Waxing, Pubic Hair, and Passivity

This story is not mine, but was shared with me by a friend who wanted help sharing it with others (while remaining anonymous). Check out more personal stories and reflections about sex, dating, and relationships at my weekly column, The Debrief.

Days away from a potential date with a woman I just started seeing, on which some type of sex potentially might happen, I went to get a bikini wax.

As a little girl, I often saw my mother and my grandmother change, in the locker room or having just come out of the shower. Each of them had what I like to call a “natural triangle” (natural only because it was natural for them) of hair in front of their pubic areas. I always appreciated how comfortable they were being naked, and I came to associate that specific patch of hair with the comfort they exhibited. That patch of hair offers a delicate, clean, beautiful covering for a complicated area that is different for every person and provides some well-deserved privacy for the more intimate parts behind it. I didn’t realize how unusual my appreciation for pubic hair was until I hit puberty and grew a ton of it. I’ve got the thick, curly triangle that my mother and grandmother have, but I’ve also got a happy trail, sideburns that reach well down my thighs, and hair going all the way back toward my rear end.

I told the woman at the front desk that I wanted a bikini wax “plus, well…” and told her I’d let the beautician know exactly “plus what.” I wanted to leave that beloved triangular thatch, but I also wanted some of the hair toward the back of my crotch removed. Previous beauticians had gotten those same directions and done a superb job, so I wasn’t concerned.

Perhaps because of a language barrier, perhaps because I was less clear than usual, perhaps because the salon didn’t have a very clear policy on the gradations of crotch hair removal, the beautician and I had a grave misunderstanding. She thought I was asking for a Brazilian (which involves taking everything off except a thin layer that is rather indelicately called the “landing strip”).

I wished I had spoken up way sooner—like maybe when she was clipping all my hair with scissors so that it looked like a buzz cut—but my instincts were inhibited by confusion and mild overwhelm. Why was this so painful? Why was she touching my actual—you know—area—so much? Maybe this was what my last beautician had done. Or maybe this was what hair as thick and coarse as mine required, and I needed to suck it up and let her do her job. I just kept lying there, not saying anything. Finally I asked, “You know I didn’t want a Brazilian, right?” The horrified look on her face was my answer.

By the time she finished, my skin was raw and hurting, doubly insulted by its exposure to the air. I went over to the mirror and looked at what I had never realized were relatively loose lips, hanging down from behind the buzzcut that was the only remainder of my beloved triangle. I reminded myself of a horse whose tail is lifted, my delicate parts exposed for all the world to see.

Like all women, my body hosts variations, and they’d never been a source of major insecurity for me. But now, exposed to broad daylight without that patch of hair that symbolized my womanhood, the sight disgusted me. It made me feel old, ashamed, robbed—as if someone pulled a thread of my dress to render me naked without my permission. It was like turning into a different being. I told myself I was the same and beautiful no matter what, but it didn’t feel right and it didn’t look right. The last thing it made me feel was sexy or confident or independent enough to sleep with someone for the first time; I felt like a little girl, clueless and unable to properly navigate a beauty salon.

Determined to never let this happen again, I decided the most forthright and sensible thing to do was clear up my misunderstanding.  The two women behind the counter couldn’t seem to agree on what I should have said I wanted to avoid this confusion. A “semi-Brazilian”? A “bikini plus buttocks”? I got so sick of whispering “So, if I want the back but just not the lips…” that I literally turned on my heel and walked out.

On the train, I texted several friends that I felt “emasculated.” (There’s no equivalent word for “loss of womanhood,” so I appropriated.)

I sat staring catatonically into space, then burst out laughing. I reminded myself of some kind of serious, large dog that was accidentally given a poodle’s haircut. My anger, in light of that image, seemed ridiculous. But equally ridiculous was the whole business—literally: the fact that we not only go about altering our pubic hair but that we make it so complicated, with so many gradations and styles that the industry can’t even keep them straight.

Later, in the shower, I burst into tears. And days after that, as the shock wore off, my situation began to itch. A lot.

If this potential new partner and I decide to expose ourselves to each other, I’ll really be exposed. I’ll try to show both vulnerability and strength, explaining the misunderstanding and that I usually don’t look like this. Or maybe I won’t say anything. Either way, it will take a lot of presence of mind to be attentive and comfortable with her, which is something I already struggle with in a new relationship.

Bodies—what we do with them and let others do with them—are a major responsibility. To me, it sometimes seems easier to ignore that fact by letting what happens happen and deciding later how I feel about it. But that approach led me to tacit, frightened passivity and a pubic buzz cut I didn’t want. If this bizarre experience taught me nothing else, it’s that I want to give present, active assent for what happens in and to my body.

Header image credit: Todd Mecklem/Flickr