I've been plucking my chin hairs and waxing my upper lip for years. I started noticed a few years ago that I was getting alot of fine light hairs under my chin, down my neck. They've started getting really long and getting darker. It's really hard to pluck them and I just decided to wax instead. I really irritated my skin by doing that and now the hair seems to be worse! I know some people say that you won't make your hair coarse by waxing/shaving/plucking, etc but mine are coming back much darker and coarse now that I did this!
It's gotten to the point where it's too much to try and pluck and it just seems like it would be so much easier to just shave it off.
My Dh has a very nice electric razor that I recently have started to use to shave my legs. He has very light colored facial hair and doesn't use it that often anyway. It's the kind you put in a little holder and you can clean it after each use?
Anyway it works really well for my legs. I have sensitive skin and my hair grows quickly. So when it's shorts weather my poor legs are so irritated from me shaving so often. I need to shave every day or every other day. The electric razor doesn't irritate them at all and I have been using it every other day. It does miss a few hairs here and there but nothing too noticeable.
Yesterday when I finished my legs I was so tempted to use it under my chin! I was looking in the mirror and I had the razor right there and couldn't do it! I am so scared I am going to make the hair even worse! I have a tube of Vaniqua in my bathroom I tried using after I had waxed the hair but my skin was so irritated the cream was burning too much.
It's just so hard to deal with all this hair and it's really depressing me. I want to try electrolosis but we can't afford it yet.
Can someone please give me some advice? Will it be ok if I shave it? I am so scared to do this even though I think it will be easier than trying to pluck it all off which I can't seem to do anyway. It's upsetting to see all this hair every day!!
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Can someone please give me some advice? Will it be ok if I shave it? I am so scared to do this even though I think it will be easier than trying to pluck it all off which I can't seem to do anyway. It's upsetting to see all this hair every day!!
Goodness gracious, it's just a piece of metal, don't let it scare you! I shave under my chin and on the corners of my upper lip every day! Once you start doing it, it's just part of your routine everyday. For some people, like me, it turns out to be the best choice, depending on how much hair you're dealing with. And you can keep saving up for electrolysis or laser!
I don't have a huge amount of hair, but plucking always left me with red bumps or ingrowns, and the rashy looking stuff was way worse than the hair ever looked, so I switched to shaving.
OK, now onto the "myth" of shaving making your hair grow back worse. As I say, this is a myth. What really does happen though, is, when you shave, every single hair that you took off, will grow back starting from the same length, skin level. So, they look like more of them are growing, instead of what is natural, that they would be at different lengths. Second, an individual hair that has been shaved will not come back in thicker or coarser. What it does, though, is come back with that blunt, shaved off end, instead of a naturally tapered end that it would have if it were natural. So while it looks like shaving changes the actual hairs that grow back, it really doesn't. They just all grow back starting from the same level, and they grow back with blunt instead of tapered ends, so they look "thicker." And when you run your hair over this little forest of same length, blunt hairs, they feel coarser.
Shaving will NOT cause you to have more hair grow there, and it will NOT change the fine hairs into coarse dark hairs. It's the hormonal imbalance that causes you to develop more of these. Not the shaving.
So, you need a nice moisturizer. I do this in the shower, and I wash my face with Cetaphil, so it makes a nice slick surface to do the shaving with. I make sure to have a fresh razor once or twice a week. Sharp makes a difference. Go lightly, and slowly. A big ole razor cut is more obvious than chin hairs, believe me. Don't ever do this dry except in an emergency! Shave over the area just a couple times to make sure you get everything, but don't dig in, and don't keep going a zillion times.
I also have an electric razor around for use if I'm running out the door to exercise, or I forgot in the shower, or if it's late and I'm going out again. But for me, the razor in the shower is closer and cleaner. Useful to have that electric back-up though.
But don't be scared, goodness. It's just chin hair, and it's just a razor. Go for it. I see from your signature you have a little girl. Heavens, woman, you've given birth! And you want to do that again! That scares me worse than shaving. YOU CAN DO THIS! You are woman, hear you roar!
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Can someone please give me some advice? Will it be ok if I shave it? I am so scared to do this even though I think it will be easier than trying to pluck it all off which I can't seem to do anyway. It's upsetting to see all this hair every day!!
Go for it -- shave it! I've been shaving every day since I was 15 -- by that time my moustache was so heavy that it needed shaving every day. I've used Norelco (mens) electric razors right fromthe start -- I started off borrowing my father's (without his permission!). It only takes seconds. Nowadays (I'm 50) it's my chin as well as my moustache, but shaving is so much less trouble than anything else and it's 100% reliable. What worries you about it?
LOL ok let me clarify. I'm not scared of the actual razor but that shaving the hair will make it feel or look worse than it already does. However I think you are both right, it would be easier than what I am doing now. Obviously what I am doing now doesn't work anyway. It's not a huge amount of hair but I think any hair on your face probably seems worse to the person dealing with it than it actually is. I am going to go ahead and give shaving a try. I do get ingrowns from the plucking and I hate that.
Thanks for the advice ladies!
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I know what you mean about being scared. I agree with other poster that it may look as if it's growing back thicker, but shaving won't cause that. I recommend doing it after you shower. I find if I wet the skin, then apply some lotion, THEN apply shaving gel, it really helps my skin not be so irritated and dry feeling. I don't like the idea of shaving at all, but it is SOOO much quicker than plucking, which I still do now and then.
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I think you should shave rather than wax/pluck. Reason being is that shaving won't cause it to grow darker or thicker, like everyone else said. But waxing and/or plucking most definitely will, because the body's response to the disturbed hair follicle is to send blood rushing to the site to try and repair the "damage" thus nourishing the follicle and causing it to grow in very thick and dark.
I wish I never would have waxed my upper lip. Otherwise I wouldn't have had to spend the money to get it lasered. Keep saving for your permanent hair removal because it is TOTALLY worth every penny.
In the same boat except I am growing mine out for lazer but yes I hated the day I used a razor on my face ... I felt like I had finally admited that I had a serious prob .. I however have a razor at work which I take to the toilet and do when I can feel hiars ... one day I am going to be hair free (literally with the hair loss too !! )
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I know exactly how you feel! I've been plucking my chin hairs for the longest time. (at least 2 or more years) The new doc i'm seeing told me to shave instead, because i do want to eventually go for laser hair removal, when i get my hormones balanced and can afford it! lol. But i actually just shaved for the 1st time yesterday! After reading this thread infact..it was months ago when i was told to shave, i just couldnt bring myself to do it, emotionally. I kept thinking, how disgusting, i'm like a man now, having to shave my face..women aren't supposed to do that! But i gave in, because i'm looking at longterm now..i really want the laser to work when i get it, and shaving will help that rather than plucking..
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i actually just shaved for the 1st time yesterday! After reading this thread infact..it was months ago when i was told to shave, i just couldnt bring myself to do it, emotionally. I kept thinking, how disgusting, i'm like a man now, having to shave my face..women aren't supposed to do that! But i gave in
I wouldn't look at it as giving in. It's just that shaving the face seems to be regarded a distinctively male thing. That's quite ridiculous, because if you think about it, how many women reach 80 without growing at least some sort of moustache? And by that age, most will have some beard growth as well, if they're not on hrt at some point. It's just that we've got that sort of growth very much earlier and not too far, in the case of some of us, behind what some men have. I've never gone for laser -- I'm quite happy shaving. Probably because I was shaving for so long before laser became common or I could afford it.
For my lip I get professional waxing. I get my brows done anyway, so I figure I might as well. For the rest, personally I am more of a fan of the Nair face stuff... it smells terrible, but it does seem to last longer than shaving. I have a hard enough time finding the time to brush my teeth every morning... I can't commit to another daily morning thing. I do keep one of those pen sized electric razors in my car for emergencies as well as a pair of tweezers...
I was about 14 years old when I first started to shave my face. I didn't understand what I was doing. To tell you the truth, I regret it. Now that I have been doing it for 8 years now I have noticed things about my face that seem to be abnormal. First and formost I get a 5 o'clock shadow. When my hair grows our (daily) it feels awful. It feels like a man. VERY course and rough. I long to have a smooth face even if it meant having peach fuzz. I wish I would have not shaved that very first time. I cannot go anywhere without make-up on. Not just a little bit of makeup but I have to really cake it on. Even then I can't still notice something about my face that is not femine.
I was about 14 years old when I first started to shave my face. I didn't understand what I was doing. To tell you the truth, I regret it. Now that I have been doing it for 8 years now I have noticed things about my face that seem to be abnormal. First and formost I get a 5 o'clock shadow. When my hair grows out (daily) it feels awful. It feels like a man. VERY course and rough. I long to have a smooth face even if it meant having peach fuzz. I wish I would have not shaved that very first time. I cannot go anywhere without make-up on because my face is darker on my bottom half of my face. Not just a little bit of makeup but I have to really cake it on. Even then I can't still notice something about my face that is not femine. Is there anyone out there that experieces this.
I was about 14 years old when I first started to shave my face.
Many of us started around that age
Quote:
I didn't understand what I was doing.
But presumably you were very conscious of the fact that you had hair there you wanted to get rid of pretty urgently.
Quote:
To tell you the truth, I regret it. Now that I have been doing it for 8 years now I have noticed things about my face that seem to be abnormal.
But don't forget that the reason for shaving in the first place was that there was something that you regarded as not "acceptable"
or "normal."
Quote:
First and formost I get a 5 o'clock shadow. When my hair grows out (daily) it feels awful. It feels like a man. VERY course and rough. I long to have a smooth face even if it meant having peach fuzz. I wish I would have not shaved that very first time.
What's happened is that your face has gone through a process of developing peach fuzz which under the influence of increasing amounts of testosterone has grown stronger and stronger until it's coarse terminal hair. It hasn't happened because you've shaved. The only reason it seems to have happened that way is that presumably you started shaving during the relatively early stage of its development. It's the same sort of process that happens with a man and it happens for the same reason -- testosterone stimulation. It happens with fewer women than it does men, and often not to quite the same extent, but it's the same process and many of us have moustache and some beard growth in the same way as most men do.
Quote:
I cannot go anywhere without make-up on because my face is darker on my bottom half of my face. Not just a little bit of makeup but I have to really cake it on. Even then I can't still notice something about my face that is not femine. Is there anyone out there that experieces this.
Yes, lots of us experience it. The only way of really stopping the "not feminine" bit is to get the testosterone levels down to what's normal for females and the estrogen levels and progesterone levels up to what's normal for females. If we've got a hormone balance that's much like a male's, our bodies will respond with facial hair growth much like males have -- and in other ways too. "Naturally-feminine" appearance depends on having a typically-female hormone balance.
Shaving doesn't increase moustache or beard growth at all.
Trying to find the courage to shave....... 
I know what you mean about being scared. I agree with other poster that it may look as if it's growing back thicker, but shaving won't cause that. I recommend doing it after you shower. I find if I wet the skin, then apply some lotion, THEN apply shaving gel, it really helps my skin not be so irritated and dry feeling. I don't like the idea of shaving at all, but it is SOOO much quicker than plucking, which I still do now and then.
