tria 4x hair removal laser
just a diary of my personal experience. your mileage will certainly vary
i bought the home laser. as far as i can tell this is the only viable one you can just go out and buy. it's significantly less powerful than a clinical laser, and less capable overall than a professional operating one, obviously. but it is a real laser. its 500 dollars new from the company, or they show up on ebay and stuff. my friend tried to give me her old one but the battery was dead after sitting for a couple years. it only works on white people. or, ok, it only works on dark hair on light skin. because it uses the fact that dark colored things absorb light and light colored things reflect light as the mechanism of how it sort of "targets" hair follicles. so thats fucking weird
i have good candidate skin and hair colors for it and the price is cheaper than getting it done, but the real reason i got one in spite of all the drawbacks was i just think its way more compatible with my executive function (#adhd tag) to do something like this at home than like try to make phone calls and book appointments and stuff. im already working to keep my head above water with that just going to the dentist and booking surgeries.
i am not totally sure if it works very well. ive been using it occasionally for a few months, always on full power, on my face. it actually says in the instructions you shouldn't use it on "a man's face, jaw or neck," because the hair is too closely spaced and its too much stress on the skin. my facial hair is still pretty dense even with hrt, and i can actually kind of see what they mean i think ... but i still do it. in light of that insight i do try to move in from the outside, like, focusing more on the outer edges of areas with hair, so there's less under the window at one time. but i go over my whole face too, i just try not to overdo it. im pretty wimpy for this kind of pain anyway so its easy enough to not go too hard.
the instructions also say to space sessions out to every two weeks, presumably to let the skin heal in between. and also to shave before using it, to "improve comfort and allow the light to better reach the hair in the follicle." i headcanon this to mean like, it's wasting less energy destroying hair so it can deliver more to the follicle itself, and it also hurts less from that hair dissipating heat. so whenever its been two weeks and i have the time and energy and motivation and not-pain-aversion for a session and to to shave first (ideally in the shower, to be lasering minimally irritated skin,) i try and do one. i use this dermasil moisturizer with aloe vera in it after, which has a nice dual moisturizing / burn repair thing going on.
and the results so far are .. mixed ? its not nothing, but its not overwhelming. when i first started i was noticing a lot of little smooth patches where it seemed like no hair was regrowing, and i was excited that it seemed like, only a matter of time until i could unite all the patches. but lately .. i'm not sure if it's hair regrowing after all, or if it's not working as well anymore on the remaining hair for some reason,, or, if it's working the same and it's just harder to see the progress in the thick of the task like this,, but for whatever reason it feels like it's kind of plateaued. there's definitely still smooth patches and i think the "edges" are moving inward .. it's just hard to tell. tbh i should start taking some progress pictures, but thats just more executive function. i'll keep plugging away for now..