Does Laser Hair Removal Mean I'll Never Have to Shave or Wax Again?

If you added up the time, energy, and money spent on removing unwanted body hair, whether through shaving or waxing, the final tally would be high. And it’s still growing.

If you want to spend your time and energy on less tedious tasks than shaving daily or keeping up with waxing appointments, we recommend laser hair removal. Laser skin treatments are growing in popularity, and nearly 3 million of them were performed in the United States in 2022.

At Advanced Aesthetics Lopez Plastic Surgery, our team of laser and aesthetic specialists at our L Med Spa, under the direction of Dr. Manuel Lopez, offers light-based laser treatments that can make quick work of face and body hair.

While laser hair removal may not eliminate your need to wax or shave entirely, it can provide smooth skin for months. With multiple treatments, you can ditch the razor and wax altogether. Let's take a look at how this innovative approach to unwanted body and facial hair works.

Going to the source of your hair

Laser hair removal technologies rely on light energy to remove body hair. We direct this energy right to the source of your hair — your follicles. More accurately, we target the pigment that’s inside the follicles. These pigment cells absorb the heat from the laser energy, which causes malfunction inside the follicle, preventing it from holding the existing hair and disrupting its ability to grow more.

Tackling your hair at every stage

In most cases, we need to perform a series of laser hair treatments to ensure we’re addressing all of the hair in your target areas. Your body, facial, and scalp hair are in one of four stages at any given time:

Anagen — growing phase
Catagen — transition phase
Telogen — resting stage
Exogen — shedding phase

During the resting and transition phases, spotting the follicles can be tricky, so we space out your laser hair removal treatments over several weeks to treat all the follicles as they become active and visible.

Where we can remove hair

We can remove hair almost anywhere on your body except around your eyes. Most of our clients come to see us to remove hair on their:

Back
Chest
Legs
Armpits
Bikini area

While we don’t use lasers around your eyes, we can use this light technology on other areas of your face, such as around your mouth.

Is the hair gone for good?

Now, let’s get to the title of this blog — can you ditch your razor and waxing appointments? With laser hair removal, we can remove the hair in your treatment area entirely, and the results can last for months or years, depending upon your body hair type.

The good news is that when (or if) the hair returns, it’s generally finer and lighter than before, and we can remove it with another round of laser hair removal treatments. After a few rounds, many of our patients find the hair is reduced enough that they no longer need to address the area — in any way.

If you’d like an easier way to achieve smooth and hairless skin, please contact one of our six locations in the San Antonio, Texas, area to schedule a laser hair removal appointment.