What Are The Signs Of Electrolysis Gone Wrong?
Last week I met a young woman who had been going to another downtown Toronto electrolysis clinic since July for weekly treatments in her bikini area. After spending about $300 a month for 7 months she had seen absolutely no reduction in the amount of hair growth coming through.
I know who performed the treatment and this woman is well known for being a rapid fire plucker. When I was a client of electrolysis 15 years ago she had the same reputation of using the poke-and-pluck method. That is, just poke into the skin (the actual target is the hair follicle opening which is difficult to see without surgical loupes or a surgical microscope) and pluck out the hair.
These bad electrolysis treatments left my client with a bikini area FULL of ingrowns. Many of them are so deep that I can’t use a lancet to remove them, they will take months to disappear on their own. Furthermore, electrolysis gone wrong is very painful. My client noticed the difference in my treatment method right away. She said the insertion didn’t hurt and I didn’t rip out the hair.
Nope, I didn’t rip out the hair because I use a microscope to properly insert into the hair follicle and I deliver enough current so the hair slides out of the follicle. The previous “electrologist”, if you can call her that, just pierced the skin and yanked out the very strong, deeply rooted pubic hairs.
I feel the pain just writing that.
Here is an image of my clients bikini area 6 days after her first treatment with me. The scabbing is a normal reaction to an effective electrolysis treatment in this area and will heal just fine. It’s the amount of ingrown hair evident from her previous treatments which is shocking. It’s normal to find one or two during a treatment but this woman had so many it actually interfered with the first treatment because I had to take time to lift them out of the skin before I treated the follicle.
A classic example of electrolysis gone wrong is the appearance of lots of ingrown hairs in the treated area.
Magnified image of ingrowns resulting from electrolysis gone wrong
If you are treating an area weekly for 7 months then you should definitely see an improvement by that time. My client was given the line “everyone is different, I don’t know when your hair will disappear” line from her previous electrologist who, incidentally, has been in business for over 20 years and has a really good domain name that places her high in the search rankings.
I can’t stress enough how you need to find an electrologist willing to stand behind their work. I see the results of my work over a matter of months so I am confident I am providing permanent hair removal to clients and I tell them so. If someone can’t give you a straight answer on how you can expect the treatment process to go then you should keep looking until you find someone who can commit to providing you with a treatment plan that includes a projected end date.
Further Reading:
AND THIS ONE ON ELECTROLYSIS CONTRAINDICATIONS
AND THIS ONE ON ELECTROLYSIS OVERTREATMENT