Ingrown hair can be quite annoying. They can be itchy, painful, and even irritating. Ingrown hairs can occur anywhere from your underarms to legs and the jawline to your bikini line. No matter where they show up, ingrown hairs are pretty frustrating. Ingrown hairs are the hairs that have curled back in the skin rather than growing outside the skin surface. They are popular in people having curly, thick, or coarse hair. They generally occur at places where you shave the skin.
Signs of ingrown hair include:
- Rashes
- Irritation or itchy skin
- Razor Burn
The area around the ingrown hair may look like a raised bump that may even look similar to a pimple. That bump can frequently become reddish, sensitive, and irritated, and may also fill with pus.
Tips To Prevent Ingrown Hair:
Prepare for Hair Removal: Preparing properly for body hair removal can help prevent ingrown hair. You should wash the area that you want to shave using a gentle soap thoroughly. You can use a shaving gel or cream to decrease friction.
Ensure to use a new razor that can make accurate shave. Old blades can leave jagged cuts increasing the chances for ingrown hairs.
Natural Exfoliation: You can use homemade exfoliators as well to decrease ingrown hairs. Some ingredients can be scrubbed to decrease dead skin cells. They include salt, sugar, coffee, and baking soda.
Over-The-Counter Products: Many over-the-counter products are also available to treat and even prevent ingrown hairs. For example, tea tree oil can help prevent ingrown hairs by killing bacteria, bringing down swelling, and reducing redness. Creams containing salicylic acid help open the follicles and pores, thus prevent them from blocking.
Never Tweeze: At times, it can be alluring to use a tweezer if you find a stray hair somewhere. But if you tweeze hat hair, it can leave a hair fragment under the skin, resulting in ingrown hairs and inflammation.
Consider Trimming: It is not necessary to shave fully. When you trim instead of removing the hair completely, the hairs that are left are long enough to not grown back in the skin.
Try a Serum: There are many serums available in the market that can help prevent ingrown hair. Many of such serums contain chemical exfoliants such as salicylic acid that can slough off the dead cells in the skin so that the hair can start growing normally. A few of the serums have antibacterial ingredients such as tea tree oil that can assist you in reducing the risk of infection and soothing ingredients such as aloe to prevent irritation.
You can leave some minor ingrown hairs alone, and they will go away without doing anything. But if the hair is visible and is near the skin, you can then use a sterile tweezer or needle to tease it out gently. Never try to dig the hair that is deep inside the surface of your skin.