Disclaimers:
- This is an incredibly TMI (too much info) post about female grooming, so if that doesn’t include/matter to you, you may not enjoy this read. Anybody can get sugared, but I’m focusing on lady bits… you’ve been advised.
- PLEASE DO NOT USE VEET/NAIR ON YOUR SENSITIVE PARTS. It’s included in the photo above purely as another form of hair removal. I occasionally use it on my legs. That is all. Don’t use hair removal creams anywhere near your face or bikini areas unless it’s specifically made for those sensitive spots.
- This is my personal view on female grooming. Please do not bash people for how they choose to groom themselves or blame any of this on conforming to society’s beauty standards. Thanks!
First of all, I wanna tell you that it is a personal preference of mine to remove my hair. And if I could be permanently hairless from the neck down, you bet I would be! Unfortunately laser is currently hit or miss on my hair type – more about that later.
I just don’t like having hair, and because this is the internet and everyone is always so nice on here *taste my sarcasm please* don’t @ me for hating hair on women because that’s not what this is about either… Just allow us to look and groom how we want. K?
Before I delve into gushing over my sugaring experiences (I’ve been trying to write this since March 2019 and I go every 3-5 weeks so I guess you could say that I’m totally an expert, or at least a regular…), I’m gonna give you a bit of a shaving/waxing history of mine. Hold tight!
Anyways, TMI BITS ARE BEGINNING HERE… SO… AGAIN… if you have no lady parts or are not interested in hearing about sugaring, you probably should just stop here. Don’t be weird or pervy…
I feel like I really don’t need to elaborate on how I originally started shaving down there way back when. Not that I did a bad job mind you, when I wore a bikini I actually had someone ask if I shave or wax because it was so clean. But lets for a second just mention how awkward it is to try and shave an area you can’t see…. I never cut myself… thank god! I don’t even wanna think about that! Moving on…
In 2012 I coloured my hair brown. Suddenly eyebrows because a huge part of my beauty routine (I have blonde facial hair…). I adopted my mum’s routine of getting them waxed/shaped AND tinted. LIFE IS EASIER!
Over the course of the next two years, I had a couple different ladies at the one spa I went to tackle my brows. Some for better and some for worse… Who knew brows would be so important!?
In 2014 I finally decided to ditch my razor down there and get a Brazilian (brave… I know). Anxious due to the fact that nobody but myself has ever seen my lady parts and some stranger was about to get all up in my biz! I was so lucky to be scheduled with an amazing girl named Sasha who took on the tasks of my eyebrow wax and tint, and Brazilian. She was so down to earth, professional and made me feel super comfortable. She made me talk through the whole thing to keep my mind off the fact she’s ripping hairs out of my body with hot wax… She used hard wax which doesn’t require a paper strip and told me that was what’s best for pubic hair. When it came to my brows, she used soft wax and strips. She was also a laser technician and when I asked her about it she said it would make a tiny difference, but laser works best on darker hair, whereas my pale nature does not make me a good candidate. The laser would have a hard time spotting my light roots. (Laser has come a long way since we had this conversation though I’m unsure if I’d spend the money on it right now.)
Sasha was the only one to do any of my waxing for the next few years! And even when I moved to a different city, I’d still make the trip out for her. Unfortunately at the end of 2017 she quit to find work closer to where she lives and I haven’t seen her since.
Now what do I do?
THREE YEARS of a beauty relationship is gone. And it really becomes a relationship with a great aesthetician! We talked boyfriends, vacations, Christmases, family, jobs, beauty etc! My hair was growing back and I was feeling like I’m back to where I was when I started. Back to dropping my pants for a stranger?!
Knowing that you aren’t supposed to shave in between waxing sessions (seriously don’t do it, it just sets you back to where you started) I scheduled an appointment at Fuzz Wax Bar because it’s right next to where I lived and they used hard wax.
Well they don’t tint brows yet so already I was a little disappointed.
But let me tell you, NEVER HAD I EVER had so many INGROWN HAIRS! Gah!
Maybe it’s my skin, maybe its the wax they use, I’ll never know but it happened almost every time I went there… Someone else also told me if you wear laced underwear or certain fabric mixes that can cause more ingrown hairs.
The only upside was that I had a few different ladies wax me and quickly became used to the fact that I was having different people put my legs in whichever position they needed them in to get me hair-free!
A year later I moved again, now Fuzz was two cities away and a terrible inconvenience. I drove there only a few times. Back to square one with my Brazilian AND my brows. Back to testing every wax place until I find one TOLERABLE enough to go to regularly.
(I say tolerable because how ‘good’ or ‘great’ is it to have your hair ripped from your body by hot wax… honestly…?)
My mum suggested I go to The Brow Room, she had been there once before.
Immediately I was in love!
After just one visit!
The best my brows have ever looked.
AND THEY TINT! AND I TRIED LASH TINTING!
Game. Changing.
And I’ve been going since!(almost 2 years, every 4-6 weeks)
This is a selfie from when I landed in Glasgow after 2 flights and little sleep.
No makeup! Peek those brows! Love!
The catch?
It was just a brow place at the time. When I asked about body waxing the girl handed me a card for The Mystic Peach which is sugaring. I can’t find the youtube video anymore but I remember watching a beauty channel and they sent their girls to get sugaring done on their underarms and forearms! (Click here for a similar video I also found)
So I put in my wallet and totally forgot about it… *Queue unfortunate foreshadowing*
For the remainder of the year and into 2019 I was still walking to The Brow Room for my brows and still testing random wax places to find my girl! One place used hard AND soft wax down there… really an odd experience. Someone else left me feeling more painful than ever before! One time I was in the area of Fuzz and decided to hit them up for an appointment and the wax BURNT me. BURNT!
Should I say that again or do you understand the gravity of the fact that they BURNT my poor lady bits!?
Moving on…
I was cleaning out my wallet for whatever reason and I found the card. Remembering the youtube video I decided to give it a try. Why not right? And at the time, this sugarista was operating out of the same unit as The Brow Room so say hello to convenience!
My first appointment was March 1st of 2019.
*Honestly I left and immediately felt like I needed to write a blog post about it which somehow took me almost a year… anyways… you’re currently reading it so everything is fine now*
Leading up to the appointment I was trying to do some research because I honestly knew nothing! Which can be a little nerve inducing. I realized there were ZERO blog posts about getting a Brazilian… many talked about forearms or underarms but I needed the deets on my most sensitive area… and there was nothing. Which is one reason that sparked needing to do this piece. Another reason was just how excited I was by the whole experience! Let me tell you!
First off, this sugarista, her name is Steph. She’s so down to earth, friendly and inviting. Now, me being a total Brazilian wax vet, I’m not a stranger to dropping my pants for the hairlessness I want. But if I were still nervous, she would’ve made me feel totally at ease!
She asked me if I’d had a Brazilian before. I said yes. She said that’s good because I’m familiar with what the process is like from her point of view but she told me I should notice a massive difference because we aren’t using wax!
DID I EVER!
First of all, lets all remember together how that woman BURNT ME!
Well sugar isn’t hot! No burns. Ever.
It’s a paste that will match your exterior body temp but not much warmer than that.
Sugar is applied in such a way that it bonds to the hairs and not your skin! Say goodbye to that raw and stingy and pulsing feeling of wax tearing at your sensitive bits. I never miss that! Sugar is also made of all natural ingredients (lemon, sugar and water) and it leaves my skin feeling so soft! Sensitive skin happy dance over here!
SUGAR CAN BE APPLIED MORE THAN ONCE! Wax is so harsh and abrasive on your skin, you should never wax the same patch of skin more than once.
Miss some hairs? Tough luck, get the tweezers!
Sugar is removed in the direction your hair grows! It comes out much easier, IT IS SIGNIFICANTLY LESS PAINFUL BECAUSE OF THIS! I can’t emphasize that any more! Much less painful! If that isn’t a selling point, guys, what is?
Maybe that you’ll experience less ingrown hairs because the whole hair with the roots get pulled out! Waxing can break the hair instead of removing the whole thing which can cause ingrown hairs.
Sugar exfoliates the top layer of your skin and removes dead skin cells! It’s all natural, easy to clean, doesn’t leave sticky strings everywhere, and hygienic!
So now that I’ve given you the bare basics of the pros of sugaring, allow me to do a direct comparison of my experiences:
With waxing, I experienced A LOT of pain. A girl burnt me for crying out loud…
With sugaring, it’s still quite painful – hair is still being ripped out – but it is significantly less!
With waxing, I experienced a lot of pain, stinging, pulsing and irritation afterwards! You cannot shower, work out, swim/hot tub or really wear anything. Undies kinda hurt to put on, I won’t lie…
With sugaring, I’m aware the pain is virtually gone by the time I’ve paid up and I’m walking home. I’ve showered later that day with zero pain.
With waxing, sometimes I’d find strings of wax on my legs that would stick to my leggings and underwear.
With sugaring, I’ve never experienced stickiness or remnants of the sugar on my clothes. But if I ever did, sugar is water soluble and super easy to clean!
With waxing, the broken hairs sometimes caught on the fibres of my underwear and tugged while I was still throbbing. More pain afterwards? Lovely…
With sugaring, my hair has come back softer, my skin is softer and I have no hair breakage to catch on my underwear and cause discomfort!
With waxing, after a few years and a few different shops/waxers, the hair felt different but the amount of hair growth was almost exactly the same after every appointment…
With sugaring, it has only been 10 months and my hair regrowth is significantly less!
Now that you have all the deets, DO YOUR RESEARCH AND FIND A SUGARISTA!
I cannot recommend it more! I never want hot wax near my lady bits ever again…
Steph offers so many services under the hair removal umbrella but also spray tanning and teeth whitening ! Towards the end of last year I even got into doing my arm pits because all my life I’ve just never been great at shaving such an awkward area. Plus I have some skin tags that I’m scared I’m gonna cut with a razor! My arm pits look hairless longer and I love it! I’m just bummed I didn’t start earlier!
Please check her out on instagram @The_Mystic_Peach
She’s a boss babe, running her own business. She uses wax made by a local Ontario university! At the end of last year she opened her own store front and it looks amazing in there, complete with (my favourite decor) neon peaches!! She also works with a lash/brow girl to offer even more diverse self care services under one roof. Writing this, I need to remember to book my first 2020 appointment ASAP…
As always, with any service you may seek, please do your research of the aestheticians or the shop/spa where the services are offered.
It must be reputable, clean and hygienic.
YOU MUST FEEL SAFE AND COMFORTABLE!
Take care of yourselves and why not try something new, like sugaring, to start off your grooming regime of 2020!
Stop waxing, and happy sugaring!
-J
This is so great and insightful! I tried making my own sugar wax once but just went back to razor becasue it takes too much time – i used it for my legs. Anyways, since laser doesnt work for you, have you looked into electrolysis? From what i’ve read, it works great for lighter coloured hair.
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Thank you! I will have to do some research into that
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