There is a lot of information about how the various electrolysis techniques work from a technical point of view and lots of resources on numbing and where to go, but I wanted to share other things I've learned in my 140 combined hours of electrolysis all over my body (I'm still not done!).

The success of electrolysis on a single follicle depends on a whole host of factors. It's important to be aware of these factors to make sure you're not wasting time and money.

The modalities - six in one hand

There's a lot of info out there on the different modalities but not much beyond how they work.

Pure Galvanic

This is the original modality, the most rare, and the least painful. An electric current is passed through the follicle, which causes moist hair to turn to lye, which damages the follicle. It takes a long time, like 30 seconds or more to treat a single hair. In the old days they would stick several probes in at once to treat large areas. An analogy of how this modality works is like dumping poison in a flower pot and then pulling out the stalk. It slowly damages or kills the flower -- it makes the flower grow back much weaker or just die.

Pure Thermolysis

This modality uses pulses of radio waves to try and heat up the follicle enough to kill parts of it or destroy it entirely. It can be the most painful, depending what settings/equipment are used. Hairs are treated in just a few seconds. An analogy for this method is like stabbing at the flower pot with a trowel and then plucking the stalk of the flower out, hoping you damaged enough of the root to kill or weaken the flower.

The power of the pulses can be customized. For instance cis women with vellus hair only need lower power blasts. More coarse hairs may need several lower-powered pulses that, combined, more gradually heat up the follicle. Alternatively, the electrologist may deliver fewer higher-powered pulses.

The size of the probe can be adjusted as well as the amount of insulation around the outside of the probe. Bigger probes offer a wider blast radius but can be more painful on insertion or cause more indiscriminate heating and thus more discomfort. Insulated probes help focus the energy to reduce pain but need to be aimed more accurately.

This method covers more area per session, but several passes have to be done over the same area to get hairs that were only weakened, or those that were missed as they weren't grown out at the time of the last treatment.

Blend

Blend combines galvanic and thermolysis. The probe runs a current that produces lye and then warms up the follicle using lower-powered radio pulses. It's usually less painful than thermolysis. Machines can be calibrated to produce differing amounts of lye and different levels of radio pulses. It still takes several seconds per hair while the lye is generated.

Modalities compared

In the long run, there is no big difference between thermolysis and blend. You end up treating the same amount of hair. Some electrologists just prefer thermolysis because with no electrical current there are fewer worries about complications with certain medical conditions or pregnancy. Done incorrectly, thermolysis can also cause bad scarring if too much is done on high density areas or power levels are set too high.

Moisturize!

Electrolysis works best on well-hydrated skin. It's important with all modalities because they rely on interactions with water to function. So keep hydrated. Wear a moisture mask the night before. Use a greasy moisturizer like Eucerin Advanced Repair on the days leading up to your appointment. Exfoliation is also important.

Different areas of the body also produce different qualities of hair. Facial hair is usually much more moist than chest, arm, or pelvic hair. This means it can require more passes to destroy non-facial hair.

Know your cycle

The hair growth cycle is an extremely important factor but I rarely see an information about it online. Electrolysis is most effective when hair is in the growth (not resting) stage. This happens after you pluck a hair and it regrows. Because of this, the first pass over an area is less likely to permanently kill hair versus when an area has been previously treated. This means it's best to keep a regular schedule where the same areas can be re-treated.

Growth cycles are shorter for facial hair (6-8 weeks) and longer elsewhere on the body (about 10 weeks).

The longer a hair goes between clearings, the deeper a root can establish itself. This makes it more resistant to damage (meaning a less likely kill) and means more pain because the heat is being applied to an area closer to the nerves. So stay on top of your growth cycles!

The bottom line: make sure you retreat the same area every 6-8 weeks, otherwise you spend money and hours on less effective clearing on out-of-cycle hair.

Don't be a martyr

There are lots of tips on numbing creams, drugs, and other techniques. But the issue of numbing is important. If you go to a session with no numbing, unless you are incredibly pain tolerant, the electrologist will likely turn down the power or else you'd run out the door screaming in pain. They'll also work more slowly as rapid treatment causes pain to build. Effective numbing means the electrologist can crank up the power, which means a more likely kill, as well as allowing them to work faster because they're not worried about your pain levels.

This is another area where large volume sessions (4-8hrs with multiple electrologists) are a big advantage. You're completely (well usually) numb so they can work at max speed.

Every hair is special

Some hairs grow more horizontally out of your skin. This makes it hard to position the probe and can mean more pain as the hair crosses over more area and thus has a higher chance of overlapping any nerve endings.

This seems to be true for me, that the left side of the body tends to be more sensitive and has more hair growth, which makes for a bad combo. This is possibly due to higher blood flow on the left side of the body. Not sure how scientific this actually is tho...

Hairs that are only damaged by electrolysis will grow more slowly and grow finer. This means you should allow plenty of time for hair to grow out before a session on areas that have already been treated.