Hair removal via IPL laser at home Part 1

As requested, here's my experience with my home IPL laser so far.


Tweezing and laser hair removal

First of all, I'd like to transform my body into what I consider sexy which means hairless below the eyebrows, full head hair, and a slim or athletic body. There could be more but I am also reluctant regarding the effort. There's much more to life than just sex.

The strong wish to become hairless except for my headhair and eyebrows started around five years ago. I looked into different methods, tried waxing myself with bad experience, but rejected the option of laser. I have no piercings, no tattoos, and so far I have been personally reluctant to do more permanent changes on my body, contrary to some fantasies about those. So I started to tweeze my hair, quite unusually, from facial hair down to my feet. I had read a small chance of way under 1% that a plucked hair doesn't regrow.

So far I have been sticking with that method. Since it is very time consuming, I then started to have my legs waxed, plus my butt since it's so hard to pluck it by yourself. I also tried out waxing my arm pits and eyebrows. Works.

My research regarding permanent laser hair removal taught me it's available for around 1,000€ for the whole body. But, that also meant and still means up to seven sessions with breaks of four to five weeks in between, letting the hair grow. That was one major reason to not go for it so far, I think. Now, seeing advertising for laser hair removal devices for home, I revisited the method. I discovered that some waxing/cosmetic studios had picked it up. I decided for trying out the device for home due to the scheduling issue and several questions I didn't find solid answers on.

It turns out you have to remove your hair before using the device, and I didn't know exactly how to do that in regard of a booked session in a studio.

I'd also like to add that I am sceptic with any research results. There's no known reason that shaving should have any effect on hair growth. But, I had a very thin and rediculous beard since the age of twentysix, when I shaved the very first time, and it changed my hair growth a lot! So I doubt anyone really knows much about hair growth in practice, unfortunately. Also, I am reluctant to believe that I cannot get any change I want, in other words, stubborn.


Device and application

The device I bought does cost 430€, I got it for 360€ due to a scratch (haven't spotted it yet myself). I did carefully read the instructions. Not much surprise though. Turns out it's quite safe to use since it only fires the laser when it's completely set on, so you don't need special protection glasses. It comes with four different attachments. Yesterday I applied it for the second time.

Shaving my legs did cause so much irritation that I waited one more day. The manual tells not to proceed with any skin with irritations. So you might plan some time ahead for the hair removal as well. The second time it wasn't an issue though.

Application is pretty easy, except for occasional issues when my device doesn't work since I didn't set it up onto the skin properly. But, regarding bumpy areas like fingers, hands, toes, feet, well, it's not made for that. It's hard to make it work on the finger and toe hair at all.

Also, it takes some time, so you might consider watching videos or a movie or listening music and relax while doing it.

Pain-wise, it's different. I know the pain from tweezing which I got so used to or it scaled down completely that I wouldn't call it pain at all. I do get well along with the pain from waxing, and the pain from the laser is little compared to this. I guess it can be unique and different for everyone but it's big deal for me.


Results

The manual says to apply every two weeks for the first five times. It also tells says that it might not work on certain types. From what I read, my expectations are even lower. I have read about people perfectly matching the criteria and still having no effect at all. I would guess up to 20%, and I might be one of them. Might, since I think it already works, but I can't really tell. I already think tweezing had effects on my hair growing less and thinner but don't go to the effort of measuring everything, taking pictures or so, or even leave out areas to compare.

Since I started the tweezing, I also don't expect anything like one hundred percent complete and permanent hair removal. Real life isn't that simple. I also have nothing against that very short, cozy thin hair on my skin, like I saw it on other people.

If the lasering has a lasting effect to have my hair grow significantly less on my body, I was already happy. So far, it might.

Maybe I can tell more confident news in the next part, in a couple of weeks. I'll see.