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posting this instead of using it right now lol. making progress but its hard to get myself to sit down and do it.
My cis ass stumbling in from /c/all :
the magnifying mirror is to see my face better. the water is in the hair follicle. the computer is there because i have limited space haha. it looks like that because functional equipment always gets put in a beige box for some reason lol.
thanks for the answers, I just wanted to make myself look foolish as an outsider for the benefit of spreading smiles in your community. The computer need and why no water gets answered by "this is for removing hair" :D
I guess this is for pro use instead of home use , so they didn't bother putting fancy stuff on there to seem appealing, and functional equipment gets put in beige boxes to minimise costs and remove specificity.
If the same electrical company is making electrolysers for water treatments at various power levels, they can just shove different components in the same box and send it off for electrolysing water to "clean shit" , remove hair and whatever else it gets used for, since the machine just puts out an electrical current between two probes.
EDIT : thus no need to have boxes with different aesthics, and buying 10x or 100x the same box is cheaper than buying 10 or 100 different types of box
It is pretty scientific. It involves inserting a tiny probe into the pore where a hair grows, and then administering a small shock that kills the hair follicle for permanent removal. It's basically an alternative to laser hair removal, except unlike laser, it works for people with fair hair too.
Whoa thats cool! Did it take alot to get set up? I swear the ingenuity of this community makes my brain feels as smooth as a babys bottom lmao
it took a lot of learning for sure. finding the electro machine wasnt the easiest but theyre around. figuring out how to do it on my face has been hard. the magnifying mirror helps a lot but i still cant get my neck effectively cause its so hard to see what im doing. i was able to refine the technique pretty effectively on my happy trail and nipples so once i figured out the mirror it wasnt too bad to start on my face. i did around 6 months of electro on my face at a professional place before i really tried it on my face myself, so at least i know what it feels like when someone is doing it correctly.
Smart to get professional before so you know what it feels like!
Im so thankful that (for now atleast) all my desires are 100% covered by insurance. Its a really privileged position to be in that i dont take for granted. But i always keep this stuff in the back of the ol brain in case some shit happens 😂
I hope my insurance covers it. I'm in the fun limbo stage where the insurance company declined to either approve or deny during the pre-approval process, so I get to just go have very expensive appointments with no idea whether they'll be covered or not. It's fine... im sure its fine.
Fuuuuck im sorry 😭
I really feel bad about the privilege honestly, cause i walked into my first appt told them i want estrogen and speech therapy and electrolysis and i want it now. And i walked out with E in hand and referrals to speech and electrolysis clinics.
I want that for all of you! Fuck anyone telling anybody what they can do with their own body i hate it it makes me sick
nonononono it's fine. I'm happy for you that it was so easy! I think we should share our experiences and stories, and not feel guilty about having it better than others.
It took me about three months to get my estrogen. My doctor required an informed consent form and initial blood test, and my wife required cryopreservation. But other than that and then this with the electrylosys limbo it's been pretty smooth sailing.
What makes me more sick is insurance refusing to state whether they are going to tell me what to do with my body or not. I have other options available, but I don't yet know if those will be needed.
I should probably ask about a speech therapy referral. My biggest thing is being scared of asking, not going for the next thing immediately. I'm taking things slow, and regretting that choice every step of the way.
Aww thanks 🥰
I wish you truly the best of luck. Dont wait too long none of us are getting any younger lol. Insurance crap does suck pretty much everywhere else, but im rooting for you and all the other girls! ❤️❤️
Was it too expensive at the professional place? Or did it not work well? 6 months??
the cost was the main reason i stopped yes. it was $340 for a 2 hour session and i was going once a week. i live in a high col area so its more than it would be elsewhere. i quit my job back in feb so i stopped more to stretch my savings than because i couldnt afford it. i already had the machine so just started on myself. the professional place was more effective i think cause their machine is more powerful. i could have gotten health insurance to pay for it but i didnt want to wait and all they seem to want to do is jerk trans people around. it takes like a year or two of going consistently to get the whole beard, depending on how much hair you have and how coarse it is.
So very cool! Folks had told me it was hard to get a hold of a good electrolysis machine. Like, there was a racket limiting availability to professionals. Seeing that you have one is an inspiration! I had been planning to have to build my own.
Are you happy with it so far? How long have you had it? Have there been any scaring problems? Are the probes and gel easily sourced? Have you ever traded work for work with another electrologist? Occasionally I see folks seeking such arrangements where I live. Do you mind lots of questions?
Also, you seem very knowledgeable about hair removal so you're probably aware, but some folks use a dual mirror setup for hard to see places, which might make the neck area easier.
Anyway, very cool bit of kit you have there!
yeah it was a bit hard to find one that did direct sale to consumers. its not the strongest machine though so it takes a bit longer per hair. im pretty happy with it yeah haha. just the fact i can do anything has been amazing. i used to have a ring of hair around my nipples and now its almost completely gone. still a few stragglers coming in sometimes but less all the time.
ive had it around a year i think, but took a long break when i went to a professional.
no scarring problems at all, i just get some swelling and redness, which is honestly normal for me since i have eds.
i just skip the gel and have been reusing my probes. with galvanic theyre self sterilizing so havent had any issues with infection or anything.
never done any work swapping. ive been a bit nervous about working on someone else because i wouldnt have the sensory feedback i have working on myself and thats the only way ive ever done it. id probably try it on my friends though if they wanted.
ive tried a dual mirror setup but it was like impossible to do anything lol. its like riding a bike with backwards steering, my brain says do this but my hand does the opposite. im sure in time i could figure it out but ive had enough to work on that i havent needed to put in the effort.
i dont mind a lot of questions haha.
Thank you! Good luck with your hair removal!
Btw, the mirror kinda betrays you, idk if you care about being seen here but just wanna make sure you know.
people here have seen more than that of me lol. i put on a dress because the first photo i took i didnt realize how clearly you could see me and i was naked 🤦♀️
I for one would be happy to see you naked again. :3
I’m sure many of us do, but all that matters is whether or not she’s comfortable with it.
extremely true
you will :3
huzzah!
Haha! That’s funny. Also, please educate the youth (me), what is this for? Torture?
permanent hair removal
Permanent facial hair removal. Or other hair I guess, but I assume this is mostly used for facial hair.
Ohhhhhh that makes sense
How much did the machine cost? How does it compare to other home hair removal tools like nood, (which is laser based?) Super hairy cis lady and would love to pick your brain about this.
my machine was about $1200 when i got it. the nice thing about electrolysis is its actually permanent, where every other method only makes the hair smaller but doesnt fully kill it generally. ive done pretty much every method of hair removal, and laser is faster to do a session but it doesnt usually kill the hair, which for me the hair on my face i want to be gone gone, not just smaller. i also have a fair amount of grey hairs on my face which you just cant treat at all with any of the light based methods.
i will say its a commitment lol. it takes a long time since you have to treat every hair individually, one at a time, and the technique is not easy. its not great for really large areas, which is why ive been doing laser on my legs, pubes, arms, and armpits. i pretty much reserve electro for areas i never want to see a hair again like my face and nipples so far. at some point ill get electro on my junk for surgery prep but ill definitely have a professional do that.
if the area you want to treat is relatively small it would be best to go to a professional. theyll be faster and better at it, and then one day all the hairs you want to kill will just be gone and youll be done lol. thats the dream im holding on to for my face.
Wow $1200 is more than I would have guessed. Does that mean these laser ones you can buy on Amazon are trash? Or just make the hair smaller like you said. I've been so close to buying one but didn't know about this electrolysis option
they arent trash, some people get good results, but it is unlikely to ever make the treated area actually hairless. it seems like theres kind of a limit to what can be done with light based approaches. some people will actually get more hair from laser or IPL, but thats usually someone who already has very fine hair. the light doesnt fully kill it but damages the follicle causing a healing response and increased blood flow counterintuitively making the hair larger. my electrologist said some of her cis women clients had that experience, which pushed them to get electro.
This is the coolest thing ever. Thanks for sharing.
Inspired me to set mine back up. I need to start working on things again.
oooh nice i didnt think anyone else had one! id love to see it when you get it set up again.
It's not special really. I have the Texas Electrolysis Supply T-200 which has a pretty small footprint. The controls are not great, but the price was right. It's usually on my coffee table for lower body stuff or my craft table for upper body stuff. There's a small light and magnifier that clips on to the edge of the table. And not pictured, I have a mirror similar to yours for cosmetics that I use for this too, and a small, repurposed UPS to keep it from making the power dip in other stuff on the same circuit when it activates.
Works well enough for me. Though, I really would like a brighter light, and I never really was able to do the electrode very well. I have one to hold or one that's a wrist strap, but the wrist strap doesn't work very reliably, even with wet wipes under it, and the device is really picky about a good connection before it will activate.
Also wish there were better, weighted foot pedals that wouldn't move around and get lost all the time. And I've been looking for something else to trigger it other than the pedal. I was thinking about making a switch I could bite on instead, but those would be hard to do well since it's a wet environment, lol. But that way when I'm working on lower legs, it's easier to get comfy on the couch rather than needing one leg on the floor at all times.
But either way, it was a great investment. With an IPL for the really thick hairs and the electrolysis machine for the rest, I made a lot of progress that would have been way too expensive otherwise. Still probably need another few rounds of pro treatment at some point for the harder to reach stuff, though. Trying to convince the girl I'm dating to do it, but she's a little squeamish about trying, lol.
(For the conductivity issues, have you tried tens unit gel? It's basically designed for exactly this, and a tube is both cheap and lasts a long time since you need very little)
Thanks for the tip. I'll try it out.
Can this become a traveling thing we all mail around as we finish with it/need it? Maybe a few community members build them and we start sharing them around! I know I’d be down to tinker this one of these, and I bet my roommate would have a good time zapping me.
Looks like a Brazil computer:
