Hey everyone, new member here so apologies if I'm posting in the wrong area. I've decided to join today as I need some advice about hair removal - so lets start from the beginning...
I have pretty much always shaved when it comes to any form of hair removal because its the 'easieast' way for me but I'm sick of the drawbacks. I have always struggled with either nicking myself by accident, causing ingrown hairs and shaving rash. In the past year these issues have really worsened as my skin has become more reactive and sensitive, so EVERY single time I shave I come up in hives, rashes and all sorts of lumps and bumps the next day. As you can imagine, this is a huge issue for things like fake tanning where you shave the night before, as by the next day I'm covered in rashes and uneven skin tone. It's also an issue in summer when I plan to wear shorts or a skirt the next day (so if I shave the night before to go to the beach the following day) as it just ruins my confidence when I'm covered in red blobs. Not only that, it's just generally uncomfortable so I'm now looking into other methods of hair removal.
I have previously used hair removal cream as it appeared to be such an easy, quick way but I find it just melts my hair off so that it appears as stubble and I have to use a ridiculous amount of it to get all my hair (buying 2 or 3 bottles everytime I want to fake tan). I also struggled with timing, by the time I have applied it to one area of my leg, I need to apply it somewhere else but I will lose count of whats been where for how long and due to my sensitive skin this often ended badly. I just didn't find the hassle, time and money was worth it for such an unsatisfying result. However, I did enjoy using hair removal cream on my intimate areas before shaving, as it tended to weaken the hair and soften it so that shaving was much easier after -but, again, I might as well just shave instead.
My next choice was waxing as I know it's supposed to have positive long term effects (reducing hyper pigmentation and just generally a longer lasting result which I would like.) I have used soft wax in the past but always struggled with it, find it too painful, too sticky and hard to remove. I also found it doesn't remove all my hairs and still caused me to come up in hives, so it wasn't worth the fuss, leading me back to shaving.
However, I recently bought a wax heater and some good quality wax beads and tried this instead. This worked pretty well, it seemed to pick up a lot of hair, was a whole lot less painful than soft wax and not very messy at all. My only issue was that no matter what I do, the wax doesn't seem to pick up all my hair! I've watched videos and read articles on how to prep the skin, I would shower and exfoliate beforehand which seemed to help a bit but not completely. I also saw tips such as covering the skin in a light layerof oil or baby powder before applying the wax to allow the wax to adhere to the hair not the skin, but this didn't help either. The baby powder just made it less painful and the oil just caused the wax to slip around. At first, I thought it was due to the bad quality, cheap beads that came with the heater so I bought some salon quality ones, which admittedly were much better, but I still have a lot of hair left behind!! It's super frustrating as I really hoped this method would work for me, for the most part it did as my legs looked visibly smooth, but to the touch they were still hairy in areas and it was really hard to see where I had missed. I ended up just going back over each area which caused me to use a ridiculous amount of wax and didn't really give a better result.
So I apologise for the essay but I'm really a bit lost as to what I can do. I'm a university student so I can't afford to keep going to salons and paying for hair removal, especially when there are so many at home options. My leg hairs are also very dark in colour and I'm quite pale so they are really obvious, as soon as they start to come through I am really limited as to what I can wear. I try to avoid shaving because by the next day I'm covered in bumps and I hate going out looking like that but I don't have much choice. It's beginning to really damage my confidence and I cant wear any of my cute outfits as I tend to stick to a hoodie and leggings to avoid the issue.
Any advice would be really helpful. I'm not a professional by any means so I'm sure I've done something wrong, along the lines of application or products used. I am open to trying any one of the hair removal methods that I mentioned again with proper advice.
Thanks!
I have pretty much always shaved when it comes to any form of hair removal because its the 'easieast' way for me but I'm sick of the drawbacks. I have always struggled with either nicking myself by accident, causing ingrown hairs and shaving rash. In the past year these issues have really worsened as my skin has become more reactive and sensitive, so EVERY single time I shave I come up in hives, rashes and all sorts of lumps and bumps the next day. As you can imagine, this is a huge issue for things like fake tanning where you shave the night before, as by the next day I'm covered in rashes and uneven skin tone. It's also an issue in summer when I plan to wear shorts or a skirt the next day (so if I shave the night before to go to the beach the following day) as it just ruins my confidence when I'm covered in red blobs. Not only that, it's just generally uncomfortable so I'm now looking into other methods of hair removal.
I have previously used hair removal cream as it appeared to be such an easy, quick way but I find it just melts my hair off so that it appears as stubble and I have to use a ridiculous amount of it to get all my hair (buying 2 or 3 bottles everytime I want to fake tan). I also struggled with timing, by the time I have applied it to one area of my leg, I need to apply it somewhere else but I will lose count of whats been where for how long and due to my sensitive skin this often ended badly. I just didn't find the hassle, time and money was worth it for such an unsatisfying result. However, I did enjoy using hair removal cream on my intimate areas before shaving, as it tended to weaken the hair and soften it so that shaving was much easier after -but, again, I might as well just shave instead.
My next choice was waxing as I know it's supposed to have positive long term effects (reducing hyper pigmentation and just generally a longer lasting result which I would like.) I have used soft wax in the past but always struggled with it, find it too painful, too sticky and hard to remove. I also found it doesn't remove all my hairs and still caused me to come up in hives, so it wasn't worth the fuss, leading me back to shaving.
However, I recently bought a wax heater and some good quality wax beads and tried this instead. This worked pretty well, it seemed to pick up a lot of hair, was a whole lot less painful than soft wax and not very messy at all. My only issue was that no matter what I do, the wax doesn't seem to pick up all my hair! I've watched videos and read articles on how to prep the skin, I would shower and exfoliate beforehand which seemed to help a bit but not completely. I also saw tips such as covering the skin in a light layerof oil or baby powder before applying the wax to allow the wax to adhere to the hair not the skin, but this didn't help either. The baby powder just made it less painful and the oil just caused the wax to slip around. At first, I thought it was due to the bad quality, cheap beads that came with the heater so I bought some salon quality ones, which admittedly were much better, but I still have a lot of hair left behind!! It's super frustrating as I really hoped this method would work for me, for the most part it did as my legs looked visibly smooth, but to the touch they were still hairy in areas and it was really hard to see where I had missed. I ended up just going back over each area which caused me to use a ridiculous amount of wax and didn't really give a better result.
So I apologise for the essay but I'm really a bit lost as to what I can do. I'm a university student so I can't afford to keep going to salons and paying for hair removal, especially when there are so many at home options. My leg hairs are also very dark in colour and I'm quite pale so they are really obvious, as soon as they start to come through I am really limited as to what I can wear. I try to avoid shaving because by the next day I'm covered in bumps and I hate going out looking like that but I don't have much choice. It's beginning to really damage my confidence and I cant wear any of my cute outfits as I tend to stick to a hoodie and leggings to avoid the issue.
Any advice would be really helpful. I'm not a professional by any means so I'm sure I've done something wrong, along the lines of application or products used. I am open to trying any one of the hair removal methods that I mentioned again with proper advice.
Thanks!
