ingrown hair hunting

[imbored2deth]

I get ingrown hairs on the right side of throat area fairly regularly. Beyond adjusting shaving technique, I will still probably get them because my hair lays flat and almost horizontal in that area. My current method is to use a handheld magnifying glass (you know, a smaller version of what sherlock holmes would use and it is a pita to use because i need both hands to make this work, leaving nothing free to root out the ingrowns. Does anybody know of a cheap (<$15) magnifying lens that may work here? For desks, you can buy a lighted magnifying lens thing but that is too bulky to put in the bathroom. Something you know of that I could mount to a flexbile arm (I could cobb job this). I need a third hand here with a 5-10X lens.

 

[TourettesTuna]

Hmm... I can't say much about magnifying glasses. You might be better of trying to find a magnifying cosmetic mirror. There are plenty of those floating arround, and you should be able to find the right mag for the right price.

Though, you may still want to varry your shaving protocol. Adjusting technique can help, but anything else in the shave could be causing ingrowns: I usually get them on the left side of my neck when I use a blade that doesn't agree with my face. Anthing from blade, razor, lather, or prep/facial care could be causing the problem. Could you outline what your products and procedures are? Also do you wash you face regularly?

Honestly, the world of wetshaving has so many varriables that you should be able to eventually reach the point of having no discomfort from a shave at all (or even feel better after a shave than you did before). Hopefully the good people of comunity can help you on your way.

 

[GD45]

Hmm... I can't say much about magnifying glasses. You might be better of trying to find a magnifying cosmetic mirror.

This. I've done the magnifying glass trick before too but a little while ago I went into a cosmetics store with my wife and they had all kinds of magnified mirrors and as soon as I lookeed in one, I realized that I was doing things the wrong way... this is gross, but the first thing i saw was a blackhead on my nose...I swear by the image in that mirror i could have scooped it out with a spoon (using both hands!)

 

[Dusty1]

Get a set of the needle point tweezers, they work like a charm.

 

[imbored2deth]

Yes, I agree on the tweezers. I recently bought a pair of tweezerman ingrown hair tweezers. I used them and they work very well. Shame I did not get them earlier. I was using a needle. It worked but what a pain.

I do have a magnified mirror but it is lacking. I will need to take a look at some others.

And to answer the topic of shaving protocol, I am currently trying to find a better way that fits me. I typically do not shave after a shower. I prefer shaving in the morning and showering at night. I usually wash my face at least 2X/day, usually 3X/day, with every man jack cleanser. It seems to work the best so far (I have tried a lot of other cleasners). My face is somewhat oily so I feel a need to clean it more than 2X/day.

I have been exclusively using a semogue boar brush.

For creams, it is either one of the four flavors of proraso, maca root from body shop, and KMF unscented (this stuff seems really good for me).

I have soaps of arko and VDH unscented.

I do not do well with DE's but I do have a Slim adj with Wilkinson blades that I can tolerate on occasion. What I do shave with now is the Atra type setup with a twin blade cartridge that pivots. This works very nice for me. Some may say that the twin blades are a detriment but it seems that either the DE or Atra razors gives me the same chances of ingrowns. I am trying to figure out the best angle for dealing with horizontal'ish hair. It is the frustration of having irritation when it is not quite right but I guess I will get there soon. The slim worked fairly well when I did a 4 on my face and then turned down to 2 on my throat area. I still have some ingrowns but it was getting better than previous attempts where I was just shaving N-S. A N-S pass on my throat is XTG for my hair pattern. The other frustration is getting flat hair to actually stand up, which it seemingly won't do for me.

 

[FancyDan]

You are gonna do what you want to do, but if I were to give any advice I would strongly recommend shaving AFTER a shower. The time in the shower with the hot steam and water opening your pores and softening the hairs on your face really helps in the preparation process, if you shave right when you get out of shower. This will help with the hairs being soft, and ready for the lather from the brush that will further lift the hairs and prepare the face.

Have you tried any other blades for a DE razor other than Wilkinson?

 

[imbored2deth]

Habits are ard to break with taking a shower and then shaving but yes I have considered doing this with shaving at night. I just prefer shaving in the morning but I am trying to break this.

Other blades I have tried: i bought a sampler from WCS that had feather, derby, personna, and a couple others. Also tried merkur and some others that I cannot recall right now. Of all of those, I found that the wilkinson's at walmart were the best. I reached my point of trying different combos with the DER and while there may be a viable option out there that I have not tried, I just can't bring myself to go through any more irritation from ingrowns/razor bumps.

 

[Jeff_H]

You may have tried it, but witch hazel really helped my skin. I would get the occasional ingrown when I used to shave with cartridges (nothing like you from the sounds of it though), but the witch hazel really helped just clear up the tone of my skin. I have always had really small blackheads all over my nose, too small for anyone to see unless they were really close, but they always bothered me. Acne cream, wash, blah blah blah, none of it worked. I just learned to live with it. Then I found witch hazel after I found DE shaving.

After several weeks of using it morning and night I really saw a great improvement. I used it right after shaving in the AM (it did sting a bit, so maybe non-alcohol if that bugs you) and then again before going to bed as a cleanser..all over. Also, my wife started to get a lot of small little hard bumps on her arms. Not pimples, nothing inside them...just hard little bumps. Witch hazel twice a day got rid of them after a few weeks use as well.

I'm not saying this will solve your problem, but maybe it could be something that you can add to your routine to get you a little closer. The best I have found is Thayer's with Aloe. They make it with and without alcohol and in several different varieties such as Lemon, Rose, Lavender, Unscented.

Maybe it will help. Retail about $10 a bottle. Used twice a day with one of those little exfoliating cotton pads you get at any drug store, a bottle should last you 2 months.

 

[Eeyore]

Wouldn't exfoliating your skin before shaving lessen the problem? Maybe you could also switch to face lathering, if you're not doing that already?

 

[imbored2deth]

My luck with witch hazel has been so-so. I do have the drugstore version (Dickinson's, I believe) which contains 14% alcohol. In all my experiments I never really isolated whether WH was helping along with getting irritation or not. I mean, ingrowns do irritate but I was not sure if the WH was making it worse or not. I could try an experiment and use it everyday (w/ or w/o shaving) and see how things go. I will pencil that in for perhaps a 5 day trial.

I have done exfoliation to a point. The products in the stores say to only use every other day. Many here will also state that shaving itself is an act of exfoliation. While I typically don't always read the directions to everything, with the irritation I had I always wanted to get that healed up before adding more factors. When I do the exfoliation I do use a toothbrush to apply. It is not a perfect system. While not the ideal to cure the problem, I have found that using anthony logistics ingrown treatment is pretty decent but I don't like the high cost. Effectively it is just a high priced exfoliator.

I mainly face lather anything shave cream/soap I have.

 

[imbored2deth]

Update: I have tried a couple of the ideas above with varying results.

1) Adding WH does not seem to all that detrimental as I fist thought. Lately I have been using dickinson 14% alcohol WH and I do ok on that. I don't think that I can categorically state that it helps with ingrowns or preventing them. The WH I had tried long ago was a version with Aloe. I am using WH with no aloe and it seems better.

2) I have been using my slim adj DE more on my throat area with both wilkinson and astra blades. Still get ingrowns to some extent. I don't really see a difference between the DE and twin blade cartridge razor in terms of helping with the problem.

3) The area that seems to help the most is prep. I have been trying various versions and lately I tried some musgo soap before shaving. This has been better for me but it has been only a week or so. I had pre-existing ingrowns that I have been trying to fix so I cannot say this is a cure all but it does help. Even though I like EMJ cleaner I am trying to get away from it because I think a bar soap is more economical.

4) I have seen a couple mirrors that I like for hunting of hairs but at $40 a pop I have a hard time justifying that purchase.

5) I think I just have to accept the fact that I cannot shave my throat area everyday and do it every other day.

Here is my question: One of my main problems with ingrown hunting is not just in finding them but making sure they stay dislodged. Time and time again I will free a trapped hair (say in the morning) and then come back in the afternoon after work and find that the hair has embedded itself once again. I keep repeating this time and again. Is there anything I can do to prevent the hair from re-embedding? Something like put some talcum powder, neosporin, etc on the problem area? I am not saying those will work but in my caveman approach to things I just wanted to get ideas out there. I have tried using anthony logistics ingrown treatment for this and it really does not help with this aspect. It does ok at exfoliating but it does not do well with keeping freed hairs free. Also it seems that I have become very sensitive to using this product too often and will get spotty redness it used too long.

 

[mblakele]

Do you cut these hairs short after freeing them, or leave them long?

You might try a dab of hydrocortisone lotion, to reduce inflammation. Or a dab of a balm containing allantoin: I believe Real Shaving Company and Nivea have options for that.

 

[imbored2deth]

Do you cut these hairs short after freeing them, or leave them long?

No, I leave them alone until the next shave.

You might try a dab of hydrocortisone lotion, to reduce inflammation. Or a dab of a balm containing allantoin: I believe Real Shaving Company and Nivea have options for that.

I will try this. I do have hydrocortisone and afta, which does have allantoin in it.

 

[Kotton]

Get a wife, and tell her to dig every time it festers up, lol, at least that's what I do when I get them.

I'm also thinking in a sense that you might be too clean. A little dirt don't hurt. If you are so clean that you're never dirty, the time that you don't have time to clean and you get dirty, your body will go wild, because it doesn't have any way to fight it off.

 

[will_i_ockham]

Have you tried bump patrol? I used to get a some of irritation and ingrown hairs on my neck and using bump patrol has helped, you can pick it up at Target.. Also just try going wtg only (1 or two passes) and use very short strokes.

 

[Guest111]

I ended up getting a lighted cosmetic mirror on an extension arm from BB&B. It ran me about $100, which I consider outrageous, but it's really, really useful for in-growns, blackheads, and other up close face tending.

 

[imbored2deth]

Have you tried bump patrol? I used to get a some of irritation and ingrown hairs on my neck and using bump patrol has helped, you can pick it up at Target.. Also just try going wtg only (1 or two passes) and use very short strokes.

I have bump patrol. It has some limited benefits but it still does not really address the underlying cause of the ingrowns which is not being to get the hair to stand up when during lathering and probably technique issues. I may revisit this as I have not used it in a while.

On my throat, I usually just do 1 WTG pass or as close as I can get WTG. Hair grows a bit funky there.

Get a wife, and tell her to dig every time it festers up, lol, at least that's what I do when I get them.

I'm also thinking in a sense that you might be too clean. A little dirt don't hurt. If you are so clean that you're never dirty, the time that you don't have time to clean and you get dirty, your body will go wild, because it doesn't have any way to fight it off.

Already have the wife. I prefer her not to be around that area as her eyesight is so-so and I may end up with tweezers installed in my throat.

I typically wash my face/neck 2X per day because I have a somewhat oily complexion. I am at risk for acne even though I should be well past that stage of life in my low 40s.

 

[Kotton]

I understand, I'm only 24, but I used to have oily skin and some acne on the forehead and around my chin. I used to wash my face to keep it at bay, but it never cured it. Quit washing my face because I didn't see the point in it anymore, and I very rarely get pimples anymore. If I do, it's because I went a couple of days without a shower, and they are more so sweat bumps. And I'm not a dirty person, I take a shower when I feel greasy-grimy, dang near everyday, but if I haven't done much and it's been a long day, but when i dont shower, I just rinse my face off with water at night and morning.