes but if applied to the cuticle the gel will lift in a matter of days. And once it is cured it is pretty much inactive. If your getting irritation from cured gels, the fumes are probably giving you an asthma attack.

[Guest Raya]

Interesting, I never knew about acetone making nails flakey, or using moisturizer on nails.

On the curing, I think led lights have to be tuned to UV spectrum to do the curing. Maybe the curing wavelength is different enough from the bad ones.

[Cosmo]

If the uv is a concern, apply a stout sunblock. While gel had been run into the ground I think by the standard nail varnish company, most of the cheap nail hardeners contain formaldehyde. The better companies have eliminated it from the formulation but they don't compare to what a formaldehyde based hardener.

[tracy_j]

I wonder if there would be any issue with LED ultraviolet sources. I have done a little investigation into using these for eprom erasing. Obviously wavelength has a lot of influence but those I have found as yet are far lower in potency to direct sunlight. This brings the question - Can sunlight cure gels?

Tracy

[Cosmo]

Yup, sunlight not only can but will cure gels. Check the container. True gels are always in a ' blacked out ' bottle. Most nail stations using gel are removed from Windows or no windows at all. There are quasi consumer level gels that will cure without use of UV light. Not the source but wavelength that cures gel so same light weather florescent or led. Led packs more punch for size of light.