Gym Problems: My Pit Hair Tried to Kill Me

There are many healthy activities that I wish I could do but for various reasons can’t get away with. Take running at night – it feels like flying but there are myriad safety issues. And now that I’m a responsible mom-person, I can’t risk a twisted ankle or, worse, a mom-napping. I’d also love to wear a sweat band – They are the epitome of functional! Plus they look like Muppet eyebrows! – but I still haven’t found one that my fashion sense will permit. It’d feel really good to hawk a loogie into the spittoons at the gym (I’m not sure what they’re called – bidets for your mouth? Oral urinals?? – but they’re right next to the drinking fountains and it appears their express purpose is to be spit in.) and yet it just seems the height of impropriety to spit in public, indoors. And so I don’t. I don’t run at night, I don’t wear sweat bands and I don’t spit (unless it’s on my fingers and I’m using it to wipe the muck off my baby’s face, in the grand tradition of mothers everywhere).
But there is one healthy “don’t” that I’d really really like to do.
It all started with CrossFit, the first workout to really make my shoulders stronger and therefore my pits craggier. Shaving my weirdly defined pits is such a process it got it’s own badly drawn comic. But I used the “star method” and while it took a bit longer, it worked. This would have just stopped at entertaining over-share fodder at dinner parties except that during a routine treadmill run my pit hair tried to kill me.
Thanks to cap sleeves and a lack of bodyglide, my pit hair stubble – it’s like a 5 o’clock shadow except I get it at 11 a.m. – chafed so badly that I ended up with two open sores under my right arm. And as everyone knows, the gym is the last place you want to have an open sore thanks to MRSA, impetigo and other scary bacteria. See? Nearly killed – or at least maimed – by my prickly hair. Thank goodness my immune system is still on my side and rallied. Whew! That’s definitely a close call for the memoirs…
So many questions: Do I just have sharper hair than other people? Or does this happen to other people and they just don’t talk about it? Why was it just my right armpit that was afflicted? Would this have been fixed by running in long sleeves, as suggested by Gym Buddy Megan? And why has this never happened to me before, despite the fact that I’ve been in possession of said hair ever since puberty? I don’t know the answers but there is a solution: stop shaving. Legions of men will attest to the fact that unshaven underarm hair doesn’t chafe, nor does it give you razor nicks which then burn like crazy when you put your deodorant on. Why should men get to be the only ones with non-stinging soft braid-able pits?
Then there’s leg hair. While I have never been attacked (yet) by razor sharp leg stubble, it can also be a problem. When you are as pale-skinned and dark-tressed as I am, even clean-shaven my legs still look, as one of my sons put it, “all polka dotty.” (Poor boy was so disappointed when I told him he couldn’t have polka dot legs like mommy.) Anytime men complain about having to shave their faces, I like to point out that for sheer acreage needing harvesting we women have got them beat by a mile. Besides the worst hair-removal damage I have ever done to myself was a lip waxing gone horribly horribly wrong. And we won’t even discuss the many many issues with maintaining the hair that is between the pits and the legs. (And we REALLY won’t discuss the time my roommate in college literally glued her butt cheeks together with a bikini wax gone awry. Guess what: water does not remove wax. Even really hot scalding water.)
But before you start mailing me daisy chains and fringed vests, there is a precedent for this. Behold the beautiful yet unshaven:
Take the gorgeous Russian supermodel, Natalia Vodianova, who stepped out in a gown accessorized by some serious fur on her million-dollar gams. (Click through the link to see the close-up if you don’t believe me.) And does she look ashamed? Not even a little! And who’s looking at her leg hair in that dress anyhow?!
And who can forget the awesome Drew Barrymore sporting her pit hair loud and proud on the red carpet?
One website even put up a poll about which is worse: M’onique’s shaggy leg hair or Julia Roberts fluffy pit hair. (Click on picture to enlarge… you know you want to.)

All this shaving business is a fairly new phenomenon. While women have had body hair since the dawn of time, we’ve only been routinely shaving it off since 1915 when safety razors were invented. That said, I’ve never grown out any of my body hair. I’ve been shaving, waxing and plucking things since the fifth grade when I stole my mom’s pink plastic bic and butchered myself in the shower. (I still shudder remembering that early lesson: never slide the razor sideways. Owowowowow.) And honestly, even though I wish hirsuteness would come back into fashion, I’m probably not going to quit shaving now. I can’t even go to the gym in unflattering workout pants much less sport a full arm bush, slave to society that I am.
As to the myth that shaving hair makes it “grow back thicker”, wikipedia debunks that – although it notes that pit hair grows faster than other body hair and may require multiple daily shavings to reduce stubble. That’s just great. I can barely get one shower a day in and I’m certainly not going to dry-shave under there. I’ve also tried those deodorants that claim to thin and soften pit hair over time and they so totally do not.
What about you – do you shave, wax or otherwise pillage your body hair? Have you ever grown out your body hair? Have you ever been mauled by your pit stubble? Does it gross you out to see lady pit or leg hair?? Lastly – do you feel weird spitting in those loogie-catchers too?


35 Comments

  1. I personally really like the clean-shaven look, and that goes for men too. I knew a guy who shaved his legs, and wow did they look great afterwards. I’m not a fan of the hairy chest, and pit hair is just kind of gross, whether it’s on men or women.

  2. Yeah, I wish I had the guts to stop shaving my legs! Pits don’t bother me since (I guess I have very slow growing hair) I only need to shave them once a week. But I also have very pale blonde, fine body hair so that probably helps. Even after a week I’ve never been hurt by the stubble and I workout in tank tops. Sorry Charlotte, that sucks!

    As for legs though, oh god. I basically don’t have to shave above the knee due to the fine, blonde hair thing but it’s a little darker below the knee and my skin is so pale so, since I workout in capris, it gets embarrassing when it’s super long. So I do it once a week too. The problem (and I’ve always had this) is that once the hair starts to grow back in my skin gets soooo itchy. Itchy as in I’ve scratched myself in my sleep until I bled. My skin tends to be super sensitive so that’s my only guess since I have the same problem with every razor ever and also with waxing. By shaving with baby oil and applying extreme moisturizing lotion after every shower and never showering more than once I day I manage to keep it to a minimum but it’s still annoying. When I’ve been in periods of not working out in gyms I basically drop to shaving my legs maybe once a month. The fiance doesn’t care so I’d only do it that much since one time I hadn’t done it in months and friend surprised me by taking me for a pedicure. Super embarrassing!

  3. Have you tried laser hair removal? It works really well for light skinned, dark haired people, which unfortunately, doesn’t include me :-(. I have many many friends who swear by it – for pits, legs, and other body parts where hair is either superfluous or unwanted.

  4. I’m kind of an obsessive shaver. Unless I’m stuck in the wilderness I shave every single day. Even if I’m not even going to see my legs all day. It’s just what I prefer- although it sounds a little excessive when I see it typed out- haha! I’m better than I used to be b/c I guarantee that 15 year old Shelly would have dry shaved on a camping trip. Now I at least have enough perspective to skip that!

    I wanted to suggest to you that you put Body Glide under your armpits when you run (once they heal.) I don’t have pit chafing problems, but most runners deal with various chafing issues. It’s miraculous stuff.

  5. Like Abby, I am lucky to just not be very hairy. But it seems to have gotten more pronounced since I started dry body brushing about 3 years ago. Now I “might” shave (usually dry) every other month or so… My body hair just doesn’t seem to grow much. Which is funny, cuz when I started drinking a heaping tablespoon of diatemacious earth every day, my head hair started growing like CRAZY. Definitely not complaining though…

    I’ll be T-Tapping with Teresa herself next month. And I will shave prior. LOL

  6. Haha, I went to an all girl high school, and I remember some of the girls would wear their leg hair proudly until summer break. I never went that far, but was known to only shave the part of my legs that would be exposed between my knee high socks and uniform skirt most of the time. During winters, I sometimes just stuck to shaving the part of my knee that showed through the hole in my jeans. Good times.

  7. I’m sitting here, legit freaking out about the sideways razor thing. Worst. Pain. Ever.

  8. I’m a fan of shaving…not the time that it takes to do it, but the afterward.

    My fiance and I have a shaving pact. I keep my legs shaved and he keeps his face shaved. When one of us slacks, the other gets to, too.

    I would LOVE to get laser hair removal someday, but wouldn’t bother to pay to do it to my pits. They’re easy enough and quick enough to shave…it’s other areas that are more time consuming and therefore annoying.

  9. I’m so jealous that women on here don’t have to shave that often! I’m Italian and Irish, so I have pale skin and glorious body hair, haha. I usually shave below the knee every day and my full legs once or twice a week. My armpits have to be done every day and I, too, get a five o clock pit shadow by 11am. Suckfest. I would totally get laser hair removal if I could afford it! Although, my body hair has never tried to kill me 🙂 my husband is pretty cool about it though. If I start looking…Bohemian…he never complains. I think because I get screamy if he brings it up, lol.

  10. This brings back memories of trying the epilady in highshool. Oh ow ow ow. I recall sticking my legs out the window in the subzero Canadian winter to chill them in the hope that the chicken plucking agony would be lessened by frozen skin. Nope.
    For me, I have to either shave regularly or else let it grow flowingly or I chafe like crazy. I personally don’t like armpit hair or leg hair so I shave every couple days on the days I wash my hair. If I could afford it I’d get laser removal done, then I wouldn’t have to bother with it at all, which would be great. I’d like to try waxing for the lack of effort in volved…I’m just too wimpy after the epilady incidents 🙂

  11. This post makes me feel so much better! I was in Montreal a few months ago and forgot to bring a razor with me. I ended up chafing my pits so badly I was in a lot of pain (that together with leg chafe from wearing skirts and I was not a happy camper). I thought it was because I had gained some weight and it was making me really depressed, but I’m glad to know other fit people get the same thing and it’s totally normal! I just have to remember to bring my razor with me when I go out of town.

    And as a side note, I love me some crossfit 🙂

  12. I have often said that, if I had the money to do it, I would SO get my armpit hair lasered off. I don’t mind shaving my legs. I’m lucky in that, even though I’m on the pale side and I have dark hair, the hair on my legs is pretty sparse. I can usually get away with shaving every three days or so in the summer and once a week in the winter. But my pits? Forget it. You have polka-dotted legs? I have polka-dotted pits, even immediately after shaving. And my armpit skin is super sensitive, so in addition to all the little dark spots, there are a couple of red spots. Let me tell you. It’s hot. I keep thinking I should start waxing them, but that involves waiting for the hair to get long enough. Maybe this winter though.

  13. I have also been attacked by my underarm hair. In one year, I got MRSA on my leg from shaving and going to the gym (it took 3 courses of antibiotics and no shaving for 8 months to heal and I still have scars) and that following summer I had underarm sores of the type you describe on both of my armpits to push me into getting laser hair removal. Unfortunately for me it seemed that the only options were give up on shaving (not going to work for me) or get laser hair removal. I have always been active and do CrossFit and weightlifting, at the time of these hair incidents however, I was doing other activities, so hard to know what caused the armpit sores. Since I had laser (dark hair, light skin) I still have to shave often but I no longer get crazy ingrowns and sores and the hair is less thick. However I am very careful about shaving my legs and then going to the gym, apparently all the microscopic cuts permit the bacteria in, so I am actually more likely to go the gym sans shaving than risk MRSA again.

  14. OMG, I seriously just brought up the Julia Roberts pit-hair scandal in class today (discussion on women’s sexuality). SHE IS STILL BEAUTIFUL. As are all of them. Who cares if they don’t want to shave once in awhile?

    I have gotten lazy shaving, but I still make sure legs and pits are done at least 1 time a week. I recently finished up 5 sessions of laser hair removal for my bikini line and absolutely LOVE it. I am waiting for another groupon for the same place to come out so I can get started on my underarms.

    p.s. I was mauled by arm pits problems when i switched to a homemade deoderant a couple weeks ago…turns out most people shouldn’t use baking soda in this concoction! particularly if you shave often. ouchie! i switched to cornstarch, and am now loving my homemade deoderant and I think my hair growth is slower because of it.

  15. I really wish I didn’t care, but I’m just not mentally cool enough to get behind not shaving my pits or waxing my bikini line. I did however quit shaving my thighs years ago… I think when I was pregnant with my daughter. The hair isn’t as thick or dark as it is on my shins/calves and doesn’t bother me. I’ve only ever had one person ask about (but who knows how many others noticed and didn’t say anything), and surprisingly I didn’t feel embarrassed. I just said “Yeah, I quit doing that.”
    And I do think a sleeved shirt would help with the pit chafing.

  16. I rarely shave above the knee anymore, as being blonde it doesn’t really show anyway. I stop shaving my legs just about every winter with the exception of New Year’s Eve (but only if I’m wearing a dress), and I feel like the only place you can really REALLY tell is right around my ankles. I honestly don’t think my husband even notices anymore. As for the “other” hair… that just gets trimmed down. I only shave my literal “bikini line”… why does that “other” hair have a tendency to want to grow to the MIDDLE OF ONE’S THIGH?!?! How does that in any way, shape, or form constitute being part of that other area?!?! Bodies and body hair is/are just plain weird. That’s all there is to it.

    As for my underarms… they’ve never really bothered me, other than the fact that they have to be shaved pretty much every other day. Why can’t the hair on my head grow that fast? It seems pretty unfair to me!

  17. Oh the terrors of shaving! I keep saying I’ll try waxing but I can’t seem to wait for the hair to grow long enough to grow out to the appropriate length for waxing… maybe this winter!!!

  18. Ladies – unless you are pale skinned with blonde hair, laser, laser, laser is the way to go! Zero irritation, zero hair left (after only about 4 goes!) and I only need to do it once every six months to maintain. Couldn’t be happier. Also amazing to thin out the bikini line hair – I work in gyms, so am always in tight (read: ingrown / irritation causing) clothing = laser has been heaven sent!

    • Yep. Laser or IPL (intense pulsed light) are awesome. My treatment cost about $50 every 6-8 weeks over the course of half a year, and now no more underarm hair. Find a *reputable* clinician and have at those follicles! (Mind you, I’m an ideal candidate with pale skin and dark hair – it doesn’t work for everyone, unfortunately.)

    • I also lasered my armpits and I noticed it was getting much thinner after the first 1-2 treatments. So maybe if you can’t afford a whole set, it would be still useful to get a few sessions? It would make the stubble less stubbly!

  19. Yeah I shave religiously and I’ve experienced what you are talking about with the pit chaffing. I actually found it was sort of irritated by my deodorant that was making my skin more sensitive (and prone to chaffing) and stopped happening when I switched back to a different one. I had been using the deodorant for awhile it just out of the blue started irritating me. My sister waxes and her hair has way thinned out BUT I can’t handle the growth in between waxing.

  20. I shave or wax pretty much all the hair below my eyebrows, but I certainly don’t judge women or men who make a different choice than me. I don’t think there is any logic to saying that body hair, something naturally occurring, is “gross” or objectionable to just leave alone. I love women who are confident enough to leave it be.

  21. My arm pit hair is dark, too, and I need to shave it everyday. However, I love LOVE Dove’s deodorant called Visibly Smooth (I use the prescription strength version because I sweat. A lot. Just standing around, lol!). It’s the best invention ever – it helps your hair grown in slower and softer (IMNSHO – not exactly sure the right marketing tagline).

    Legs, however, I skip shaving all the time until you can see the hair standing up from at least a foot away. In the winter, that might be once a week or once every 10-14 days. In the summer, I can usually go 3 days or so between shaves.

  22. Three words: LASER HAIR REMOVAL!!! Works like magic. I haven’t shaved in 6 years and my skin is baby soft and smooth. You have the perfect coloring for it, Charlotte. And you wouldn’t have the polka dotted look either.

  23. Wax your bikini and underarms! And shave the legs 🙂

  24. Somewhere along the line I took a hard stance on my own body hair. Maybe it’s because I’m a bike racer or I look like I’m related to Bigfoot.

    Either way, I now shave any or buzz pretty much everything.

  25. I shave everywhere BUT don’t get me started on age & facial hair. You think it is bad now – OMG – friggin craziness. Start saving up for the facial laser hair removal now. Wish I had the money – it is AWFUL!!!!!!!!!!!!

  26. Several years ago, I grew out my leg hair so that I could get a full leg wax before a beach vacation. Letting it get really long then helped me get over any compulsion I had to maintain a smooth shave, and now I just shave when I feel like it. Sometimes it’s two days in between, sometimes it’s ten. I treat shaving my legs sort of like fully blow-drying my hair – it happens on days when I want to look nice for something special, but it’s not prioritized as part of my daily routine.

  27. Lots of people have posted about laser hair removal, and many have lamented the cost. I was the same, but this year I decided to hell with it…it’s my 40th birthday present to me. I started with my underarms (yes, stubble chafe, I know thee) and I have every intention of continuing with bikini and legs later this year.

    I justified the cost (which was less than I feared, actually, when I finally priced it at several local reputable clinics – I live in downtown San Francisco so YMMV and your sensitivity to costs in general may be different than mine) in several ways: 1) I’ve been putting various gift checks from birthdays and holidays into our joint account for many years to be used on general expenses – I could have (and you could too, if you are lucky enough to receive such checks or could sell other gifts or unneeded stuff) put those away into a targeted savings account, 2) I spend quite a bit on razor blades, since I have sensitive skin and need a sharp blade all the time, and over the next 40 or so years I’d likely be shaving it will pay for itself in razor savings, 3) I convinced myself it’s one of those ancillary health care things that I always put off because “it’s not critical” – but your chafing wounds, Charlotte, make the case that perhaps it is, and 4) after a long period of my husband being unemployed, we actually are having a pretty darned good year (savings come first and my birthday present to me is more than offset by our increase in charitable giving in honor of that extremely welcome stroke of grace, so the guilt of doing something “frivolous” is blunted). I realize that last one isn’t common.

    With discounts I negotiated, my underarms will be hair free forever in approximately $250. If you can find a similar deal – or better, considering you don’t live in the second most expensive metro area in the US – and can find $10 to $15 per month or some gift checks/sold stuff proceeds to put in a “just for me” fund, you could be similarly free in a year or two.

  28. Charlotte, I found that some of the more heavy-duty solid anti-perspirants (think Mitchum) worked but caused me to scab up. I can get away with Dove in the cooler months. This summer I tried Secret Outlast. Seems to work, no scabs.

  29. The dry shave of my armpits in the morning about every third day has been the best discovery of my life. Zero stubble, zero irritation, just perfect smooth skin. I couldn’t photoshop my underarms any clean! Try it!!! I’m also pretty muscular and have tough pits to shave.

  30. i hate razors and had thrown them out of my life when fist time i went through IPL hair removal treatment, Anyone who want to flaunt her smooth and vibrant skin should go for it, its reaults are smashing!!

  31. Face is the first thing that anyone notice in you. So keeping it smooth and clear is the aim of everyone, i have seen wonderful effects of laser machines on some of my colleagues. its really a must do those who wants perfection and confidence in their look.

  32. Pit and leg hair gone wild absolutely positively gross me out worse than youtube videos of massive explosive zits. I couldn’t click the pictures for a close up, I’ll take your word on it that there are gorillas masquerading as celebrities! 🙂

  33. Ernest the Sociologist

    Men interested in women don’t really dwell on armpit stubble, shadow, or european natural. you should remember that all hair is a sexual characteristic for attraction of the opposite sex(not a fetish). Airbrushing has created impossible standards for humans, homosexual men do not want sexual women, but rather “barbie dolls”or as John D. M Donald once wrote, ” why do women take beauty advice from men that dislike women and view them as competition”. Lasering, waxing and shaving each have their medical drawbacks. Be a confident grownup, put on your sundress and revel in your dark hair,pale skin, dark pits, stubble, or hair. You will be thought more attactive for it.