Chinney Chin Chin Hairs

Today's topic is on chinney chin chin hairs compliments of a friend after she read the leg hair post.

Her question was: Why do hairs suddenly appear....... and appear to be 1-2 inches long overnight? I actually have thought of this before to research and blog about. Problem is I have senior brain farts a lot and never remembered this as a possible blog post when I am wracking my brain trying to think of what I am going to blog about. I have often thought of carrying around a tape recorder to record those thoughts but then I would have to remember where I put the tape recorder. For those of you who would say, well then just leave it on all the time - I answer nope - I talk to myself. I wouldn't want to actually listen to myself and weed through all the crap I say before I got to what I was looking for. That would be kinda scary. I could put it on a post it note but then again the problem is finding the post it note plus I have been known as the 'post it note lady' already and quite a few get fed to the washer quite often. Actually more often than naught.

So back to the chinney chin chin hairs. I remember my first chin hair. It was like having a gigantic pimple on your face, yanno the one that the whole world sees right away? But there it was, a single hair growing from my chin, about a half inch in length, all by itself, blowing in the wind, appearing out of nowhere. At first, I thought I had drooled and it crusted or my lunch had hit my chin instead of my chest and it was dried and caked on. So I excused myself and quickly went to the bathroom holding my chin. But after scrubbing, I realized it was the dreaded chinney chin chin hair. I went back to work but I was sitting there rubbing my chin thinking - Wowsers.....is this a beard? Everyone was looking at me, I just knew it. So I kept my hand discreetly up on my chin for the rest of the day.

My first hair was just the one easily tweezed thick hair (the rest of my body has really thin hair so I knew this was definitely an alien foreign thang). But this came out overnight. As soon as I got home, I got out my makeup mirror and put it to the magnifying side, picked up my tweezers and plucked that baby out spit spot. But a month later, there came 2. Soon there was a whole crop bursting out (the more light you put on them the more they seemed to show up).

It was like one day I had a nice clean chin. The next day I had one. Few months pass I feel like I looked like a nanny goat. Then to top it off my hairdresser said to me one day: "Yanno, I think we need to start shaving you." I about peed my pants. I think I screamed but I am not admitting to anything. But sure enough, with her mirror that magnifies everything a zillion times, there was a whole crop that popped up on my face too. My only consolation was that at least they were light in color. Hairdresser says: "Don't worry about it - you can hardly see them." I was like now that you pointed them out, I can see them. So I decided I would handle this by never looking in magnifying mirrors or be anywhere in public in the daylight. I also learned to dab my makeup on with a sponge instead of rubbing it on with my fingertips since that makes the hairs less prominent. Every once in a while I allow my hairdresser to shave me.

Back to chinney chin chin hairs. It’s so humiliating to have chin hairs. They just seem to appear out of nowhere. Not there one day, here the next. It doesn’t matter whose terms I’m going by, the chin hairs invade my sense of self in such a horrible way. I think though I was more upset because this ran through my mind: why hadn't anyone told me I could pass for Santa complete with a beard?

Recently, the overgrowth has migrated to my nostrils. Men are just as prone to the wild hair phase of aging which manifests as mad scientist eyebrows and back hair, so I guess I should be grateful for a few chin whiskers and a hair or two in my nose.

So the brainiac in me wanted to know the why. Why did I get this? As a younger woman, I dealt with thin eyebrows after a close encounter with the windshield of my car. But as I aged, those thin eyebrows became even thinner. So did they migrate down to my chin? Everything else sags south as you age, why not chin hairs too?

Well, although that might be one possible reason, facial hair may begin to grow in women as a result of the natural aging process. Every woman has a normal amount of male hormones (called "androgens") in her body. As we age, our body produces more of these androgens which may cause an increase in hair growth on the chin, upper cheeks or neck area. It is also related to the decline of estrogen. Though heredity or age are most of the reasons, some facial hair growth can be linked to underlying medical conditions that can cause an increase in androgen production, which in turn causes facial hair. One cause of excess androgens in the body is obesity. Fat retains androgen, so the more overweight a person is, the more androgen is kept in the body, potentially causing some male-patterned hair growth. Other medical causes for excessive hair growth can be polycystic ovary syndrome, or hormonal fluctuations due to pregnancy or menopause.

So now that we have the wire chinney chin chin hair, what can we do about getting rid of them? Googling the subject, I have picked up a few hints on removal:

1. Put some eye shadow on your chin. They really seem to show up then. If you have dark chin hairs use white eyeshadow. If they are white or lighter ones, use a darker eyeshadow. If they are those wiry stick straight out ones, you don't need shadow at all. Remember to wash off the shadow though. You could get some strange looks. I did that once. I just said I was trying out a new makeup style and it was supposed to take inches off off your chin and make you look younger (they actually believed me which proved to me they weren't high in the gene pool). Anyway, get yourself good tweezers and go plucking them away. Just remember tweezing can cause that hair to become ingrown so you might have to try exfoliating before they turn into a huge red pimple on your chin. Tweezing them is also why they suddenly pop out overnight - there is actually a bump there with the hair in it curled up as if it was in its cocoon. It waits until it is about a half inch then it pops out, much in the same way a chick comes out of an egg when it is ready.

2. Dye or bleach your chin hairs if there aren't that many and/or they're short. This will make them much less noticeable and save you the hassle of the next steps.

3. Shave and exfoliate if you have more than a bit of bristle. Shaving your chin hairs is a continual, short-term solution but it's simple and safe.

4. Wax persistent chin hair or just to achieve a smoothness that shaving cannot. Home waxing kits are readily available, but make sure you have time to spend by yourself as your face can become very irritated.

5. Apply hair removal cream such as Nair. Alternatively try a hair retardant like Vaniqa which will inhibit key enzymes causing hair to grow back slower and thinner which makes plucking/waxing more effective and easier. As a person who is allergic to hair removal creams, please make sure you follow the directions on the box carefully and do a test spot first. Nothing like a really red chin to get you noticed. Maybe a bandanna if that happens?

6. You can always let them grow and if you get three of them you can braid them. Maybe even put a bead or two on the ends and say it's the latest fashion trend.