I’m in the process of removing my gf’s beard. We go a little device that has a 9 volt battery wired otwhat looks like a mechanical pencil with a tiny little wire probe instead of lead. It seems to work fairly well, but sometimes it feels like this will take the rest of my life.
Anybody else try home electrolysis?
Yes.
Unfortunately, it doesn’t work.
Professional electrolysis runs approx. $1-$1.50/minute. I had it done to remove a few obnoxious hairs on my chin and still get touch-ups from time to time.
Note: Hair grows in cycles. Electrolysis is only effective on hairs that are in the growing stage. Also–for every hair seen above the skin surface, there are actually 2-3 below. It may seem you only have 1 whisker, but there are actually a few ready to take its place when it dies. As a result, electrolysis, professionally done, takes a while to become truly permanent. Waxing or plucking speeds hair growth and increases hair root strength–so it is very important not to use those hair removal techniques for areas to be treated with electrology. They can double to triple treatment length! Stick to shaving or bleaching inbetween treatments.
Although I am predominantly of the more hairless American Indian and Irish decent, the German part just seemed to go haywire (hairwire?) so I am quite informed on hair removal techniques. I do not have the same kind of facial hair you’re describing, but still–I can identify with your g/f. If you have any more questions, lee, I’d be glad to try to help you with them.
It does work. Why wouldn’t it? I nearly cleared her face once almost a year ago and then took a break for several month because of other aspects of RL. Patches on her face are periodically clear every few months, obviously depending on the growth cycle. Wefirst noticed this when she had a runny nose for about a week and could not keep makeup on her upper lip. Apparently snot is a good Dermablend remover. Her lip was completely clear. Not surprising as I had worked quite a bit on that area.
When I put the probe in and it touches the root, little protein froth cooks up. Hold it there for 10-30 seconds depending on the level and hair. The hair should slided out easily. Sometimes the follicle is so big it gets stuck, but with practice you can tell that from a hair that has not been zapped enough.
What does not work is those silly kits with electric tweezers. Hair is not a good conductor. All you need is to apply electricity to the living part of the hair. It is not easy to find a device that will do that, but we did for about $30. There are many devices that claim to remove hair painlessly and permanently, those are frauds.
Plucking does not make hair grow back thicker, in fact it can damage the follicle enough to kill it, though that does not happen often enough for my tastes.
Here is my cite: http://www.keratin.com/af/af001.shtml
Tell that to the bare spot on my chin.
This is not true, actually. Electrolysis, correctly done (whether or not by a professional), only kills the follicles that are in the growth phase, but those follicles will never produce a hair again. You will obviously have to return later, when the follicles that were dormant the last time you were treated are active in order to kill them, too. This, however, is true of all hair removal techniques. The length of these cycles varies depending on body region, with the eyebrows being the most rapidly cycling, and scalp hair taking the longest to cycle (scalp hair can grow for up to ten years at a time).
Oh, really? Everything I’ve seen suggests the opposite. Waxing and plucking tend to damage the follicles and may, in fact, kill them (this is why Shirley McLain has no eyebrows). The main reason to avoid waxing or plucking is ingrown hairs (damaged follicles are more likely to have the hairs they do produce grow in “tortured” fashion). The reason to avoid plucking or waxing during electrolysis is that once plucked or waxed, you will have to wait several weeks for that follicle to resume growth; until then, it cannot be “zapped”.
BTW, at least some home electrolysis kits, used correctly, are actually more effective than professional electrolysis. Why? Because the home kits are pure galvanic electrolysis. Galvanic electrolysis is almost perfectly effective: if you get a hair in growth cycle and you run the current through it until it releases, the follicle will be dead. However, many (in fact, most) professionals do not use pure galvanic electrolysis, because it is the most tedious and timeconsuming method, requiring inserting a very fine needle into each and every pore and holding it there long enough for the electric current to destroy the follicle. Instead, they use thermolysis (which consists of heating up the skin in the general area of the hair in the hopes of killing the follicle) or blended approaches. Thermolysis does not have anywhere near the effectiveness rate of electrolysis (the follicles quite frequently are not permanently killed) and has more side effects, but it can be applied at a much higher rate. Laser hair removal is essentially a form of thermolysis, using a tuned medical laser as the heat source. An area that could be treated with galvanic in 100 hours, or with blend in 40, can be treated in 1 with laser. (Of course, the kill rate will be much lower, around 20% or so.)
There’s a lot of misinformation about permanent hair removal out there. Most of it, it seems, comes from the people who do it professionally. One wonders why they mislead us so readily…
Good grief, folks. I’m just sharing information that I’ve learned along the way.
I’ve relied on Hairfacts.com for my research because they are one of the few non-commercial websites that offer research-based information on the various hair removal techniques out there, with professional journals frequently cited. Their statement regarding home electrolysis kits:
This supports what you offered, Kelly, in that it is a galvanic system. I’ve had 3 different techniques used on my chin.
Um, Kelly, tell that to my (usually) bare spot on my chin. 
It took 2 years, and I still go back for touch-ups occasionally.
Well really, I guess I was duped by the 3 different electrologists I’ve seen. They’ve all strongly discouraged plucking. And no, I couldn’t be one of the lucky ones who went hairless due to plucking. (Hairfacts.com lists no such information regarding encouraging hair growth or somesuch.)
Regarding laser hair removal: Ugh. That’s all I can say. Hairfacts says the rest–based on their data, I’ll be waiting for a few years before seriously considering trying it.
I’m feeling a little squished here and that’s most likely because this is a topic I’m extremely sensitive about. You know, the hairy+girl=freak kinda thing. 
But I appreciate the clarifications.
Just showing I wasn’t completely pulling this out of my ass–or my electrologists’ mouths.