Tweezed

Shaving has been my preferred method of facial hair removal for, oh... quickly and sloppily doing the math in my head... seven years, at least.  That’s a long time to do something you don’t like, and almost every morning to boot.  Even taking days off shaving when I can, it gets tiring.  And lately, as I’ve been thinking more and more seriously about laser hair re-removal, I’ve been fantasizing about waking up and having no hair to remove way more than usual.

So last weekend, I needed a longer break from shaving.  I got prickly, then stubbly, and by the third day, downright beardy.  And as I thought about going back to work the next day and dreading the shaving, I just felt extraordinarily weary.  And as I had little else to do that day, I sat on the counter in my bathroom after a shower and took out the tweezers.

Two and a half hours later, I was very sore and my chin and jaw were beet red.  I couldn’t even remember the last time I had stared down every dark hair I could find on my face and then ripped it out.  It hurt more than I remembered, and it gave me such a feeling of futility.  For the whole two-and-a-half hours I was thinking, “Damn, that’s so much hair!  And it’s only half of what I used to have!”  It was a real downer.

But as the stinging and redness receded, I glanced in the mirror a few more times in passing, and it felt nice to see that I was beardless without the shaving, and would likely be in the same state the next day.  And I was, except for a few missed hairs that I caught by the morning light, and a handful that broke off rather than came out by the root.  And so I didn't shave before going to work.  Or the day after that.  Or the day after that. 

What I find pretty funny is that I am now having to get used to having blond hair on my face again!  It’s mostly normal vellus hair that everyone has, with a scattering of coarse blond ones that I am trying not to pluck, but it’s weird to me!  I’ve shaved it all for so long that I’m more used to lumpy-nicked-ingrown-hair skin than smooth-healing-blond-furred skin.  It’s been really interesting.

It certainly would not be practical to keep this up, time-wise, which I already knew.  I used to pluck in the eleventh grade when I had much much less facial hair.  And I cannot see how ripping and tugging on so many hair follicles so often could be good for your skin.  But I haven’t shaved in five days now, and it’s been great.  The longer break has been good.  But gosh, I can still think of so many things I could have been doing for those two-and-a-half hours!

Product: Olay Smooth Finish Facial Hair Removal Duo (Fine to Medium)

To be honest, it’s just kinda nice to see a facial hair removal commercial air pretty regularly on mainstream TV channels.  My guess is that it features models who probably never have to actually use the product, and who are being shot with the perfect lighting and filters to make them look even smoother than the most “hairless” human being would normally look, but...  Eh, I was curious.  And because I was curious, I figured I wouldn’t be the only hirsute girl who was.

Of course, a few weeks after I purchased the box, the version for “medium to coarse hair” began to appear on shelves.  Awesome.  Now I have to shell out another $25.

I was thrilled, though, to go to their website and see they make an effort to educate visitors about hair.  (They state that the saying that hair will grow back thicker and darker after it is removed is myth!  YES!  FINALLY!)


Olay Smooth Finish Facial Hair Removal Duo (Fine to Medium Hair)
Skin Guarding Balm - 1.9g
Hair Removal Cream - 19g

Ingredients:

•     Skin Guarding Balm:  Sucrose Polycottoseedate, Brassica Campestris, Ozokerite, Beeswax, Propylparaben, Ethylene Brassylate, Tocopherol, Propyl Gallate, Tocopheryl Acetate.

•     Hair Removal Cream:  Water, Mineral Oil, Cetearyl Alcohol, Calcium Thioglycolate, Calcium Hydroxide, Ceteareth-20, Sodium Hydroxide, Fragrance, Chamomilla Recutita (Matricaria) Flower Extract, Aloe Barbadensis Leaf Juice.

Things I liked:

•    When I followed the instructions to spread the balm out farther than where I planning to apply the hair removal cream, and don’t leave it on longer than specified, I did not get the dreaded aura of redness that I’ve had from every other depilatory cream ever.

•      It slaughtered my peach fuzz mustache.

Things I didn't like:

•     My peach fuzz mustache was all it slaughtered.  Like the little green rectangle on the box says, it can’t handle much more than that.

•     It smells like chemical depilitories always smell.  It also tingles like chemical depilitories always tingle.  (Put that balm on first!)

•     You are told not to use it more frequently than every three days.  This is impractical for women who are so hirsute they need to remove dark, secret-telling hair every morning, or every morning and afternoon.

•    The price is not ideal, for what they estimate to be up to twelve uses (probably working off of the area above your lip, which is what they always show in their commercials)

Did it do what it promised?

According to the box:  “Works together to gently remove facial hair for skin that is beautifully soft, smooth and visibly hair-free.”  Well, the Skin Guarding Balm (which feels like you’re rubbing chapstick on your face, by the way) is pretty cool, because it protects your skin from the immediate redness, and though I would have expected this to prevent the hair from behind dissolved away right at the skin’s surface (leaving stubble), I was really impressed by the hairlessness of my upper lip.

But I don’t need a hairless upper lip.  That hair is light and thin and not really a concern.  I need something to remove the dark coarse bristles on my chin and jaw.  So it’s not the product for me, and probably for a lot of you.  But now that I know I can get the “Medium to Coarse Hair” version, that’ll be a more practical product to evaluate.



See what other people thought of Olay Smooth Finish Facial Hair Removal Duo (Fine to Medium):

my cosmetic bag 
Olay Customer Reviews 
MakeupAlley
Ulta Beauty 

And a really cute video review by ShawneePoo:

Hee hee, I want to be her friend.  I’m going to go watch more of her reviews now.

Bearded Ladies Pay Extra

As some of you may know, I rung in the new year happily jobless.  But in cutting loose a job that made me miserable, I also lost some pretty cushy benefits which my new job hasn’t replaced.  And that’s okay, really--it's a small price to pay for happiness--but applying for brand new insurance has been a pain in the butt.  Particularly life insurance.

There’s no need to go into the details, really, other than to say the company I’ve been dealing with seemed very concerned by this cyst on my ovary.  I had to jump through a few little hoops to get them the information they asked for, including driving across town for ultrasound results which subsequently got lost or never arrived, making them ask me to go across town to get them again when they would not release them to me without a request from the insurance company first... and then I wasn't notified when the original information was finally found.  And after more than a month of silence, I received a letter.

They’re unable to offer me the original premium, but not because of my ovary.  Because of my idiopathic hirsutism.  If I want their life insurance, I have to pay a higher rate.

How high?  Two-thirds of the way to the amount I’d have to pay if I were a smoker.  That’s how risky the medical underwriters deem idiopathic hirsutism.

Yeah.

Now, I used to sell health insurance as part of my last job.  I had to explain risk categories to many, many upset people.  These people had some frightening pre-existing conditions.  I cannot comprehend how idiopathic hirsutism would up anyone’s risk category.

I could understand if the hair had a serious underlying cause that could affect your overall health, like PCOS or a tumor.  But if the underwriters had my health records, they would have been able to see I was tested for such causes and have been found healthy, the hirsutism inexplicable.  There are no known health risks associated with my being hairy, except the side-effects of the medication I choose to take, which I’ve been tolerating for well for over a year now.

I wondered if they thought hirsutism made me a higher suicide risk, but if that is an indicator of someone’s mental health risk, maybe they should be asking all their applicants to submit photos of themselves so they can evaluate the self esteem each applicant should have based on how they look.  Ridiculous, right?

So the only other thing I could think of that would scare an underwriter is the fact that there is no known cause.  But see, if it were that much of a danger to my life, wouldn’t a doctor treat it as such, too?  Why, when no cause was found, did the focus turn to helping me live with the cosmetic aspects of it, if it was indeed so dangerous to have?  A vulnerability to normal amounts of male hormones in one's body also manifests as acne and excess sebum.  Are people with bad skin penalized too?  I mean, their underlying cause can be just as "idiopathic."

It just flies in the face of what I’ve been trying to tell myself for so long; that idiopathic hirsutism is a simple genetic quirk, out of my control and not such a big deal.  Now I have to pay more because I have it?  Do I at least get a discount for having blue eyes?  Maybe I should advise the company that I faint when I get needles, and see how much more I have to pay for that.  That, at least, presents a real risk of smashing my head open when I fall unconscious to the floor.  This infuriates me, and it infuriates me that it infuriates me.

I wish I could speak to these underwriters, just to understand why.  Why am I being penalized for the ability to grow a beard when I am otherwise young and healthy?  Do they even know what idiopathic hirsutism is?  Or does their little price chart have a column that assigns a dollar value to anything with “idiopathic” preceding it?  But alas, even when I sold insurance and had all sorts of backways and direct phone numbers, the underwriters were ensconced in some holy sanctum that no one could reach.  My chances of getting to speak to the anonymous decision-maker who looked at my medical records and judged my life based on my hairiness of all things, are probably nil.

So do I swallow my wounded bearded-lady pride and pay the higher premium?  Or do I continue my quest for life insurance and hope I don’t die of skin sensitivity to normal amounts of androgen until I’m covered?

Sometimes

I have to deal with being a woman with a beard every day of my life.

Every.  Day.

So sue me if the odd time, coupled with other events that might be currently wailing on my emotions, I can't handle it.



These words, which I can never seem to say out loud, are directed at anyone who feels I have disappointed them by giving up for a day and refusing to leave the house.  Sometimes, I don't have the energy to fight.

What Happened to August?

Wow, I can't believe I haven't updated the blog for a month!  I really apologize for that.  After my trip I experienced a vague need to hold on to that state of mind, and let a lot of things slide in my life for a week after I returned.  And then my computer needed a complete hard-drive wipe and restoration. And then I had a week full of appointments, mostly doctors, and then I got sick.  Aaaand that, in a nutshell, was August.

Camping was great.  We got stuck in such bad traffic on the way out that we had to overnight in a highway-side motel, but that was just a part of the adventure.  The campsite facilities have been seriously upgraded since the last time I was there, greatly reducing a part of my fear--that of having spiders drop on my head arachnophobia style.  Our site happened to be nice and close to the showers, too, so that I felt like I had more opportunities to shower than I needed.  It took a huge load off my shoulders.

I was really hoping to have some photos to prove to you guys that for about a week, I, the hairiest woman of my personal acquaintance, lived in a bathing suit.  I had an awesome bathing suit, very modest, with a low rise at the legs so I didn't have to fiddle with the bikini line all the time.  I didn't shave my body every day, and sometimes I did my face in the tent with a stainless steel bowl of boiled water.  I never did try the sink in the washroom, mostly because they were more popular with the teenage contingent of our party--a contingent I had not realized would be present on this trip.  (And a contingent that flipped out when they thought a waitress at a restaurant one night was in M-to-F transition... so... didn't think they were ready to have their minds blown with the knowledge that sometimes, women just have beards.)  But overall, although I wasn't terribly close to most of the people I was camping with, they were much, much more down-to-earth than previous camping companions.  For the most part, I would not have had a problem telling them, "Excuse me while I go shave my face."

Also I tried highway driving and wake-boarding for the first time, got some great new shoes, discovered a wonderful bookstore, and made some new friends.  I read several books and was so relaxed not having to do anything else.  And I have to say, working through some of my fears really heightened that feeling.  It may be the only time I'll get away this year, but it was excellent.



The appointments went well, too.  I got back my old GP, the one who sent me to the endocrinologist in the first place, and she will continue to fill my prescriptions for Spiro and Diane so I don't need to keep seeing the endo.  The cyst on my ovary is stable--not shrinking but not growing--and the OBGYN didn't recommend any surgical intervention.  So now I know why I'm hirsute and I know why I get pain, and I'm tolerating my treatments.  What next?

I've got to call the laser clinic I used to visit, and see if the laser technician who helped me before still works there.  She was lovely and I'd want to give her the business.  Also apparently my GP is concerned about some moles on my stomach and wants a dermatologist to look at them.  Just have to wait for the referral on that one.  So that's what I'm working toward now.