Hair Down There

[Oowhachamacallit]

OK girls, I have a new relationship and will be dtd hopefully! What is the protocol for Hair Down There?? I'm late 40's but trim and fit but haven't got a clue about what to do? Trim, shave, hairy? Whats a girl to do??

Answers on a postcard please!

I totally understand the question. There has been a huge change over the last 10 or 15 years and where once hair was the norm, it now isn't so much. If you look on porn sites (I do), it is listed as a particular fetish.

So if you haven't taken your drawers down for a new bloke in a long while, there is a bit of a worry. I tend to get it out (not like that) quite early on that I don't shave. If they don't like it, they can fuck off back to their fleshlights.

I don't really understand your comment. I'm certainly no madonna, in either sense.

Do you think that is what it is? Women often say "it's cleaner", which it isn't necessarily. Or they prefer it in hot weather (not sure why, I've tried it and you just get sweaty and slimy). Or perhaps they don't want to admit that they think it's expected by some men.

I've asked DH (mumsnet sin, I know, sorry!) and he reckons he has no expectations other than clean and tidy i.e. not exploding out of knickers, and that most men would be so chuffed at having made it to the knicker stage of the relationship, they aren't going to be paying much attention to pubic styling.

I agree. I mean I do have a preference for myself and partners, but it's not the sort of thing which would make me react or change my feelings in anyway.

I prefer to be fully waxed myself, but the upkeep is too much faff so I keep it for special occasions. Most recently the birth of dc3 :)

I don't think that's right about porn, Lois - 10 or 15 years ago the shaven look would be considered a fetish, these days it's considered the norm. In porn terms.

I can remember my mother telling me, with some horror, that they used to shave you when you went into hospital to have a baby. NOBODY shaved back then. I don't think anyone even looked at it. EVER.

That's what I said, RiverTam. Hair is considered a fetish now. And that change has happened over the last 10 or 15 years.

I think going around thinking that there is a universal 'protocol' is a mistake.
I know that was said tongue in cheek, but really, as all our mothers would say, "just be yourself".

In my shagging around days, only ten or so years ago, (sigh) my pubic hair was just trimmed at the edges, that's all.
No man ever died of shock, and they all wanted to do it again.

(hairy preen)

Just as an aside, one of my abiding childhood memories is seeing my sister washing her INCREDIBLY hairy minge at the kitchen sink. We didn't have a bathroom. The sixties and seventies were a totally different world.

chaseface i was "long term single" and when I met somebody I didn't ask this. I have thought (twice now since being 'long term single') that if he was turned off by hair down there then that would turn ME off.

I'm not doing anything I don't want to do to please a man. And that comes right from the confidence gained from being "long term single".

Where is the OP?

Mowing her lawn.

Sex.
Pubic hair.
Wear it how you like it.

There does seem to be a bit of a hairy backlash (if one can put it thus). Lady Gaga recently posed for a magazine with clearly visible pubes. I'm no fan of the Gaga but change starts with little things like that.

My 46 DP shaves and prefers a woman to be shaven. He hasn't asked me to shave, I don't have a preference either way and if I didn't shave he'd still find me attractive. We haven't been together that long, but I knew him as a friend long before we started seeing each other so I did know his preference before we saw each other naked and I confess that I did shave for the first time we had sex. I don't mind doing it, he likes it, so I don't see a problem.

If I was starting out again with a new partner I think I would definitely trim the area and make it look neat and tidy but you should only do what you are happy doing and what you are happy to keep doing!

I find even trimming causes a terrible itch. This is god's way of telling me not to deforest. I am forest woman.

cambam2010 "prefers a woman to be shaven"?? How many is he seeing?

Also, you knew his preferences before you started seeing each other? How on earth do these topics come up? I've never had a single conversation with a friend, make or female, about pubic hair.

The fashion HAS changed.

The (male nurse) who assisted at DS1 birth, 12 years ago, assured me that it is no longer necessary to shave down there before birth.

I have always remembered that he seemed pleased for me not to have to suffer the indignity of being shaved.

Then, a few years later I started to trim it off anyway. Now I keep it "short".

I feel it ought to be short or not there, for me. What others do does not bother me. This "feeling" I have must come from fashion/peer pressure/societal expectations? How can I just decide at age 35 that I must start shaving?

DH is not bothered either way and has never commented.

It is a bit like boot cut jeans, suddenly they became really not-done. Like flares in the 80s, or stone washed jeans in the 90s...suddenly the mighty bush was out of fashion...

Emily - ah that may have come out wrong :-( He was in a 17 year marriage, that ended and he saw a 'few' women (never more than one at any time). Once he got that out of his system he calmed down!

I find these topics come up quite frequently. I work in a small office with 3 other women and we have discussed this. I also run a Facebook Singles Group and people discuss this kind of thing, or someone will post a funny picture and people will comment. I've had conversations in the pub on much more personal topics.

For me, the not trimming (and believe me I've tried. I've tried total Yul Brynner, and everything in between) is because of the way I'm made down there. If you have one of those neat coffee bean noo noos then maybe the trimmed hair doesn't dig in. I have labia that extend beyond the coffee bean and sharp hairs are really uncomfortable.

And if that isn't TMI I dunno what is.