Footie sez: Hairy Legs are Zzzzzzzzzzzz... Via PhDork.
I started writing this post back in November, but got distracted with more timely things, real life things, etc., but with the recent hoopla about Teh Horror! of Mo’Nique’s unshaven! legs! at the Golden Globes!, I seems like it’s time to dig it out and dust it off.
In my bio, I mention that I could be considered something of a cartoon, and my reticence to mow my walkers on a regular basis is part of that. Although I don’t usually consider myself a contrarian-just-t0-be-a-contrarian, every sexxxy, hairless, nekkid-lady ad telling me that love and happiness is just one scrape away makes me want to do my calves up in cornrows out of spite.
But on top of that, I got all kinds of reasons:
It’s easier. Duh. Shaving/waxing/depilating/whatever the hell else I’m supposed to be doing to render myself slightly less disgusting to the world takes time. I remember learning some years ago that my own mother (now 63 years old) still shaves in the shower every day. Everyday? For, say 45 years? What else could you do with that time?
It’s cheaper. Ditto, and double ditto. Also, have you noticed that shaving cream marketed to women is wildly more expensive than that marketed to men? Compare the ingredients and you’ll find no significant differences–menthol vs. fake raspberry scents, perhaps, and of course black vs. pastel packaging. On drugstoredotcom, I can see that 7 ounces of Aveeno Positively Smooth (for gals, Allure magazine-approved!) is $4.29; the same amount of Nivea for Men is $2.47. (If you do shave, you might consider this the next time you hit the store.)
Pants. It’s January. And even when its not, I usually wear pants. And even when I don’t, I usually wear tights. And even when I don’t, I usually don’t care.
I’m an old unmarried lady. I know the fact that I’m not “on the market” has something to do with my willingness to cast off the razor. The dude gets that I have leg hair and all sort of other unsavory, non-porn-approved qualities, and he has yet to cast me off. I doubt leg hair is my least savory quality, anyway.
Say something. I dare ya. All the time I save by not shaving I use coming up with devastating comebacks to Nosy Parker busybody assholes.
Now, to be totally honest, I do still occasionally shave. I will shave before Sister Dude’s wedding next summer. I shaved before spending the day at a water park with the Dude Family last summer, and before spending a weekend with PapaDork and that part of the family at a resort in Florida. I will shave, that is, in anticipation of a lot of bare-leg time with less fur-friendly family. (Strangers I don’t care about; I know that my appearance is already fair game to the man-on-the-street.) And were I to ever have occasion to walk a red carpet, I’d probably shave then, too.
Now lest my anti-shaving sentiment gets someone’s back up, let me be clear: my choice not to shave is not to make you feel guilty, or less feminist, or (maude forbid) judged. I make all kinds of compromises with the Big P–we all do–but I’ve learned that what I get from shaving (smooth, stranger-approved legs for approximately 8 hours) is not worth what I give up (the aforementioned time, money, and the sense that my body hair is morally neutral). So shave, don’t shave, whatever, you’ll get no shit from me. But if you start talking trash about “gross” and “dirty” and the like ? It’s on.
So: rock on, Mo. And rock on, my yetis.
The patriarchy has its needles so deep under my skin that even when I stop shaving (which is often, and most frequently borne from laziness) I still get fucking vain about it, and start trying to make my underarm hair bushy and dark and “pretty” instead of wispy and weird like it is. So irritating. But not as irritating as razor burn! Since my male partner is extremely hirsute, there is no shaving cream in our house, which is kind of too bad because it doubles as hair junk magnificently.
Remind me to show you my remarkably shaggy leg hair this weekend. It’s been WEEKS since I shaved, but hell, I was in India, where no one cares, and then I got home and it’s cold and I’ve been wearing pants, so no one’s seen it but me and I’m not offended by my own body hair.
That said, if my legs were going to be on display, I’d shave them, at least some of the time. I pick my battles with the beauty culture and leg hair ain’t one I care much about.
I also use plain old baby oil or vegetable oil to shave with. It’s significantly cheaper than that banana-strawberry-girlie gel, which tends to dry my skin anyway.
I will also say that underarm shaving, while not of course necessary in any universe, is useful for those of us prone to stank, and also to using virtually useless natural deodorants. I realize that not accepting my body odor also makes me a tool of capitalism, but a slightly more understandable one.
I shave on weekends only. Because I just don’t want to get up that ten minutes earlier on week days in order to have smooth legs that nobody will see. Quite a few years ago I switched to using men’s shaving cream after my roommate pointed out how much cheaper it was. So my legs don’t smell like peaches for 1.7 seconds… I can deal.
When I was in Jr. High I was picked on pretty mercilessly by the boys in my gym classes because I didn’t shave my legs. This clearly had its effect as I now would never ever bare my legs in public unless they were void of hair. I hate that those dumb 13 year old boys are still getting to me. What Mo’Nique did was pretty fantastic in my opinion. Maybe one day I’ll be brave enough to not give a rat’s ass what anybody says.
JD: I’m lol-ing at this, “I still get fucking vain about it, and start trying to make my underarm hair bushy and dark and “pretty” instead of wispy and weird like it is.”
It reminds me of a line from the Sarah Silverman show where she talks about being jealous of her sisters “full bush” when they were teenagers, “She had a full bush, and she FLAUNTED it!!!”
Anyway, I shave my legs in the summer but do so sporadically in the winter and then barely ever above the knee (I have light hair above the knee anyway). I personally don’t find hair aesthetically pleasing on the calves but that’s just my opinion! I don’t really give a fuck if someone doesn’t shave.
Also, I think its really fucking awesome that Mo’Nique doesn’t give a fuck and rocks the unshaven legs on the red carpet. It’s not like she doesn’t know she’s gonna get shit on.
I don’t shave my legs often, not even monthly, but if I am going to be potentially showing off some skin, I try to shave once a week in advance, then the day of so I can avoid those annoying missed spots with the quarter inch hair. Granted, I’m blonde, and my body hair is exceptionally slow growing, and most people probably can’t even see my leg hair, but it bothers me when I can see or feel the patchy spots.
I usually use either fancy conditioner that is too rich for my oily hair- which I have because I’m a sucker for salon product upselling- or barbasol, which is not only the Beard Buster, but is generally outrageously cheap for a large container.
“Beard buster” makes me think it somehow calls people in fake straight relationships out of the closet, and I kind of want to be it for Halloween next year.
@Becky – I’m with you — rare shaving in the winter, but when my legs are going to be bare, I shave them most of the time. Honestly…I like the feeling of them smooth. Not enough to shave more than once a month in the winter, but enough to not mind doing it when it’s warm.
And I shave with soap. When I used shaving cream for ladies, I cut myself almost every time because I had a hard time judging where my leg was behind the inch of foam.
I shave my legs once every two weeks in the winter, and once a week in the summer. More than that, not gonna happen.
Usually I will shave if the Mister complains about being stubbled to death by my legs, and since I bullied him out of a beard years ago, I feel I can’t really complain about him griping about my leg hair. (In my defense, he looked AWFUL.)
I also just use soap to shave my legs.
I don’t shave in the winter. Sometimes I tell my yoga classes that I have a distinguished Indian gentlemen visiting with me: M’legssis Hari.
Like baraqiel, I just like the feeling of shaved legs. I stopped shaving when I went hippie in my freshman year of college. Then I spent a summer hiking around SE Arizona in shorts and realized that I really.couldn’t.stand. the itchy, scratchy, yucky feeling of sand and dirt caught in my leg hairs. I have a weird thing about dirt and sand – as much as I love the beach, I can NOT stand the feeling of dried sand on my feet. This gave me the same feeling.
So, I started shaving again, and to this day I still typically shave 1x/week, maybe 2x/week in the summer or if I’m getting dressed up for some event. In addition to avoiding the “ick” factor, I just like the feel of smooth legs. That and what J.D. said about stank.
I normally just use soap, though once a year or so I’ll splurge and buy a bottle of girlie shaving cream on sale. Usually after I’ve come back from months of hiking and living in the rainforest being all sweaty and stinky and just want to smell good and be girly.
I don’t shave, and haven’t regularly since I tried it for 6 months or so when I was in the 7th grade–and I’ll wear shorts and skirts and let the hairy ol’ legs show. I can’t really say why. It’s less a matter of politics (though I do hate the idea of spending time shaving off hair for the patriarchy) and more a matter of personal comfort. I shaved my legs just once in my adult life, about a year ago, for a Very Important Wedding, and I was grossed out by the feeling of my leg skin sweeping across pants legs or sheets for the next few days. Shudder. And also, when the hair started growing back from the shave, I was reminded that it comes back as prickly stubble. No thank you. I plain old prefer the constant fuzzy softness of my own hair than the never-ending struggle of shave/stubble/shave.
@Becky, I just wrote about this on my blog. I am of Indian descent and my aunt and grandmother have never shaved their legs because in their day legs were always covered.
http://thatbrowngirl.wordpress.com/2010/01/19/hair-everywhere-hell-yes-monique/
Also, for us brown girls with sensitive skin, those annoying black dots show up a few hours after shaving and horrible itching the day after. Last summer, I would go a few days between shaves and still wear shorts – I hope to get up the courage to go Mo’Nique style by next year.
I stopped shaving in winter. Once I got past the prickly point it didn’t bother me. Or my partner. And it keeps me warmer.
I will say, though, that I work out at a gym at my place of employment. And even though it pains me, I wear long underwear pants under my shorts for cardio because I really don’t need my colleagues seeing my monstrously hairy legs.
this is one of those times where the harpy nest feels like my electronic tribe.
PhDork, I hear you!
As a fellow female who doesn’t shave/wax/et al regularly including during the Australian summer, and wears pants a lot I don’t understand the consternation.
Though the only exclusions I have are defuzzing for important events (like friends weddings and then only the bits of the body that may be on display), and when I’m swimming only the bits of the bush that appear outside of the cossies at the beach/pool.
I’m kinda lucky that for the most part my friends and family don’t mind what has hair where on my body anyway.
I don’t shave in the winter, unless for a special occasion, and every few days in the summer. I’m very very pale, my leg hair is black, so I think it’s more aesthetically pleasing to myself to see clean shaved legs when I look down at myself in shorts. When I’m wearing pants, I couldn’t care in the least. I shave my armpits because it tickles when it grows, and giggling like a madwoman all day will get me committed.
The one bit I never enjoy shaving is my bikini area–it’s not natural for a grown woman to be smooth, so I make sure I’m never hairless, and if any man asks me to shave, he’s shown the door.
Also, Mo’nique rocking her unshaved legs made me smile–she’s so badass, I want her to mentor me in her glorious ways!
I haven’t shaved my legs or armpits since I was 25. I can’t remember the reasons for stopping. I was in a relationship at the time, but after it ended I didn’t feel it made a difference, so I continued to avoid the razor.
Granted, I don’t grow a LOT of hair, but it’s still quite noticeable. I guess I just can’t stand the idea of pandering to the ridiculous notion that my legs OUGHT to be hairless, while men’s OUGHT to be hairy.
(A former boyfriend of mine was a cyclist, and shaved his legs for his sport. This poor guy received grief from his male friends about the fact that his legs were hairless and smooth!)
@thatbrowngirl: Great post!
I think leg-shaving is such a white thing. I grew up in a neighborhood of mostly brown people (primarily Latino but also some black and Asian) and the majority of my non-white girlfriends not only did not shave their legs, but were forbidden to do so by their parents. In more than one culture, it was perceived as a sign of assimilating into the overly sexualized white world and definitely not something that “good girls” did. I remember my friends shaving in the locker rooms at school and then have to hide their shaven legs from their parents.
Exactly! I remember cutting my legs something awful the first time my mom let me shave — and being too afraid to tell my dad the reason behind the band-aids on my legs.
I distinctly remember attending an 8th grade dance with a big ol’ bandaid right slap in the middle of my shin, and the mean girls laughing at me because they knew I’d gashed it shaving!
I’ve always resented shaving. I’ve always done it every 1-3 weeks, depending on the season (my hair grows slowly). The only place I ENJoY having shaved is my armpits. I shave those once a week.
This winter I’d finally had it, and stopped shaving my legs in Sept, when pants season hit. I think for the first time ever, I can now see what my legs would look like in a natural state. It actually feels kinda nice, now that I’m in the soft hair stage, and my skin hasn’t been irritated in months. It also feels warmer.
I think from now on I’m never shaving in the fall / winter / spring again.
In the summer (only July / Aug here in the Pacific NW) my legs do get sweaty, and shaved legs do feel good, though I hate the shaving.
I get mine waxed, because they are long and very dark, on my very white skin (down here in high-skin-cancer-risk Australia, I use plenty of sunblock, and avoid the sun where possible). Over the years, waxing has made my leg hair finer and more sparse, but given my genetics, I still get a good crop if I just leave it to grow. I get my legs waxed done every four weeks or so in summer, but over six weeks or so in winter. I aim to get them done in the first half of my menstrual cycle; I’ve found that it can sting a little in the second half. I get them waxed to above my knee, and I don’t do my bikini line at all.
When I was in my late teens to early twenties, I didn’t shave them at all, because I thought I shouldn’t, and then I realised that the major impact was that during summer, I wore jeans or very long skirts and I didn’t go swimming at all.
Super hairy – Mediterranean style – & an intermittent shaver over here. When I do shave my legs, it’s definitely a concession to compulsory femininity. I like the way freshly shaven legs feel, sure, but I’m pretty sure that’s just because I’ve been told they’re supposed to. Also I’m a lazy hobo-type, so at my most shaving-est, it’s maybe once every 10-12 days or so. Maybe. I’m in a long distance relationship, and I’ll shave once right before I see my young man friend, but that’s all.
My thing is the pube region. So much hair, dudes. I want to accept my natural appearance, I cannot accept the thick black hair creeping down to mid-thigh. It’s like, “Why is Magnum P.I. wearing a swimdress on this sunny day?” Like that. Incidentally, the fact this hair appeared long before my breasts or period did was included in my long list of “Proof Teenage Odonata may possess undescended testicles”. (Seriously.)
Also, there have been times in my life where I’ve consciously tried to change my thinking. “Lady hair is non-heteronormatively APPEALING,” I say to myself, and set the razor aside. It takes a while, but if I consciously try to associate hair with positive attributes, then I can actually start enjoying it. Except for the aforementioned thigh hair. I still have not won out over that.
Re: stank, I’ve found Lush’s “Greeench” product to be really great at stopping that, but then you do smell a little bit like you should be basted and put in the oven, what with the rosemary and thyme.
I have never really felt the need to shave regularly. I am fortunate in the eyes of my shaving friends because the hair on my legs has stayed fairly blonde and you have to be looking for it to see it. The first time I shaved, I cut myself and still have a faint scar on my knee. That pretty much killed the desire to remain clean-shaven. I probably shave less than 5 times all year. Usually only before we go on our annual trip to Schlittrbahn and if someone’s getting married in Spring or Summer. Otherwise, I really don’t care.
Last summer I noticed the difference between the prices of: shaving gear, socks, underware, bathing suits, and, a bit more subtly, sunscreen marketed toward women/children vs “sport” or “outdoor” formulas of the same stuff.
Interesting post, Ph.Dork. Another area in which, instead of all variations being right, we’re made to think that whatever we do is probably not good enough.
I think shaving is, at the least, silly and pointless and, at the worst, infantilizing. But then, it’s easy for me not to shave my legs because my hair is light, in both senses of the word. When I was diagnosed with breast cancer, I stopped shaving under my arms for fear of cutting myself and ending up with lymphedema. It’s been a long time but I never started again. I have to admit that I never feel entirely comfortable with unshaved armpits, but it’s a matter of principle to me now and I’m damned if I’m going to shave just because someone might not like it.
Shaving your pubic hair just makes me angry. Women are expected to go to a lot of pain, inconvenience and expense so they can meet male ideas of what our bodies should look like? Are we crazy? Granted there are situations like Odonata’s, and of course everyone should do what makes them feel comfortable. But it infuriates me that women feel pressured to look like porn stars. Why exactly is that a good thing again?
@price differences: it is especially noticeable when you walk from one side of the dressing rooms to the other in a big box store like Kmart and notice that you can buy a pack of underwear, a t-shirt and jeans in the men’s section for as much as it would cost you to buy a bra. If men wore bras they would have racing stripes, sizing that makes sense, and cost $4.99 each.
I’m a regular shaver, and I’ll even admit I do it partly because my husband prefers it. But I come from, as my sister says, a very hair people. Super fast growing really thick dark hair on my head? Fabulous. Super fast growing really thick dark hair everywhere else on my body? Makes me self conscious. I shave my legs at least every other day (I wear a lot of skirts, even in winter), and I trim my pubic hair (I think shaving it is incredibly uncomfortable, but like Odonata it’s scary long). I also pluck my breasts (though I didn’t do that till I started breastfeeding – now that I’ve started, I feel like I have to keep it up). I also have to pluck my chin and I sometimes shave my upper lips. On the other hand, I only shave my underarms every two or three days because that’s pretty sensitive skin and easily irritated.
I know a lot of that is giving in to the patriarchy, but I can’t imagine ever feeling good about my looks without it. I was bred to survive Russian winters, and now all that hair is as useless as the appendix.
What sucks is that most of us start shaving before we’ve even thought about why, or whether we really want to, and by the time we consider the reasons we’re already used to having smooth legs. I shave about once a week, less often in the winter. I do like the feel of smooth legs but I can’t even remember what they felt like before I was a regular shaver. I shave my underarms every other day or so because I’m so accustomed to having smooth pits.
I feel bad because my mom really tried to get me not to shave (even though she does) and I was the last girl in middle school to start (enduring tortures for it I believe I have already recounted here), and I think she was even doing it for feminist reasons, but as a repressed Catholic woman she was unable to articulate her reasoning on feminist grounds and it just ended up with shame and silence like always. I probably would have started shaving even if she had explained it well, because conformity is survival in junior high, but I probably wouldn’t feel as conflicted about it now.
That’s totally right, SMC. I think the first time I shaved I was…6? Of course I had no fucking clue, but Mommy shaved her legs, and Mommy’s razor was right there! And Mommy found the Dorklet sitting in a tub full of red water and nearly had heart attack.
That was pure monkey-see-monkey-do, but I think I was probably shaving on the regular by 6th grade. Gawd, 6th grade. Zero critical thinking, just “grown women do it, I want to be grown up.” The same mindless approach I had to make-up and most of the rest of the trappings of femininity. Yes, my mother attempted to dissuade me–rather, she forbade certain things–but that just made me sure they were super-awesome. I wonder if I would have even listened to (explicitly or implicitly) feminist reasons against it.
I’m a bit late in this thread but what the hell?
In deep south Mexico many years ago when my grandmother was a young to-be married lady she was told that men who saw body hair considered the woman with the hair mature. Granny got hitched at a whopping 14 and she wanted this “maturity” promised by her friends advice: shave and more hair will grow. She got what she didn’t ask for. She never grew hair on her legs or armpits again. Who the hell really understands social norms?
I don’t shave my legs unless a full long display is already booked. I agree, it’s way too much time and money. And when the impromptu quicky with the old-reliable disposable booty call comes up I have never heard of fuss over it. Seems like the only people to comment are the ones who won’t or don’t expect to be getting anything later.
That being said I have also caught my co-workers looking at my armpits whenever they are flashed while working out in our government approved work-out uniform. And shockingly no one has ever been stupid enough to say a word. It pays to actually voice an opinion a few times?
To add to the above when Ocean_Breeze was just a little Ocean_Squirt I found the man I was destined to marry and promptly divorce a year and a half later. Mr. Ex was insistant on certain grooming and brazillian bikini wax (no hair on the moohaha or anus AT ALL) along with shaving of the legs, armpits, and stomach was expected to be done religiously.
Never again. And he had enough back and body hair to donate to locks of love.
@oceanbreeze: Ain’t it always that way? I dated a guy once who was a total hair-phobe and insisted on complete depilation of basically everything but my head (including my moohaha, which is now my new favorite vagina euphemism). And yet he had no problem with his own body hair, which was so abundant he looked like he was wearing a black angora sweater. Go fucking figure.
I shave about once a week, less in winter, and hardly ever above the knee. It’s pretty useless since I’m already stubbly again by the next day. I also regularly forget to shave my pits, but usually do so once I notice how hairy the situation has gotten. As for the bikini line, I stayed blissfully naive for a very long time about the supposed “need” to groom my nether regions. My skin is really sensitive down there, and the bumpy red mess that results from shaving is actually far less attractive than just leaving things au natural. My SO is fairly hairy, which is pretty much the norm in his home country, and even he feels the hairless press here. I wanted to get him a professional massage as a gift after a particularly tough stretch of work that left his back a mess, and he was really resistant. He finally confessed that he was embarrassed by how hairy he is, and thought it would gross out the masseuse. That made me sad. Needless to say, he’s never said word one about my grooming habits (or lack thereof as is often the case).
It’s funny, when I stopped shaving our daughter was 2, so she doesn’t remember me shaving. My mom, though, who is a feminist down the line (but a first-wave one), was pretty upset that I wasn’t encouraging my daughter to shave. She was worried that not doing so would subject her to nasty remarks, and she was no doubt right.
As it turned out, our daughter decided on her own to shave and still does so (in her early 20′s). She understands why I don’t and I understand why she does. But she doesn’t shave her pubes, so we have no conflict. I’d be sad if she did, but she’s smart and aware, and it’s her body and her life.
@ BeckySharper
Yep that sounds about right. Why exactly should we look like 9 year olds with tits I have never understood. And they can be as fucking nasty as they bloody well please and always seem to get away with it.
And yes…. The AMAZING Moohaha! It’s amazing the amount of delight, shame, secret, controversy and power that one body part can generate.
I’ve got hairy French Canadian genes thanks to my dad. I’ll shave my lower legs once a week, and the upper legs maybe once every two weeks. If I’m really feeling the mood to trim, I will trim my pubes to 1/4″ or so, but the razor or wax is never going to go there. (It helps that I came of age in the bush friendly 80′s) It’s purely a token assimilation to the patriarchy – I don’t have strong opinions either way. Sure, freshly shaved legs feel nice, but laziness also feels nice.
I have a few boob hairs, but stopped stressing about these after a conversation with a few random friends when I found out they had them too.
I shave pretty regularly, before any long-lasting lights on nooky, but not before any roll around in the semi-dark nooky. I guess I figure if there is only leg-leg contact, Boy won’t be able to tell whether my legs are smooth because his are not.
I don’t have my armpits very regularly, because, frankly, I have luxurious underarm hair which would make J.D. seethe with jealousy.
When my sister and I were kids, we would pretend to shave with the cap off of the shampoo bottle. I don’t remember ever watching anyone shave, but I definitely wanted to.
Also, a couple of days ago I bought a pack of that Smooth Away Hair Remover (As seen on TV!) because I wanted to see how it worked. It was $10 for 6 tiny pieces of 800 grit wet/dry sandpaper and a bright green plastic carrying case. Yup, sandpaper. I had picked it up on the way to a party, and when I whipped it out every lady at the table was like: I’ve been wanting to see how that worked! Turns out, it works exactly like sandpaper.
I don’t “shave” my armpits regularly, I HAVE armpits constantly. Thank God!
@bellacoker
Ouch. Doesn’t sound too pleasant. Did it at least work? How about them red bumps, did they appear?
So Smooth Away should really be labelled “The Shin Shredder”? How does that take off hair and NOT completely leave your legs looking like ground chuck?
@bella: I always wondered how that stuff could “smooth away” hair without smoothing away your entire epidermis.
At some point in the late 80s/early 90s, MamaSharper bought one of those Epilady thingies that looks like an electric razor. The ladies on the TV commercials were all smiley and cheerful as they used them but it turned out the “rotating coils” grabbed your leg hair and yanked it out by the roots, but slower and more painfully than waxing. I think Mom used it like, once.
Another one with hairy French-Canadian genes here, and I’ve given up shaving anything on my lower half because I get unsightly and painful ingrown hairs that leave bad scars and its just really not worth it. Besides, out of all the relationships I’ve had maybe ONE actually cared about body hair, and he was pretty much a jerk anyways; most of the others have said straight out that it seems like an awful lot of hassle for something that really doesn’t matter.
The pits though, those are a fashion statement. Those I leave hairy and flaunt them too, because it’s fun to notice people noticing sometimes. Immature? Possibly. So what.
Hmmm very few people seem pleased with their hair growth. I myself am Cuban/Mexican and while my hair growth is not dense it’s like California redwood thick. I bleed in every individual hair even when I attempt to just shave anything. To top it I’ve got that wonderful condition that makes your skin crack and bleed no matter how much medicated vasaline shit I put on.
Sexy.
@becky: I had an Epilady and it destroyed my legs. Not only was it painful, but – like Tory – I am prone to ingrown hairs and that thing was the worst as far as that went.
Ooh, my Crazy Aunt Bev got me an Epilady when I was like 14. I used it religiously on the two square inches of skin I could stand before the pain got to be too much. To its credit, there is now noticeably less hair on those two inches than on the rest of my legs. I outgrew my willingness to endure pain for beauty long before I ever moved beyond those two inches though.