I am hairy. Super hairy. Every cruel nickname my brothers came up with for me as a child included the word “hairy” at some point in it. I am a pretty confident person on the whole; my one major issue is my body hair.
My husband is in charge of cleaning the bathrooms in our house. The one nice thing about my hair situation is that it translates to a healthy head of thick hair. The downside for him is that the drain gets clogged with what looks like a wookie fetus. The downside for me is that a nice head of hair comes along with the rest of my body being covered with hair. I know, I know, I shouldn’t let societal pressure affect my confidence and my value as a person or woman is not measured by my perfectly manicured pubes. I really do get it and I really wish I didn’t care. Unfortunately, I can wish in one hand and take a crap in the other, and I’m pretty sure I know which one will fill up first. I also know that sentence made little to no sense, but it made me giggle, so it stays. My body hair is a constant uphill battle, one I have waged since I was a pre-teen. I have tried pretty much everything on the market to rid myself of the varying degrees of hair, from a little bit of peach fuzz to gorilla- or Wolverine-like growth. My trials and tribulations will hopefully help you, should you quest for hairless-ness. Shaving is a virtually pointless endeavor for me. My leg hair laughs in the face of a razor; I usually have stubble by the time I get out of the shower. I also have exceptionally sensitive skin, being a pasty redhead and all, so a number of options are just not available to me. These things, however, make my quest for smooth and silky skin a tad more attainable.
Depilatory Section
Sensitive skin and depilatories do not go well together on the whole. I broke out in one of the most horrible rashes of my life after a teenage experiment with a baby pink bottle of Nair. However, most of these companies now have sensitive skin formulas, one of which has allowed me a less painful method of removal.
Amazon.com: Veet Hair Remover, Spray on Cream, Sensitive Formula, 5.1 oz.: Health & Personal Care.
This is the only one I can use without gnarly things happening in the aftermath. You spray it on – it is freaking cold, just be prepared – let it sit for 5-10 minutes, then scrape of the hair with the little attached scraper. My skin is a little sensitive for an hour or two afterward, but nothing too intense or unbearable.
Wax Department
Getting waxed professionally is expensive. I am cheap as hell. Getting tough enough (and flexible enough) to do it at home can save you a tremendous amount of money. If you are doing a full Brazilian wax, hitting the salon is a good investment. Trust me, you do not want to get yourself into a position where you have one leg wrapped around your neck and yet still can’t get the wax to come off of a place where nothing that hot and sticky should ever be. If your roommate or significant other happens to walk in while this is occurring, the situation becomes decidedly more embarrassing, but at least you will then have someone who can get a proper angel on the strip and rip it off your ass crack. Not that I would know. I’m just giving you guys a hypothetical example. If you are a leg, arm or face waxer, at home waxing is the way to go. Take a decent helping of Motrin and get to work. If you are doing body waxing, the best one I have found is this:
Buy Sally Hansen Spa Wax Hair Removal Kit Lavender online at CVS.com.
In my opinion, any “strip-free” body wax is going to do nothing but cause you pain and be a waste of money. I’m sure some will tell me I am wrong, but when you are doing large areas, strips are the way to go. You heat this stuff up for about a minute and a half until it is a little less gooey than peanut butter. Then you get to spreading. Some people will tell you to only put enough wax for one strip, then throw that strip away and use another for the next swipe. This is a waste of time and strips. Slather the wax on a substantial patch, press the strip down firmly in the direction of hair growth, ritualistically torture yourself by ripping it off against the direction of hair growth, then use the same strip for the next patch. You can use the same strip for at least three pulls. Of course, if you have never home waxed before, start small, or else things will end badly. But once you get the hang of it, you can definitely get more aggressive. I also prefer to use strips for waxing my mustache because no matter how often you wax that sucker, it never stops hurting. The strips give you more to hold onto without peeling the wax directly off your upper lip to get a good grip. Seriously, waxing the ol’ ‘stache is the worst, and it never gets better. I can wax my eyebrows, armpits, bikini line, legs, and arms without batting an eye. Waxing my upper lip always makes me want to cry. And take the pain out on somebody else. Always.
If you are brave enough and have a steady enough hand, I have found the best facial wax is –
Buy Surgi-Wax Hair Remover For Face & More | drugstore.com.
I use this for my eyebrows. If you are going to attempt this at home, start very slowly and carefully. You do not want to end up with half an eyebrow or a permanently surprised look on your face. I would suggest only trying to get the finer hairs that show up under the brow and a uni-brow, if you want. I will wax the general area to get the bulk of the hairs, then go back in with tweezers to do any shaping and fine tuning. I will also get a professional wax every six months or so just to have a professional do the shaping. It gives you a good template to work from.
In-Between Maintenance
People swear by Tend Skin for preventing ingrown hairs. Every time you mention ingrowns around a salon or aesthetiican, Tend Skin is the first thing out of their mouths. Unfortunately, Tend Skin is not cheap. At $20 a bottle, It is hard to look past the fact that it isn’t much more than alcohol in a fancy bottle. However, Sally Beauty Supply has a much more reasonably priced alternative:
GiGi – GiGi No Bump Rx Treatment.
It is half the price of Tend Skin and often goes on sale for around $7. I get ingrown hairs every single time I shave, so I have made it a habit to swipe this across the worst offending areas at least once a day. It has made a big difference in the amount of those nasty little buggers, and for that I am eternally grateful. Honestly, though, it really isn’t much more than alcohol, which my husband likes to remind me of every time he sees me use it, so you could go that route and it would be even cheaper.
Breaking Out The Big Guns
I am currently getting laser hair removal on my bikini line. Yes, it is prohibitively expensive for most people, although if you keep your eye out, you can get deals all the time. I purchased a Groupon for a laser salon, and then used that credit towards buying a larger area than the Groupon covered. Never, NEVER accept the first price they tell you for an area. I told the woman who helped me that there was no way I could afford the amount of money the treatment cost, and eventually she came down over 50% in price. This leads me to believe their prices might be a tad inflated. I hate to haggle, so please don’t think I got a deal because of my superior negotiating skills. If I can get a deal on this, you can get a deal on this. If you are truly ready for it to be gone and you have the ability, this is the way to go.
Do any of you do your own waxing at home? Any special tips or tricks to share?
10 replies on “Babe, Why Does it Look Like a Wookie Has Been Showering in Here?”
My two cents –
– In boarding school our house counsellor actually sat us and down and gave us a lesson on showering, so that we could avoid clogging the drains. Â We were told to run our hands through our hair, pulling out the loose ones in the process and putting them on the wall of the shower. Â Keep pulling until nothing comes away and then when you’re out, twirl the hair on the wall and pop it in the trash. Â I’ve carried this with me through college and beyond and the only downside is accidentally forgetting to throw away the hair and then having your boyfriend find them and awkward questions get asked…
– I’ve never done laser but the woman I go to for waxes does them at the clinic where she works and her main piece of advice is to find a place that leases their machines rather than buys them, as then you know they’re up-to-date. Â Apparently the machines keep getting better and you don’t want to be stuck with an old machine.
Oh dear lord. I suffer from some unwanted hair (pubic zone, do we really need a wall of curls?), but luckily not so bad as you and especially not so stubborn. I tried waxing once and my poor leg just plain screamed at me to not carry on or it would desert me (Veet Cold Wax, for ‘Beginners’).
Oh gosh. I can’t look at nair without remembering the time I was in the first half of high school and would (regular) nair my upper lip and kind of chemically burn myself in the process. Good times. I’m sure they’ve improved their formula since then, but I will forever remain suspicious and afraid.
All I can say is I admire your bravery. Both for trying all of these things in the name of science, and for using the word “Mustache.” I still can not bring myself to call it anything other than “lip hair.”
You could adapt Irish+British slang and call it a “Ronnie”.
This comes from years of my asshole big brothers calling it such, so I’ve grown immune. I used to tell them they were just jealous that I could grow a better one than they could. Total dicks, man, total dicks. I have thought of calling it Tom in honor of Liz Lemon, but I quite like “Ronnie”. So many choices for our unsightly facial hair!
I loved that wish/crap sentence and think it should become a commonly used expression.
I second your Groupon thing – a couple of my friends have had laser hair removal this way that they wouldn’t have been able to afford otherwise.
I am not very hairy by current standards, but I do wax my legs at home, usually with something like Veet strips from Boots. I pay about €8 for 40 strips which will do both lower legs 3 times (you can use each strip at least twice), which is a damn sight cheaper than a €25 leg wax each time. Also, don’t bother with the pissy ‘wipes’ that claim to remove the wax remnants: use coconut oil or some other vegetable oil instead.
I feel ya, I am a hairy hairy beast. Â My one consolation is that my body hair is fine and blonde.
I have nothing to add, but I agree that Nair is EVIL. Â I’ve toyed with doing laser hair removal, I know quite a few people that have done it. Â Mainly I want to get rid of my armpit hair. I swear it grows in two seconds and I feel hot and sweaty and gross all of the time. The rest of my hair I’ve come to terms with…but armpit hair, not so much.
A lot of my body hair is also blonde, thank goodness, but the downside of that is that it is limiting for the laser hair removal. Even though my pubes are darker – welcome to even more over-sharing! – the laser hair removal I’m doing isn’t working as well as it could because the hair isn’t dark enough. Damn it all to hell. I feel you on the armpit hair, too. Nothing like stubble in your pits to make for a lovely day. Waxing is the best for me there, because otherwise it just grows back right away, and then you don’t have sharp stubble when it grows back. Downside is having to let it grow out a bit so it is long enough to wax.