By ViquÃ©-Ocean Kahinju
A hairy body is every womanâ€™s nightmare. Todayâ€™s trendy woman and a few men use hair removal creams, or wax their entire bodies just to get rid of hair.

Florence Ndiwalana of Beauty Tips Parlour in Kampala says waxing is a semi-permanent form of hair removal. Unlike shaving, waxing removes hair from its roots, and it grows back after two to eight weeks.

In addition, waxing can work where shaving equipment cannot reach, for instance the nose and ear hair. â€œAny area of the body ranging from the back, eyebrows, upper lip, face, bikini area, legs, arms, underarm, abdomen and feet can be waxed,â€ she says.

But much as the hair grows back, especially for thick hairy bodies, waxing is effective for removal of large amounts of hair, however, the procedure is a little painful.

The cost of waxing depends on the body area. Waxing the legs goes for between sh25,000 to sh30,000, bikini area sh40,000, arms sh30,000, chest sh40,000 and eyebrows sh20,000.

How waxing is done
Clare Adong, a waxing expert at Pauline Beauty Centre in Kampala, says waxing is in two categories; strip and hard.
With strip waxing, wax is applied faintly over the hairy area and a paper or piece of cloth is pressed on the skin and pulled off swiftly.

With hard waxing, wax is abundantly applied on the skin and left to cool and harden for about five minutes. The hairs are then used to plucked with the fingers. Adong says hard waxing is less painful and needs to be applied on people with a sensitive skin, she cautions.

Dr. Humphrey Kalyesubula, a dermatologist at Kampala Skin Consultants Centre, says waxing can be dangerous if not done by a specialist.
Bad hair plucking wounds the hair follicles and can lead to folliculitis, a condition where the hair follicles become inflamed and infected.

â€œOvertime, it results in ingrown hairs, a swelling or painful pimples filled with puss, especially if oneâ€™s skin is very sensitive,â€ he clarifies.

If the condition is not treated immediately, it can result in infections that may lead to permanent hair loss or scarring to the particular skin area, he adds.

Waxing can inflame the skin, causing hyper pigmentation (inflammation of the skin). These swellings manifest as dark patches on the plucked area.

Melanin (the pigment responsible for skin colouration) forms deposits from the effect of plucking, but this depends on oneâ€™s skin type.

In some instances, poor eyebrow waxing can lead to permanent loss of the eyebrow hairs permanently in some people, Kalyesubula explains.

In order to get rid of ingrown and excessive hairs, regular exfoliation (body scrubbing with apricot scrub) and applying baby oil can nip the problem in the bud, she adds.