THE bush is back in fashion, according to Vogue. HALLELUJAH!
At last our natural, pheromone-catching, abrasion, injury and pathogen-protecting locks can be celebrated rather than causing offence.
For years now I’ve been freely leaving my garden (for that read woodland or even rainforest) to its own devices and it feels wonderful.
I find shaving in general an utter chore so even removing the hair on the body parts that are on display happens on the rarest of occasions.
My grandfather is from Burma and while the tanned skin and Cleopatra eyes skipped my genetic make-up, I inherited the full hairy gene. Excellent.
Going through adolescence looking like a hormone experiment wasn’t easy.
From the age of ten I was a full blown fuzz ball to the point that my so-called friends called me ‘Hairy McLary From Donaldson’s Dairy.’
I was desperate to shave but I wasn’t allowed to. My mum finally let me wax when I went up to senior school and it was barbaric. The pain! My gosh, the pain!
As if the leg, arm, belly and back hair weren’t enough I started to grow a beautiful, thick, black, extra-long allotment in my private areas.
Over time those hairs merged down my leg. I couldn’t tell where my leg hair ended and my pubes began.
When I was at school pubic hair was considered disgusting. I had no idea until that horrid and awkward sex education lesson in PSE where you all sit round an ancient TV and the teacher puts on a video to explain the birds and the bees.
A man’s body appeared on the screen with full bush. Nothing. Total silence. A woman entered with full bush and the kids were literally saying “Yuk”, “That’s disgusting”, “Shave ya bush”.
As I got older and I started to ponder the notion that someone might one day see what’s underneath my knickers, I began talking about it with my friends who all told me they were shaving it off.
In fact they couldn’t believe I hadn’t started. “It’s so much cleaner,” they all told me. “It’s not about sex it’s about being clean!” and even “How can you even have hair there – especially on your period?”
I was shocked. I had so many questions: “Shave it all off? Or leave some?”, “What the hell is a Brazilian?”
They all had different answers but the majority were adamant that no hair at all is prettier and cleaner.
So I went home that night and decided that I was getting rid of my disgusting, dirty, ugly, barbed wire bush.
I have to admit it was harder than I thought. After getting rid of the initial mound there was hair in places I didn’t even know existed.
I wasn’t sure if it was even safe to be putting a razor to those parts. How far does one go? Does all of mean ALL off?
After over an hour, five orange Bic razors and a couple of accidents, from which I thought I’d never recover, I stared down at myself and couldn’t help but think, “Ew… what have I done?”
It looked like a plucked chicken. Even worse it looked like I was a child again. Who in their right mind finds this attractive?
Then came the itch. After a couple of days of feeling extremely airy and wired down below the hairs started to grow back. And they grew back with a vengeance.
I could feel each and every hair making an angry protest through the skin, fighting to resurface as if to say “How dare you try and get rid of me like that.”
It was soooooo itchy. I must have spent most of college looking like I had crabs because whenever it grew back I would spend the next two weeks scratching myself. And then there were the ingrown hairs.
If I could throw anything into room 101 it would be ingrown hairs.
Even when I don’t shave I get them so you can imagine the infestation after shaving thick wiry, curly hairs.
After I had Zachary, now 10, I stopped shaving altogether.
It helped that no one was coming within a mile radius of my vagina after the trauma of childbirth but it was also because, when I was pregnant and went for my first appointment with a gynaecologist, I remember being extremely embarrassed about my untrimmed bush. So much so that I didn’t want her to do a swab.
She informed me that it was imperative that she did and as I got into the gown, I said, “I’m so sorry, I haven’t shaved and it looks disgusting.”
She looked at me in horror and the 17-year-old me assumed she’d refuse to do the swab and send me back to shave and wash.
Much to my surprise, her horrified look was because she couldn’t believe that I was apologising and so ashamed of my natural hair.
She went on to explain to me that pubic hair is an important part of our bodies and that it serves many purposes.
Firstly, despite your friends telling you it’s cleaner to shave, hair around that area traps bacteria and pathogens and stops it from reaching our important bits.
Secondly, it’s a buffer for friction and, finally, it apparently traps pheromones which will eventually attract a mate. Who needs Tinder?
If that wasn’t enough to put me off of shaving then the cost in razors (it takes at least two decent branded razors for a clean shave), the pain of ingrown hairs, knicker chaffing and general baby feeling was enough for me to put down the razor and allow my relationship with my rainforest to flourish – together in harmony.
So you can imagine my joy at the prospect of this becoming “cool” and “on trend” thanks to Vogue.
Now my friends won’t think I’m gross.
In fact, they’ll all be sporting the bush like me!
Stacey previously revealed the reason she is happy to give her hairy legs an airing on holiday.
Last week she told how boyfriend Joe Swash changed her life and made her love herself, just like Love Island's Megan with Wes.
And she revealed she has tried Botox and why she would never do it again.
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