i decided to transition into this career path as it was a way to materially impact the lives of fellow trans people and erase boundaries that they face. It sounds dramatic, but I think of myself as less of an aesthetician and more of someone who helps improve mental health and makes you harder to discriminate against in daily life.
I am not one to impose traditional norms of femininity on anyone, but the world we live in is how it is.
I operate with a severe sliding scale payment model, which slides upwards to the extent that wealthier clients are able to pay it forward to fund free sessions for folks with less means, and downwards to the extent that it costs me money to work on someone (that is okay and everyone deserves this kind of service if they want it)
In addition to my own little practice I'm also working at another clinic which is also trans focused, and does a lot of work for folks who are prepping for lower surgeries as well as general gender affirming hair removal. This also means I work with a lot of trans dudes who are prepping for their lower surgeries, so it's not only trans fem folks
Ask me anything about hair removal
edit: Have a question in the future and this post is really old? Feel free to reply or DM me - I've been posting here for years and it's unlikely to stop until i'm a corpse
I'm a cis guy
I hope you don't mind too much, but I'm wondering what my options are for diy (I think going somewhere would just be out of my price range right now, and I'd feel really weird). I know about epilators but I've heard they hurt a lot/don't give the best results/have some other drawbacks. I saw on reddit some (cis?) women talking about some expensive diy laser machines (like $400), and how effective they were for them. I don't have a link unfortunately. I suppose what I'm really wondering is would something like that be effective, especially as a guy? How would it compare to going somewhere? I know you aren't "supposed" to use it on your face but if I did, would I be damaging my face or is it a eye safety measure?Hope I'm not too far from your expertise, and no one minds me being here.
That's okay, I come from a family that has many cis people so it's a demographic that is near and dear to my heart. In fact both my parents were cis, and I even have multiple other cis relatives
One of the main reasons I practice mostly electrolysis and less laser is because those with densely rooted terminal hairs (read: most body hairs on a body that has had a lot of testosterone at some point) is unlikely to get perfect results with laser
These machines are likely IPL laser devices, so google for more information - Worst case could be hurting your skin, best case would be a pretty decent reduction in hair growth and some thinning of hair
You'd get better results from a salon with a more powerful laser, you'd get better results than that with electrolysis
$400 would probably get you 4-6 laser sessions at a good salon, so that might be a better investment unless you're looking to cover a lot of surface area
I dont know enough about the risks of DIY machines to comment too deeply on your question about dangers of DIY. Eye damage is a risk with all forms of laser to my knowledge, but you can get special glasses that filter that colour spectrum