Who is in charge of your body hair?

[Ineke Vashon]

Nobody remembers my hairy arms and legs from a year ago. I am a clean shaven, divorced, retired senior, often in shorts in summer. If someone would ask, my "stock" answer would have been: "I have dry skin and use lotion every day. Gets kind of messy with the hair so I shaved it off." I have not had a reason to use that 'excuse'. I don't think anyone cares.

Yesterday, at Wally World, I inspected a man groomer with an extra handle, for shaving the back. The front of the box showed a totally shaved bare chested male, with shaved armpits. Yet, in the fashion of today, he had a two day beard. Go figure.

Ineke

[Krisi]

I don't hink anyoue should be telling his/her spouse how to wear their hair but in a good, loving marriage, each will try to please the other.

My wife wouldn't tell me I could not shave my body hair but I know she would rather that I not. Instead, I use a trimmer to keep it short enough to where it's not really obvious but still there. Excuses like bicycling or swimming aren't going to work, I do neither.

[Annaliese]

Great thread, yes one should decide on there own body hair, or hair cut.

[Heather-Hill]

In short I am, I have been lucky in life (depends how you view it) as I have always had very little body hair. None on my chest and feint hair on my arms, legs etc. I am in my latter 60's with even less and only have to shave my face every three days!
My wife wanted me to grow a beard and I didn't object and kept it for several years until it too went grey to match my head. I have shaved it off as my cd'ing desire grew much to my wife's displeasure.

I would love to remove facial hair altogether but unfortunately Laser treatment will not work with grey so I am lead to believe. If anyone can advise or know differently I would love to hear from you.

In short I do not impose restrictions on my wife and I hope she have the same view about me. I do, however, take an interest in her and will compliment accordingly. If she asks my opinion I will give an honest (diplomatic) answer, Lol!

Love to all
Hugs Heather

[Suzanne F]

This was certainly a big topic at my house. I wanted everything shaved but my wife has struggled with it. I started shaving bikini area first and progressed from there. She has acquiesced a little at a time. Most recently she conceded on my lower stomach. The only area left is my lower arms. I agree that we should be in charge of our own grooming but I also know it is best to let our spouses catch up with us. It does often occur to me that I never tell her how and where to shave. Love and tolerance are my guides so I am trying to be patient.
Suzanne

[MsVal]

One of the sage pieces of advice we often read here is to progress no faster and no further than your wife/SO/girlfriend's comfort.
Another piece of advice is to keep the communications channels open.

In this context, it may be "my" body, and I may modify it in a way of my choosing, but "we" have a marriage, and the body plays a significant role.

Using the open lines of communications, one's wife/SO/girlfriend should be aware of the desire, and the crossdresser should be likewise aware of requested limits. This may be revisited and revised limits negotiated as the comfort level permits.

Best wishes
MsVal

[carhill2mn]

The removing of body hair was a big issue between my wife and me. In order to not escalate the disagreement, I did not remove as much hair at that time as I do now. I know this is an issue for many

[Adriana Moretti]

Being Italian..I am constantly waging war on body hair....at least it's not as bad as a Kardashian...

[Avrial]

Body hair isn't any issue anymore. Been doing everything from the waist up for quite a long time... she understood it with no problem. She told me of a time in college when friends were discussing body hair, and she mentioned I shaved. The girls all agreed, long armpit hair clumped together with deodorant is not attractive. On the other hand, the first couple times I shaved my legs, she didn't like it. Every year or so I would try, but it wasn't until last year that I started doing it regularly. Turns out the issue wasn't being smooth, it was being prickly in the days after. Well, that was easy to solve. Bit of a battle with head hair though; she's not crazy about how long it's getting.

As for her hair, she can do as she pleases. She knows my preferences, and luckily shares most of them. She's not as vigilant about shaving her legs as I am, and often not as smooth. That's fine. It's her hair. She also knows I like shorter hairstyles... tried it once and didn't like it. Love her for giving it a shot, but it's not my choice to make.

[Nikki Love]

I have always been intrigued by the concept of hair distribution in us humans. We want it here, but not there. Biologists talk about primary sexual characteristics, such as overies and testicals. Secondary sexual characteristics such as breast enlargement and hip width and terminal hair growth. I take this a step further and consider tertiary sexual characteristics like makeup, jewelry and clothing. It is important for me to be smooth shaved. I enjoy the scorched earth movement. But god, simple shaving is difficult when the hair on legs grow so fast. My wife laughed at me the other week as I was shaving my body and said it's a real bitch to stay smooth. She likes the fact that I appreciate the work she goes through to present herself to me more than ever as a cd. It is most fortunate for me that the issue of hair warfare seems to be of no concern to my wife. She likes me smooth or prickly. But she did have one moment 6 months ago when I plucked my eyebrows beyond her limits and said I went too far. I think my eyebrows looked good, but I backed off the plucking. Overall, I select the landscape for myself, and I enjoy that my wife stays very smooth too. I gotta go now, its been 4 hours since I last weedwacked the forest.

[LICutie]

i like the posts with the idea of an individual's rights for grooming or removing their body hair how they wish, and agree especially with Alice B's "me, myself, and I" post... but also if one's SO is respectful about what they like, it would be good to do for them that. sure!

great replies on how hair is where we don't wish it to be and not where we wish it was for various reasons; reminds me of body-fat distribution...

all the more reason to work with what we got the best we can.

hugs,
Lil

[LICutie]

Ah the body hair conundrum... I always kept smooth as I used to engage in MMA style fighting and body hair is a major hindrance...

Hugs

Isha

Hi Isha.

First of all, i love the word conundrum; i like how it sounds and what it means. imo, it's like a Zen koan. it also reminds of kumquat another interesting sounding word.

anyway i was curious, how was the hair a hindrance with the MMA-style fighting because i notice many fighters do seem to be without body hair?

was it more for sanitary reasons?

hugs,
Lil

[Krististeph]

Who is in charge?

My freaking testosterone, or androgen, or whichever one it is... Too much. :-( I spend about 5 times as much shaving my legs as my wife does.

[Marcelle]

Hi Isha . . . i was curious, how was the hair a hindrance with the MMA-style fighting ... ? Lil

Hi LIC,

When grappling, it is quite common to find a hold that can offset your opponent. Having body hair ripped out of my chest (either by accident or on purpose) was not pleasant. Happened once and from that point forward, shaved. As well, smoother skin is more slick especially once you begin sweating and body hair can cause drag so smooth helps you slip (literally) out of certain holds

Hugs

Isha

[Launa]

Isha, I find its still a bit of hard argument to say because your doing some jujitsu to get rid of every stitch of hair you have. Some of the guys cut their hair with clippers a little bit and others I have met flatly refuse to do it. If you go professional then I see it a lot more common with the fighters but remember those guys are ripped and shredded so it looks different than the average girl. Even Forrest Griffin had all his hair.....

[Jules Spirit]

To me, how one keeps their body hair is a personal thing. It has to do with personal choice and comfort. If you choose to keep your body hair a certain way for your SO, that is still a choice. But someone else dictating how you should keep your body hair seems like an infringement on individual choice, regardless of "societal norms." I never really considered my SO's attitude toward my body hair until reading many posts here ( on this thread and many others). Now I feel blessed that my spouse really does not care what I choose to do. He has supported every hair length I've had, including shaving my head, and every color, and any choice I've made about the rest of my body hair. Overall, to me, this is a personal choice, end of story.

[Marcelle]

Isha, I find its still a bit of hard argument to say because your doing some jujitsu to get rid of every stitch of hair you have. Some of the guys cut their hair with clippers a little bit and others I have met flatly refuse to do it. If you go professional then I see it a lot more common with the fighters but remember those guys are ripped and shredded so it looks different than the average girl. Even Forrest Griffin had all his hair.....

I fought semi professional for years and it was personal choice. Some guys kept their body hair others not so much. I still cringe thinking about the match where my opponent came away with a chuck full of my chest hair.

Hugs

Isha

[~Joanne~]

My point is, shouldn't how anyone keeps their hair be their own choice?

Yes. I have never told my SO how to wear her hair, to shave or not, or what to wear or not to wear so I expect the same respect. It's her body, her choices as is my body, my choice.

[wanda66]

Shave , wax my body needs to be smooth.

[Launa]

I fought semi professional for years

The key words here are SEMI PRO, you can get away with it if that's the case. Other than that I think its a harder sell....Just like going into a woman's clothing store and saying, I'm looking around for a Halloween costume.

I say I just do it because I like it and keep it simple.

[Daryl]

There's three people in charge. Me, myself, and I. I shave whenever it needs to be done.

[Jason+]

I am motivated by what is deemed attractive in our society, like everyone else, right? How many of us are willing to go out and look like something that society deems to be ugly?

So maybe a better analogy would be if my SO wanted me to wear my hair in a way that IS socially acceptable for women, but opposite of the way I wear it now, which is a pixie cut. And the answer is yes, I would definitely consider it, in fact I did have my hair cut quite short for a large part of my adult life.

Society for me burned it's input out long before I found my first pair of panties. The key part for me of what has been posted is deciding to wear your hair or any other attribute in a way because you want to make your SO happy whether society likes it or not. Making the choice to follow a style for someone else is worlds different than acquiescing to a demand like "You are not allowed to cut your hair any shorter than it is now."

My point is, shouldn't how anyone keeps their hair be their own choice? If you don't care, and do it to make some else happy, obviously that is different. But to be told how one has to keep their body hair, wow, I personally would revolt pretty quickly from that. What say you?

That's not the way our marriage works. We don't do the ultimatums or you will nots.

Out of respect to her, I still do not shave even with her passing.
Rader

One of my wife's few markers is the arm hair. She wants it left alone so it stays. It wasn't a demand and ultimately it was up to me.

[MaryAnn40c]

Thinking you should get back into swimming and the problem would go away.

[karynspanties]

My body, my decision. Nobody elses.

[karyn2000]

I've lasered my back and arms...so happy. My legs and chest are underway right now, along with arm pits. Im using NO NO on the face. I hate body hair so it under an assault by my friend the laser.