My man slated me for being too hairy & having more fuzz than him, so I gave up shaving & haven’t used a razor in 5 years
A WOMAN who hasn't shaved in five years has revealed how she dumped one of her flings for calling her "too hairy".
Esther Calixte-Bea made the decision to stop shaving at 22, becoming tired of the social norms stating women have to be completely hair-free.
Now 27-years-old, she has revealed that having body hair makes her feel sexier than ever.
Esther hasn't picked up a razor in five years in an attempt to embrace her fuzz - but it hasn't been met warmly by all of her dates.
“There was one time when I was seeing this guy who did make a comment saying that he wouldn’t date a girl that’s hairier than him,” she said. “And I thought, how odd.
“I ended that relationship entirely because I didn’t feel like that was productive or that I wanted to be with a man like that.
read more real life
“Other than that there have been plenty of men who have been okay with my hair.
“There was a guy who was really into me and I had never told him about the fact I had chest hair.
“I decided to tell him because I kinda knew he was in love with me, so I thought that by telling or showing him that I have chest hair, he would stop liking me because I didn’t like him.
“Once I showed it to him, he still liked me. I had never experienced that before.”
Most read in Fabulous
Esther decided to keep her body hair because she found it was growing back thicker whenever she removed it.
“My body hair became longer, thicker, darker and blacker," she explained. "I was going crazy.
“If I’m supposed to remove it, why is it growing back?
“That’s what I’ve been taught since I was a kid and I never questioned it, because I have to remove my body hair simply because I’m a woman.
“But then I started questioning and realising that those ideas didn’t come from me, but from society."
Esther remembers being bullied for her body hair as a young child, and the comments took her a long time to overcome.
Among the cruel insults were "Chewbacca" after the hairy Star Wars character and "ape".
“There was a moment in school where my friends had seen the hair on my stomach and I remember their really exaggerated reaction that made me feel really insecure," she said.
“When I got to high school I remember seeing so many girls getting bullied or teased because they had hairy arms or body hair, so it made me shy and insecure.
“I was making sure that nobody could see my body hair.
“Another time someone had filmed me as a joke, and other times people just stared at me really badly.”
Despite the traumatising comments, Esther has since decided to embrace every hair on her body.
She is refuting the societal teaching that women's body hair is "unhygienic, ugly and undesirable".
“I had to question growing up, why did I even hate my body hair?" she said.
“I had to realise it was society... like, I hated my body hair but I also hated removing it because it was so painful."
Ditching the razor has made Esther "feel free".
“I’m much happier today, I’m able to analyse certain things in my life and what’s good for me and what’s not, so no, I will never go back to how I was - ever," she said.
READ MORE SUN STORIES
“When we embrace ourselves, we are much stronger.
“It’s important to have more confidence in ourselves, to build that confidence so we’re not swayed by false ideas and detrimental ideas as well, to our health and our mental health as well.”