DO NOT TAKE THIS AS ADVICE

I’m gonna share how I shave, but I’m not going to pretend as if it is optimal or works for everyone. I have very dense and stubborn hair that, for some reason, I can only successfully shave if I go against the grain. Across and with the grain just doesn’t really remove much hair, and my hair grows in such wild directions that I have multiple places in my body (arms, legs, chest, and back) where I have to take multiple passes in different directions. As far as I’m aware, this is not typical, at least not to the degree I have to deal with.

I’ll start with how I shave my face, since that’s pretty easy. I started with an electric shaver when I first started getting hair from puberty. I stuck with that until very recently, when I switched to a safety razor. Electric shavers are really easy to use, but they don’t give you as good of a shave, and the cost of replacing the shaving heads is ridiculously high. With a safety razor (and Cremo shaving cream), I get an incredibly close shave, and I can get by with 5 shaves on a blade, so it’s around 2-4¢/shave. I shave against the grain in a single pass over my entire beard area up to my cheeks, and that gets me a very good shave. The only sign I have hair there is the shadow above my lips, and I’m hopefully gonna be starting laser soon to treat that (and the rest of my body). Use very, very little pressure; let the blade do the work. I invested in a nice safety razor (Leaf twig), and I’ve loved it so far. There’s a learning curve, and you will cut yourself at first, but eventually it just becomes second nature. Cartridge razors are generally easier, but it’s harder to reach difficult areas, like right below your nose. Many of them come with blades on a different edge that you can use as a trimmer for tough to reach areas, so use that where necessary if you choose to go that route.

As for my body, I use cartridge razors. Specifically, I use the Billie razor, and I use one razor for most of my body, and a different colored one for other, just because I don’t like using the same razor everywhere. The blades are exactly the same, it’s just a hygiene thing. I shave against the grain for all my hair, which means that I have to do multiple passes in different directions in problem areas, like my thighs. For instance, on the front half of my thighs, I shave upwards, on the back I shave downwards, and then I shave across starting from the back of my thigh and wrap around (in both directions). I do the same thing for my lower arms (below the elbow). My chest is a bit of a mess with hair growing in all sorts of directions, so I’ve had to learn what directions to shave in what locations and I can now easily shave my entire torso in 5 minutes (at least the front side). My back is tricky because I can’t see what I’m doing, but I have great flexibility, so I can reach it all on my own. The worst areas to shave for me are my genitals, and between my buttocks, the latter if which being the worst because I can’t see anything and it’s such an awkward and dysphoric area.

Since I have so much hair and shaving is so strenuous, I shave my body in sections. I split my main areas into 3, and I do one per day: 1. legs and buttocks, 2. chest and back, 3. arms. I also alternate every other day between: 1. armpits, 2. genitals. Those areas I find grow especially fast, so I need to take care of them more frequently. I shave my face every day.

I plan on getting full body hair removal in the future (laser and electrolysis), so hopefully one day I no longer have to worry about shaving, but for the time being it is a chore and a half. It’s a huge amount of effort to keep consistently shaven, and I often find myself missing days (sometimes multiple days in a row) because I just can’t find the motivation to do it. But there is something you need to understand: shaving is something you do for you, not for others. You get to choose how often you do it, and that choice is yours alone.