After the first month of treatment with the TRIA laser, you’ll notice the hair growth becoming lighter, but not any kind of huge reduction in the amount of hair.  Be patient!

After the second month of treatment, the amount of hair will continue to lighten and become finer over time.    You may start to see an small reduction in the amount of hair, but there will still be plenty of hair to remove.  Don’t give up!

After three months of treatment,  you will be able to really see a reduction on the amount of hair.  It will be most apparent where the hair is thickest.  You may have sections of thinner hair or sections where the skin is completely smooth.  Continue the treatments!

After eight months of treatment with the home laser, you will have smooth skin and only occasionally need touch ups.  It took a while, but totally worth it!

Once I have the TRIA laser fully charged, unlocked, and set to the level I want, I place the handpiece so that the laser window sits flat against my skin.  You don’t need to press very hard, pretty much the weight of the handpiece will do the work for you.  Once all three sides of the triangle surrounding the laser window are touching your skin, the handpiece will beep once and immediately emit the laser.  There is no start or activate button — it fires automatically.  Once the laser pulse is complete, the handpiece will beep a second time telling you that the pulse is complete.  Make sure you don’t move or lift the handpiece until you get that second “done” beep.

If you hear a buzzing kind of noise, that means the laser’s contact with the skin wasn’t right or you moved it too fast.  Repeat the same location to make sure you get full coverage.

Once you hear the end beep and know the laser fired correctly, it’s time to move the headpiece to anew location.  Lift the laser from your skin and move the headpiece a very small distance.  You want to move it less than 1/4 of an inch.  (Yes, that’s all!) Once again, when all three sides of the triangle surrounding the laser window are touching your skin, the handpiece will beep once and immediately emit the laser.  Now repeat, OVER AND OVER!

You want about 1/2 the laser window to overlap the spot you just treated to be sure all of hair follicles are treated.  Based on the side of the window, you’ll need to apply approximately 25 laser pulses per square inch.  Does that sound like a lot or pulses to cover an area like your legs or even under arms?  Well, IT IS!

The advantage of the TRIA laser hair removal system is that you can do the treatments on your own time and at your own pace.  It would be much faster to have this done in a salon because the laser window on their machines is much larger and therefore fewer laser pulses to cover an area.  But I like the convenience of in-home use and am willing to spend the time.

Some tips?  Come up with a pattern for treatment that works for you.  Sometime I work in a vertical line over the treatment area, moving left to right.  Sometime I work horizontally.  Sometimes I work in small blocks.  the hardest part is keeping your place, I think.  I’ve used painters tape to keep my place and a white pencil to mark blocks or lines on the treatment area.  Whatever works for you!

Next I’ll talk about treatment frequency and then what to expect after treatment from the TRIA laser hair removal system.

The TRIA laser will work when the laser window is pressed flat against your skin.  You don’t have to press hard, but all three sides of the triangle around the laser must be touching the skin or it won’t work.  Once the laser window is against your skin, the laser is triggered automatically.  You don’t have to press a button or anything like that to start a pulse.  The hand piece will beep once when when a laser pulse is starting and a few seconds later it will beep again indicating the pulse is complete.  At that point you can move the laser to a new area and repeat. If at any point you hear a buzzing kind of sound, that means the laser isn’t placed properly and the pulse failed.  You must treat the same area again.

When the laser pulses once you’ve placed the hand piece on the skin, the hair follicle is heated up to disable the hair follicle.  This where the discomfort comes in.  A couple of observations…

• The higher setting the laser is on, the greater the discomfort.
• Some areas I feel nothing on all five settings.  Other areas I can’t even tolerate Level 1.  There is lots of variation depending on where on your body you are using the TRIA  laser.
• The closer the shave, the less discomfort.  Shave as close as possible!
• Do not use the laser over moles, beauty marks, or any other dark spots in your skin.   The laser will heat it up, and OUCH!
• Keeping my skin cool seems to help with the discomfort.  As you use the laser, your skin warms because the laser is also warming up.  I sit in a cool room and in front of a fan for my at home hair laser removal treatments.
• How hard I press the TRIA laser on my skin seems to make no difference in the discomfort.
• How tight I pull my skin seems to make no difference in the discomfort.

Next I’ll post on how I move the TRIA laser hair removal system over the treatment area.  They are tips, tricks, and my suggestions that I can share.

Tria Laser in the Box

My TRIA laser has five energy level settings.  They are:

• Low
• Medium Low
• Medium
• Medium High
• High

The higher the setting, the more effective the treatment.  To get the best results, you need to use the highest setting you can tolerate.

I began treatment on the Low setting at first, but found that I could tolerate up to Level 4 on my chest area. You can press the Power button to change the laser’s energy level at any time during your treatment, either up or down.

Next I’ll walk you through using the laser itself.

Tria Laser Settings

So what’s involved in charging the TRIA laser?  You simply connect the batter charger and plug it into a wall.  Very easy.  The lights on the handle of the unit flash as it is charging.  The lights stay completely green when the laser is full charged.  When it is charging in regular mode, the fan runs.  You can hear it turning on and off, which is actually pretty loud.  Sounds like an airplane taking off!  Although obviously it’s not really that loud.  The charging really disturbed my husband when the bathroom door was open, so I charge the laser in the guest bathroom now with the door closed.

You can charge the TRIA laser in quiet mode, which turns off the fan.  The trade-off is that it takes eight hours to charge without the fan running.

Next post I’ll talk about my experience using the TRIA laser at-home hair removal system for the first time.

It took me about 20-30 minutes to cover the area, which is the size of a deck of cards.  Seem like a long time?  It does take time because the laser window is very small, about the size of a dime.  And you have to completely cover the area you are treating.  The manual recommends moving the laser window just 1/4 of an inch between laser pulses.

I was able to use the Tria laser on a setting of 4 out of 5 with just a small amount of discomfort.  I think I will get more used to it as time goes by, but you do want to use as high a setting as you can tolerate (as compared to as high a setting as is pain-free)  for best results.

I realize I haven’t spend much time discussing some of the details of the TRIA home laser hair removal system, so my next few posts will be on that.  Then I’ll start treating my bikini are and will blog on that experience.