If you have unwanted hair anywhere on your body, you are in good company. Almost everyone has hair they want to remove poking through their skin somewhere. There are lots of ways to get rid of that unwanted hair. The method or combination of methods you should choose will depend on how quick you want the procedure to be, how long you want the hair to come back and how much discomfort you are willing to endure. Comparing each popular hair removal method can help you make your decision.
Getting Rid of Hair When You do Not Want Pain
The most common way to get rid of unwanted hair with no pain or discomfort is shaving. As long as you do not accidentally nick your skin with the razor blade, you should experience no discomfort whatsoever during the procedure. However, shaving does have some disadvantages. One is it only removes the part of each hair you can see with your eyes. The rest of each hair strand stays in place below the outer layer of skin. Therefore, the hair will grow back quickly. Another problem is it can be easy to miss a few hairs when shaving.
The other common painless way to remove hair is to use a depilatory cream or stick, which can resemble a stick of deodorant. Depilatory creams are concocted specifically to weaken hair and cause it to eventually fall out. All you have to do is apply them to your skin. However, you must do so diligently over a prolonged amount of time before you are likely to see results. So, if you’re seeking a fast method of hair removal, depilatory cream is not a great choice.
Getting Rid of Hair with Convenience and Accuracy
If you are looking for the most accurate and convenient clinical way to get rid of unwanted hair, laser hair removal may be right for you. Alternatively, you can try intense pulsed light (IPL) procedures. Like treating the skin with laser hair removal equipment treatment is quite popular. Both use light to target hairs. However, lasers produce more heat. Therefore, you may prefer IPL if your clinician recommends against laser treatment, such as if your skin is excessively oily. Lasers can heat skin oils, causing burns.
Lasers and IPL devices are accurate, and the treatments are quick. You can typically be in and out of your local skincare clinic for such treatments in one to two hours. However, they do not remove hairs right away like other procedures, such as shaving. In fact, you will need to make repeat visits to the clinic for several treatments before your unwanted hair falls out. Such treatments are also not permanent, but the regrowth will take longer than regrowth after such procedures as shaving. That is because lasers and IPL treatments target the parts of each hair you cannot see, not just the parts above the surface.
Removing a Few Stray Hairs
If you only want to remove a few stray hairs, none of the methods above are ideal. Instead, you can try plucking the hairs out at home with tweezers or similar devices, such as epilators. In a clinical setting, you can also have electrolysis treatments. However, electrolysis can be an uncomfortable procedure. It also takes a long time to treat multiple hairs with electrolysis, which is why it is usually used as more of a spot treatment for single hairs or small areas.
