Death by slow, painful plucking
April 28, 2006 by Christina Jones
Filed under Hair removal, Product Reviews
In the interest of not cluttering up the last post, I thought torture devices like the Epilady deserve their own post – have you tried this little gem? Do you enjoy plucking the hair out of your legs, one at a time?
Now, to be fair, it has been close to 20 years since I have tried the Epilady, they well could have found a way to minimize the pain, or increase the plucking speed. But when I tried this years ago – OMG – pure torture. Slow, painful plucking of your hundreds of leg hairs. No thanks. SP from AgingFabulous mentioned that when she used it, she got a billion little red bumps on her legs afterwards. I didn’t ever make it that far to find that to be the problem, but it could have possibly been caused by several things – general inflamation from plucking when your legs arent accustomed to being plucked, bacteria, broken hairs rather than fully plucked hairs. I think your best bet to avoid the bumps is to use an exfoliator before you use the Epilady – and wash very well afterwards, to avoid any infection getting in to your hair follicles. I would give Epilady another shot now that I am older, tougher and more pain resistant – but I probably won’t.
If you want to try the Epilady Duet (pictured above), which is double sided – one side is the classic “Epilady pluck” and the other side is an electric shaver. It is available at drugstore.com for $49.69, which is a good bit less expensive than it was when it came out, 20 or so years ago. And if you do try it, or are using it, please share your comments, I would love to hear about it!!
I’ve been using the little devices ever since they came out- 20 years ago. First it was the original Epilady, later I upgraded to Braun. My current one is Braun’s Silkepil SoftPerfection. It plucks even the tiniest hairs.
I got used to the feeling years ago, and it no longer stings. I do it while reading or surfing the net and really don’t pay much attention to it, just to make sure I reach all the stray hairs. Never had an infection or any problem. I just wish it’d be quicker.
Another advantage is, that like waxing (which my skin can’t tolerate), over time you have less and less hair.
Thanks so much for the comment, Gaia. I have been waxing my legs over the last day and thinking/wondering if I should give one of these a try again. How long does it take you to cover your legs? That is a big downfall for me, I could stand the pain if it were quicker. Just one or two hairs at a time is crazy.
hi christina… i really like your blog, keep up the good work, ive added u to my blogroll hope u dont mind.
btw, about this epilady thing – doesnt it hurt like hell?!?! my friend uses this and she swears by them, do u think there is a difference between this and waxing? (i do neither, but im just curious haha) i mean, my friend goes through 30 mins of pain when she can get rid of it in 2 minutes, so surely there must be some kinda difference in the result?
anyways, i’ll be back again tomorrow!
love renee
It’s not really two hairs at a time- more like 7 or so
I use it ankle to top of my thighs and can usually finish both legs in less then 10 minutes. Could probably do it quicker if I wasn’t reading all the while, or if it bothered me.
I think it actually hurts less if the hair is still very short- it minimizes the pulling.
Another advantage- you can just do quick touch ups when and where needed, and that only takes a minute or so.
I know that these things vary from person to person- I can’t do waxing, because of the flaying factor.
Thanks for the extra info, Gaia – between you guys and SP, I am almost convinced to give this a shot again. Especially as I have been waxing my legs and I have such a hard time getting to the backs of them. Hmm. I might hunt down that Braun and see what it does for me.
Heh… I have my memories of the Epilady and they closely ressemble yours!! I was like 15 when I first tried it and there was much pain, much swearing and quite a bit of crying too.
After swearing I’d never use one again, the Silkepil came long… used that for a number of years. The models that came out in the last couple of years are even better. It’s definitely worth trying again