Laser – Julie Fredrickson

I mentioned yesterday I needed to get my lower left molar 19 fix up. The filling placed there long ago by a dental student wasn’t holding up well and looked pretty nasty

A warning for the squeamish that I am going to post before, during and after photos. If things like gums, blood, funky messed up teeth close ups are upsetting to you this is where you should stop.

I was schedule for an hour as molar 19 needed a new filling while 20 was also looking a bit funny as well. First they carefully numbed the left side of my mouth which always feels weird. You feel no pain just pressure. Which is an experience I’ve had a few times this year.

A cleaning was required as well as a cool laser which smelled like popcorn as it zapped out the damage areas.

These hard‑tissue dental lasers (mainly erbium) ablate tooth structure by rapidly heating water and hydroxyapatite in the tooth, “micro‑exploding” tiny amounts of tissue rather than cutting mechanically like a bur.

Erbium laser preparing teeth decay for a small filling on 19 and 20

These systems are typically used for small‑to‑moderate decay especially when soft tissue injury is concern. These lasers can mean less pain and less anesthesia is needed.

A composite filling matched exactly left my teeth looking as good as new. My mouth is still a bit numb but I’m glad to have things fixed up with relative ease. Now I can only hope the healing goes easy as well.

Many moons ago, I ran an advertising network for independent publishers. Our niche was lifestyle content like fashion & beauty. It was in the early years before social media had gotten beyond blogging and someone like me could be considered an influencer. During these halcyon years, I was loaned a Tria laser hair remover device to review on my own blog.

If you aren’t familiar with the basic concept, you can permanently remove hair by killing the hair follicles with laser light. It works well if you are fair skinned with dark hair. I don’t recall exactly the terms of my original use but my ambition was modest. I wanted to shave my legs less.

I was the kind of woman for whom one cool breeze would make my freshly shaven legs prickly. I needed to shave daily to keep things smooth and I found that to be inconvenient from a cost and time perspective. So I set out with this handheld laser zapping my lower legs every two weeks. I did this for a total of twelve sessions. And fuck it if I wasn’t surprised that it worked.

I went from having daily dark hair growth on my legs to maybe having do a proper shave once a week to get rid of the light fuzzies. I remain astonished it worked. Sure it took a couple months of use and it’s not perfect but I’ve regretted not using it on other areas ever since. It really cut down on shaving. So recently I decided to buy one. Yup, I spent $499 on a laser to remove hair.

It’s my intention to laser off the hair on my armpits and my “undercarriage” if you will. They call it a bikini area but let’s be honest. I want to have a permanent Brazilian wax. I am going to laser my lady bits and my back door. Assuming I can reach it myself.

I’ll happily answer questions about this as I go about the process. Some of what I intend to do is beyond what’s recommended but thanks to Reddit and gossip I’m pretty sure it’s entirely possible. So feel free to ask me. Or not. Up to you.