K I'm gonna pretend I did not just read the last few posts, and jump in about my brand new epilator.

IT"S AMAZING!!!!

I've never epilated before, but I've been interested ever since I read about them. (My Keeper/Mooncup was such an awesome discovery, surely an epilator would be similarly wonderful) Previously, all I've ever done for hair removal was shave. I didn't know there WERE other options for the longest time. My sister tried Nair once on her legs when it came out- horrible chemical burns. I eventually learned to tweeze my eyebrows. Once tried to tweeze bikini line- after an hour I had a neck cramp and it looked like I hadn't done anything at all so I gave that up in a hurry- plus it hurt a lot.

Still, I knew I wanted to try an epilator, so my husband finally bought me one. Philips Satinelle 6401- a simple grey/white machine, has a very long cord and must be plugged in to work.

I did my legs first from ankle to knee. I took a shower beforehand like recommended. Above my ankle turned out to be the most sensitive area, and also has the highest concentration of hairs. Like tiny little bees stinging me- but as soon as I lift up the epilator, it's instant relief, so I just went slowly as was fine. My legs didn't turn red or get painful bumps. They didn't feel completely smooth either, but they LOOKED fantastic, so I'm happy.

After going back to work (I epilated at about noonish) I changed out of my skinny jeans to find red legs that were slightly painful to the touch like razor burn. Sleeping fixed most of that, and by noon the next day all was well.

During my shower on leg-epilating day, I also shaved underarms and pubic area. After a few days, I have just finished doing those areas! I did NOT shower before using the epilator this time. While it may make things easier on your skin by opening up pores, I also feel that the hot water weakens the hair and makes it easier to break it off rather than pull it out.

Underarms were interesting. Because of sweat glands, it was difficult to move the epilator smoothly without it sticking to me. I've since read that baby or talcum powder would help that, but I simply removed the efficiancy cap with it's wide flat area and let the rotating of the disks sort of gently "pull" the epilator along smoothly. Again, I went slowly, but I think my ankles hurt worse than this. Maybe I just knew what to expect. Some of the lower pores bled a teeny bit. The vibration of the epilator itself I think helped with pain a little bit too.

After underarms (which did not hurt at all once I was done), I went to the pubic area. My goal was to do all the visible hair- so the entire triangle down to about the start of the labia crease. I found the edges to be no problem, although each side of the triangle up toward the hip bled a lot. The hairs are a LOT longer than they would seem, with most of the length under the skin, apparently. I was surprised. The center top of the triangle was most sensitive, I think, but near the edge of the labia was the most difficult. The hair there is very fine and hard to see, but packed in close, and that skin is softer. It was easier to do the left side of myself than the right, for some reason.

After I was all done, I realized it had been about an hour and a half, and my neck was sore from looking down for that long. I hopped in the shower. The water stung my underarms, and then of course when I washed that stung the beejeesus out of them, but I wanted to be sure things were clean since I'd just put a whole bunch of tiny open wounds in myself, right? Pubic area didn't care about anything.

Now I'm sitting here, and underarms sort of sting still. It had gotten bad enough that I went and put cocoa butter on them, but now it seems to be okay. Pubic area is wonderfully silent as far as irritation complaints go. I've got on silky smooth boyshorts just in case.


I'm SO happy with this little machine!!