Blog Jan 2022 

Why you need to stop plucking your facial hair

You may automatically think to use tweezers to remove the unattractive dark hairs on your face. But what began with a few hairs to pluck has now become a part-time job to keep it in order. Constant hair pulling can become an uncontrollable habit called trichotillomania. But could tweezing be leading to more hair growth and causing damage to your skin? 

Regular, repetitive plucking of facial hair may stimulate more hair growth.

Researchers at Naims found that plucking multiple hairs within a small area leads to significant hair regeneration.

According to the study, ‘the plucking triggered extensive hair regeneration—from 450 to 1,300 hairs—with some hairs growing outside of the plucked region, as well.’

Breakouts

Often, when breakouts occur on our chins and jawlines, they signify hormones are the culprit and sometimes that’s true. Have you considered that tweezing regularly could be responsible for your breakouts? 

Every time you pluck a hair from the root, it causes trauma to the follicle, resulting in inflammation. This often leads to a small spot at the sight of removal. Each hair you pluck also leaves an opening for bacteria, and how often do you clean your tweezers? 

Prepping your skin, warming it up, and using correct plucking techniques can help reduce the risk of inflammation, but your long term plucking could still lead to damage to your skin and notice discolouration from inflammation (Post-inflammation pigmentation), or even scarring.

Alternatives to tweezing

If it really is just the odd hair, you may get away with gentle tweezing now and then. Otherwise, I’d recommend finding another approach to your facial hair removal.

If choosing to wax or depilatory creams, be sure to look for ones designed specifically for the face. If you have fast-growing facial hair, waxing may not be suitable.

Shaving may leave you feeling stubbly when it grows back, and a great alternative are facial trimmers that you can find in most supermarkets.

Laser hair removal is an excellent method for those suffering from PCOS effectively to manage the growth of excessive facial hair. If you are curious about laser hair removal for hormonal hair growth, head over to our blog Laser and PCOS which contains the answers to the most common questions we receive.

If you have any questions relating to any of our posts, please email us at blog@beautytherapybrighton.com.

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Beauty Therapy Brighton offers laser hair removal, CryoPen blemish removal, facials and semi-permanent makeup in the Woodingdean area of Brighton, only minutes away from Ovingdean, Rottingdean, Kemptown, Saltdean & Lewes.