It's frustrating when you get a leg wax and 2 days later you see hair sprouting from a spot you swore was clear. Don't curse the esthetician for missing a spot.
What most of us don't realize is that hair growth is cyclic. Looking at any hairy part of your body 70% of the hairs are in a resting stage or the Telogen stage. In this stage cells are not dividing and hair is not growing. Alot of these hairs will shed. Pulling out these hairs will reveal a solid, hard,dry,white,bulb.
Doing electrolysis on a Telogen hair is like expensive plucking because these hair roots are not attached to the dermal papilla where there is nourishing blood supply and cells dividing. The root cannot be destroyed. The hair will grow back.
However, when this stage has run it's course and the course does vary depending on what part of the body we are dealing with, the hair root will elongate in the follicle and attach to the dermal papilla and grow. These will now be Anagen staged hairs.
So, those pesky hairs that dared to show up so soon after and expensive wax are probably Telogen hairs that were resting under the skin and decided to wake up just as you head to the beach in your itsy bitsy thong bikini! Now where is that razor!
So how does this all relate to effective electrolysis? Simple, in order to have successful electrolysis you need to work on growing Anogen hairs. These hairs have nice juicy black bulbs and the electrologist's probe will slide into the follice base where the cells are dividing and destroy the root. The higher the Anagen ratio, the more successful the treatment.
You can help your electrologist get a higher Anagen ratio by doing the following,
1) Shave the area to be treated 3-5 days before the treatment. Only growing or Anagen hairs will pop up above the skin. Telogen or resting hairs will stay under the skin and not show their heads. The electrologist will not waste time treating them because they will not be above the skin. I know you think shaving will coarsen the hair but this is not true. Only hormones and or drugs can coarsen hair.
2) If shaving is out of the question for you, use a dipillatory cream instead 3-5 days before the treatment.
3) Do not pluck,wax,or thread the hair being treated with electrolysis between visits. You will only elongate the process. The bulb will have been remove by these methods and it will takes months for these hairs to enter another Anagen phase.
4) See your electrologist regularly. A shorter appointment with fewer hairs treated but 100% of them being Anagen is more effective then waiting for a crop only to have more hairs remove but only 50% of them being Anagen.
Good Luck!