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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

to grow a beard?

78 replies

ZombiesAteYourCervix · 21/10/2011 22:15

I haven't plucked the ol chin for a week now in sort of anticipation of possibly making a doctors appointment to ask if it is normal for a woman to have quite such a luxuriant beard.

Problem is I haven't got around to making said appointment because I am a wimp and a bit Dr-Phobic.

So chin hair is now sprouting gloriously.

DO I

a. just grow a big beard (like ZZ Top)

b. Pluck it

c. live with spiky growth, man up and make a sodding appointment?

If c. I won't be able to leave the house for the next week.

OP posts:
Foxinsocks · 22/10/2011 09:30

I've got some too

And having escaped a life time of acne, I'm 38 and am now rivalling the teenagers for the most squeezable spots fgs

And who said getting older was the easy part!

Foxinsocks · 22/10/2011 09:31

How do you pluck them without weeping! They feel like they are rooted to my skull

CumbrianCooBeastie · 22/10/2011 09:39

I'm 39 and my witch-chin hairs started up at 37. I'm not hairy at all, and I don't have PCOS. I think it's an age thing Sad. Car light is indeed fantastic. Except when you're in the car and notice two brown beard hairs but have no tweezers with you... [tantrum]

LetTheSlaughterBeGincognito · 22/10/2011 09:46

Threading is great for this, if a little eye watering.

I'm 31 and have always had this problem. Don't have pcos. Just vair, vair hairy. :(

I will never forget when I found my first one. I was 20. The tragedy was that it wasn't me, but my boyfriend at the time who spotted the blighter. Twas the death knell for the relationship.

sevenoften · 22/10/2011 09:49

If the hair is too pale for laser removal, then electrolysis. Not cheap, not fun, but permanent.

ragged · 22/10/2011 09:51

Electrolysis, will slowly kill the blighters off (permanently).

InWithTheITCrowd · 22/10/2011 09:55

I am 38, I have pcos, but no chin hairs. I do, however, have hairs on my stomach and some on two little patches on my chest. If i get chin hairs as well (whether pcos or age-related) i shall weep...

BarkisIsWillin · 22/10/2011 10:58

mrsjacko - when I was younger I had hairy arms, now I am not so young my arms are ok (and leg hair has decreased) but have to constantly monitor my chin.

ditziness · 22/10/2011 11:08

I've had this since I was 13, with accompanying bad skin, fatness, blood sugar levels and all other pcos rubbish. The only thing that has ever helped it was serious lifestyle changes. This book www.amazon.co.uk/gp/aw/d/0007131844/ref=redir_mdp_mobile is an eye opener.

BlowHole · 22/10/2011 11:18

You're a year older than me, op. I have noticed that since I had dc, I have some darker moustache hairs, but only one or two that can easily be plucked. Have you been checked for PCOS? Sounds like you have a few of the symptoms.

FromMilanToMinsk · 22/10/2011 11:23

Never plucked in the car, but airplane toilets have fabulous lighting for plucking. I used to look forward to flights just for the great opportunity to get rid of the beard.
I'm talking pre-2001 here. Which means I've been plucking for a very, very long time.

OldMumsy · 22/10/2011 12:37

My menopause started at age 35 and was done by the time I was 38, so don't discount the peri menopause, sorry to say.

shesparkles · 22/10/2011 12:43

Mine seem to have kicked in at about 30 and seem to get worse with every passing year. No idea how many there are but I pluck a good 7 or 8 every 2nd day. Sad
They're horrible and black and wiry, and I'm blonde!
It's not hormones, it's hereditary-both my grans SHAVED for godsake![shocked]

colken · 22/10/2011 12:46

I'm afraid plucking will not get rid of them permanently. I began in my teens with a mole at the side of my chin with black hairs emitting from it. On a school outing (my children's), a child was excitied at being able to tell me that I had a spider on my chin. From then on, the hair growth spread across my chin and upper lip so I just trimmed them with scissors.

Grandchildren. Hmm, well, they don't like kissing or hugging bristles so I went to my doctor, hoping to go down the psychological route - the effect that no hugs was having on me. This sort of thing is not available on the NHS because it's not really health related. Research told me that the only way to get rid of chin / upper lip hair is electrolysis. A small electric shock kills the hair root so it can't grow again. Plucking leaves the root behind so it can grow again. Laser and any other treatment is the same.

I chose the electrolysis method, attending monthly for half an hour, and the killed roots have not regrown so I no longer trim with scissors. Yess, I had to pay for it but it's been well worth it.

Sexolette · 22/10/2011 12:54

Ask the doctor to prescribe you Vaniqa.

If he won't, you can buy it yourself, a tube lasts for ages, and works wonders at reducing beard growth!

:)

missymarmite · 22/10/2011 13:35

Oh, I am so glad it isn't just me. Gradually over the last 10 years the hairs on my face have got thicker and darker, especially round the chin, upper lip and side-burn area. So far I have managed by just plucking the chin and lip hair, and hoping no one notices the side-burns. I also have very dark stomach hair, which I shave, and legs also shaved.

However, I have lately become much more aware of my fore arm hair. A couple of people have actually commented on it, one so called friend said with a shocked expression "Oh! I thought for a minute there was a man here! Your arms are so hairy!" [hshock]

Do people actually shave their fore arms? I have noticed that no other women around me appear to have hairy arms. Yet I don't see stubble/regrowth either (signs of shaving). Or does everyone fork out for creams these days? I feel out of the loop and behind the times. When did this happen? No one ever mentioned shaving arms. Legs, yes, bikiniline, yes, under arms, yes. Fore arm, never!

demonicma · 22/10/2011 17:18

pluck the hag hairs regularly - spiky and black and horrible. have NEVER shaved my arms even though they are quite hairy. Step too far in my opinion. do my lower legs to the knees, armpits, and pluck facial hair.

jennypenney · 22/10/2011 18:44

Oh god. I've been getting hairier ('tache, threatened sideburns, chin especially, got ropes on that, and round my nipples, and a simply lovely downy patch of "fur" between my boobs) since I was about 28 (now 33)- am also too tubby for my own good, have crippling periods and the past couple of months have odd patches of occasional, unexplained nausea (neither pregnant nor pissed). Hmm

Should I get checked for PCOS? I don't have irregular periods though - at least, I don't think so. Does a cycle varying from 27-32 days count as irregular? I thought irregular meant like once every 17 weeks or whenever Paul McCartney got married.

CotherMuckingFunt · 22/10/2011 18:50

I have a lovely beard (or i would have if I wasn't obsessive about plucking, a 'tache and a rather rounded frame (read 'fucking fat'). I have PCOS which is the cause of it all but whenever I see my doctor I'm freshly plucked because it's too Blush to go 'natural'. I hate it and nothing gets rid of it. I'm 31 and feel like a freak show.

ScarahStratton · 22/10/2011 18:52

I don't shave my forearms, both DDs shave theirs though, and so do their friends apparently.

Original poster
ZombiesAteYourCervix · 22/10/2011 19:02

the beard is coming along nicely. i am considering a career in a travelling show. i fancy a dinky little caravan of my own. i'd have a woodburner and lots of books.

If I were to have PCOS (which I have always suspected) i don't think there is a miriacle cure is there? useless doc would probably just tell me to shed 4 stone (as if I haven't been trying to do that for the last 6 years or so).

OP posts:
jennypenney · 22/10/2011 19:10

Actually, I'm considering binning my tweezers and asking Peter Jackson if he'll let me start a new career as a dwarf extra in his endless forays into Middle Earth.

r3dh3d · 22/10/2011 19:20

DD2 is always very pleased to see this lady who is often using the pedestrian crossing into town as we do the school run. Though, tbh, she is not always as chic as Perez makes her look. I suspect the beard requires so much maintenance that sometimes you have to let other things slide a bit. But still, shows it can be done...

SecretNutellaFix · 22/10/2011 19:26

Sounds very much like pcos. I can grown a full beard in a week if I don't remove it's daily. I have pcos and it's very demoralising. Back hair? Yep.

SnapesMistress · 22/10/2011 19:29

I am 21 and would have a luxurious beard if not for zealous plucking and waxing. I will be a yeti by middle age. :(