Does Shaving Make You Hairy?

It has been believed for many years that shaving will make your hair growth thicker and darker. This idea is in place because the top of the hair has a finer tip and when this is cut off by shaving, the same hair growing through the skin will feel prickly, due to a bigger surface area of hair being exposed. Certain areas of the body and men’s faces have courser hairs present, these hairs are called terminal hairs. Very fine hairs known as vellus are never going to feel as prickly after shaving due to the smaller hair circumference.

The factors that can influence and increase hair growth are our hormones. This maybe due to puberty or menopause or an imbalance in hormones through a disease, disorder or certain medications. Genetics also can determine how much hair growth we have. Prolonged irritation from a plaster cast can increase hair growth in the area as this result is a natural mechanism to protect the skin.

Gliding a blade over the skin and cutting the hair off at the surface simply cannot influence the hair growth. The hair does not send a signal down to the hair follicle to indicate change in hormones or genetics and the action of cutting a hair is not considered prolonged constant irritation.

The finer the hair the less prickly feeling you will have after shaving or a derma-plane session. Course hair is sometimes better treated through waxing, electrolysis or Intense Pulsed Light/Laser treatments. These methods of hair removal make the hair feel smoother coming through, as the fine tip is still in tact and the later two treatments are reducing hair by destroying the growth ability in the hair follicle.

Happy hair removal to you.