Has this ever happened to you during a bikini wax?

By NICKY CHAMP

So there you are lying on a white, paper lined table, legs akimbo while a complete stranger smears hot wax around your genitalia and continues to rip it off while casually asking, ‘So, what have you got planned this weekend?’

Nup, nothing strange about that.

If like me, you find the whole bikini waxing process extremely awkward I’ve got some good news.

Introducing the Va j-j Visor, the product your vagina never knew it needed. Until now, obviously.

Think of it as the female version of a cricket ‘box,’ except it’s primary use is for preventing pubic hair grooming injuries.

From the company’s website: “The Va j-j Visor allows you to remove more hair ‘down there’ than you ever thought possible (or perhaps than you ever knew existed!) by protecting your most sensitive skin from depilatory creams, hot wax, razors, and scissors, as well as during laser and electrolysis treatments. It also provides protection during hair coloring ‘down there’.”

(Wait, who’s hair colouring ‘down there?’ Is this a thing now?)

I know what you’re thinking, but how does the Va j-j Visor work? Well, it’s “a soft and flexible cup that covers the inner vulva area and naturally fits the shape of your body,” while apparently “your body’s natural muscular tension holds it effortlessly in place.”

Like I said, good news ladies! You can now make the bikini/brazilian waxing scenario even more awkward by telling your beauty therapist you need a moment before she begins to stick a brightly coloured helmet over your labia.

I don’t have anything against the Va-j-j Visor – except maybe the name – and I’m all for not injuring your lady parts but it does seem like we’re getting a raw deal with all this plucking, tweezing, waxing, depilatory-creaming, colouring, trimming and now donning of labia helmets while the menfolk just turn up to the party au naturel. And that’s not to say you have to do any of those things, bewhiskered and be free if that’s what you want.

I know I’d have a lot less cringe-worthy socially awkward moments in my life to worry about if I skipped visiting the beautician. I’m awkward enough without throwing in semi-nudity, inappropriate topics of conversation and did I mention I’m an introvert?

The first time I got a brazilian wax my body reacted in the most bizarre way to the searing pain, I laughed. And not just a chuckle, a weird hyena laugh. And then my nervous system threw in another fun reaction, perspiration.

By the end the papery thin sheet was soaked, I’d was embarrassed from laughing like some sadistic freak and I had turned a bright shade of purple.

I was pretty confident the therapist was going to talk about me as soon as I left. I never showed my face or my va-j-j there again.

Then there was the time I was at an industry event when a woman, an acquaintance, remembered me from somewhere but couldn’t quite place my name to my face.

You know why? It wasn’t my face she was used to seeing. “Oh, I’ve waxed your fanny before, that’s where I know you from! I’ve seen you naked!” she blurted out in front of my (male) boss at the time. Leaving me to wonder isn’t there some kind of beautician’s code of silence that should prevent this from happening?

Since then I’ve started a weird pattern of grooming. I drive 20 minutes out of my area to see a complete stranger to get bikini waxes, I see a different therapist for my eyebrow waxes and eyelash tints because she’s cheap and we’ve struck up a friendship, so therefore she could never see me naked it would be too weird. And I go to a specialised tanning salon for spray tans in summer.

I’ve hyperventilated in facials, walked off the bed during an eyelash-tint stumbling zombie-like into the reception area because I was experiencing the worst stinging, stabbing pain of my life and I had convinced myself I was going to go blind. I’ve fumbled my way through automatic tanning booths, worn disposable undies the wrong way round and had spray tanners have to physically move my limbs into position because I’ve frozen in place and can’t seem to remember my left from my right.

I can’t even act normal sitting in a hairdresser’s chair. I’d much prefer to bury my head in a book or magazine than make idle chitchat about weekend plans or what celebrity is wearing what. And since I’m in there for hours at times and I end up feeling guilty (usually just after the head massage) and vastly overcompensate during the blow-dry phase of the operation. Making up for it by covering off on really inappropriate topics of conversation and generally giving off the vibe that I have multiple personality disorder.

The va-j-j visor being critiqued! On television!

C’mon, I can’t be the only female who finds bikini waxes extremely awkward? What weird things have happened to you at the beauty salon?