Will Removing All Your Pubic Hair Make People Love You?

Is sugaring better for you than other kinds of hair removal and does that matter?

Welcome back to Lady Things, the column where we rip the female experience out our bodies by the root and examine it closely. Today, a new form of hair removal to make you feel like if a stranger saw you naked, they wouldn't vomit in their mouths as their penises fell off.

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A couple weeks ago, I received a tweet from a follower of this column, suggesting I try out a sugaring place called the Portland Girl because, "apparently you aren't a 'PDX girl' till you rub you hair away w sugar."

As a masochist and a person who aspires to PDX girlhood, and also somewhat of an expert on hair removal, I decided to give sugaring—the process of using a ball of sugar, lemon and water to tear out body hair—a try.

To be honest, I thought I was done with violently ripping the hair from my skin. I used to spend a lot of time and money on the losing battle with the deep, biological desire of my body to be covered in a fur suit. I'm no dummy so I know that to appear sexually desirable to men, a woman must appear to have full-body alopecia but with a head of lustrous, long hair. I'm no dummy, so I know that my worth is judged solely on how sexually desirable I am to men.

Still, at a certain point, sometime after I turned 30, I decided that I was already over the hill in terms of boneability anyway, so I might as well stop the very expensive torture of having my pubic hair uprooted from my pubic area.

In many ways, this worked out pretty well. I've been dating the same person for going on two years now and he seems to like me for me, not for my lack of pubic hair. I've completely eliminated ingrown hairs from my life, I am keeping more of my paycheck and not spending 30 minutes every four-to-six weeks in total agony. Plus, my crotch is less itchy, red and weird-looking.

All this is to say, that doesn't mean I wouldn't still be a more successful and beloved person if I was one of those slim blondes with an adorable, light dusting of thin hair that you can't even see until your face is in it.

So maybe sugaring was the answer.

What even is sugaring? Well, according to the woman who sugared me (a lovely woman I might add) and HuffPo, it's an ancient form of hair removal that the Egyptians were into (good to know humans have been hating their bodies for, like, thousands of years). It's "all-natural" because it's made out of actual sugar, water and lemon juice. According to the Portland Girl's website, this is safer than other kinds of hair removal.

"Unlike most skincare studios that carry products that are chock-full of ingredients linked to cancer and skin irritation, we believe in only using/carrying/selling products that pass our artisanal standards," they write.

"No parabens, No sulfates, No phthalates, No weird dyes or fake perfumes and no testing on our furry animals. We feel that the products you use should be super effective, but that they shouldn't give you weird rashes, headaches and God forbid – cancer."

Look, I don't want to get cancer, and the idea that there may be a form of pubic hair removal that doesn't involve weird rashes—something I am all too familiar with—is intriguing.

Also, they have a hair removal option called "The Portlander" ("hair removed from labia and bum, small strip/triangle remains on pubic bone") and hey, that's me!

So I went.

Here, according to their video, is what the process looks like:

Basically they take a ball of this sugar-lemon-water gel, apply it to the desired bald area, and then rip.

Dear friends, this hurt so, so badly. Besides maybe threading, it was the most painful form of hair removal I have encountered.

Two things to consider when you judge how painful you will find sugaring: I was about to get my period, which is when you are most sensitive to pain. I knew this and forgot. And also, I had a lot of hair to get rid of. See above: I am basically a gorilla, hair-wise.

But, beauty and sexiness are pain. Life is suffering. The question is, did it work?

Well, I will say that I seem to be experiencing a lot less ingrown hairs than I remember from my days of the Brazilian, though I did opt to keep a nice, grown-up looking portion of my hair in the front, which means the bulk of the naked parts are difficult for me to see without really getting up into it. Still, it feels better than a wax felt and it seems like it's probably better for sensitive skin, if you don't mind the initial pain.

Will I do it again? Probably not. Pubic hair, it turns out, is actually good for you. It protects a part of your body that is delicate and vulnerable, and if you, like me, have a lot, it acts like an extra-nice cushion when you're riding your bike. Also, it means you're a grown up. Also, it's free to have. Also, it's painless to just keep as-is.

That said, I'm not going to tell you what to do with your body. Just remember it's yours and you get to do what you want with the hair that sprouts out from it. But if you're worried that no one will love you with a full bush, you can stop worrying. Turns out, pubic hair has literally nothing to do with love.

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