Ingrowing hair hell!

[PrincessOfWails]

I epilate my legs - not religiously, I sometimes wet shave if I'm short of time. I like epilating because I can do it at home, it's free, and it lasts.
However...

I'm having major problems with ingrowing hair. What can I do? I exfoliate when I remember and I have a bristly brush, quite scratchy, but it doesn't seem to shift them. (I reckon I'd have to take the top layer of skin off to loosen them!) They're not painful or like spots (I have seen such things on the internet!) but just like normal straight hairs but they don't stick up because they're under the skin.
I've just spent 15 minutes picking them out with tweezers, but this is annoying, and also looks quite ugly straight after. I'm talking around 100 per leg!

What can I do? Is this even normal or do I have weird thick skin or something? Should I just give up on epilating?

stop picking - it'll scar!

have you tried the lotions with salytic (sp?) acid? I think Nair do one.

I have stopped picking now - I've come on mumsnet.

I've heard that Bliss have some lotion or something but it's £££, knowing bliss. And I would need to know that it works.

I've been alternating shaving with epiliating, using the shaving as extreme exfoliation if you see what I mean. It seems to be working, when I was just epiliating there were numerous fishing expeditions with a pin to hook the ends of those long straight hairs out.

you need to exfoliate daily or every other day (I use those scrubby gloves), and moisturise religiously! I also use m.boots.com/mt/www.boots.com/en/Palmers-Cocoa-Butter-Formula-Skin-Smoothing-Lotion-with-Alpha-Beta-Hydroxy-Shea-Butter-250ml_955327/ this on the days I don't scrub (fgs DON'T use it after epilation as it stings like hell).

YOu need this is it totally, totally magic.

That Palmers thing looks interesting - exfoliating action and all that.
Youchange - I use a pin quite often too!
My googling has brought up that tend skin stuff, and also something called ingrow-go or similar; and boots seem to do one too.

When I started having my legs waxed (and getting ingrown hairs) I created a concoction which seemed to help: put a well crushed soluble asprin in a bowl, mix with a few of drops of boiling water (allow to then cool), and a few drops of pure tea tree oil and sometimes some lavender essential oil. I would then apply this with a cotton wool pad or flannel/muslin cloth to areas of ingrown hairs. It is best to do this at night and also not straight after waxing! You could also add a blob of a good body moisturiser to the mix and apply all over. The key is to get the asprin smooth.
In the end, I just went back to shaving as it was cheap and quick and I am lazy!

I also went back to shaving after getting loads of hairs with epilating - I bought tend skin, scrubbed... Everything. Nothing worked and I'm only blond and not very hairy. Now tempted by ipl...