The Hair Down There

A feminist writer wonders why she’s so quick to pull off her pants and expose herself to a stranger in the hedonistic and masochistic ritual that is the bikini wax.

Illustrations by Sophie Yanow

Internationally touring writer, poet, performer and educator — and longtime Narratively contributor — Caroline Rothstein will be teaching Deeply Personal: Writing First-Person Essays on Raw and Difficult Topics for Narratively Academy this month. Today, we’re excited to reshare this Narratively Classic from Caroline, an exhaustive look at a topic that’s well…about as deeply personal as it gets!

The year was 2013. I was four and a half years into a relationship I didn’t know was soon to end. I was 31. Regularly waxing my pubes. The ways we talked about gender and identity were expanding, but not yet nearly as far as they both could and would. Now, 11 years later, I still think about this piece a lot. Mostly because I stopped waxing altogether shortly before the pandemic. At 31, I wish I knew what I know now: that I actually like having lots of hair down there, and all the years of waxing and thinning the hair bums me out. I suppose that too is reflexive of t…