The Hair We’re Not Supposed to Have

Written by Vania Phitidis
Peaceful Eating Coach
Last updated on 10 July 2026

My mother is 89 and has dementia.

For much of her life, she cared about her appearance. Her hair mattered. The way she presented herself mattered. Like many women of her generation, grooming was part of how she moved through the world.

Now, some of those things have faded from her awareness.

She used to notice the hairs that appeared on her chin. Recently, when my sister and aunt visited her, one of the things they wanted to do was remove them.

It made me think about the women in my family, and the ways we have all inherited ideas about what women are supposed to look like.

My great-grandmother lived till her late 90s. I remember my great-aunt shaving her chin with an electric razor when she was that old.

Even then, there was still a feeling that this was something that needed taking care of.

I don’t say this as a criticism of my sister, my aunt or my great-aunt. It was an act of care.

But it did make me curious about where these expectations come from.

Because, of course, women grow hair.

That is simply part of being human.

And yet we grow up with very clear ideas about which hair is acceptable and which hair isn’t.

The hair on our heads is something to nurture and style.

Eyebrows are shaped.

Underarm hair is removed by many women without much thought.

Facial hair is something many of us feel we need to hide.

About ten years ago, I made a conscious decision to stop having bikini waxes.

It wasn’t an easy decision.

I felt uncomfortable at first. Almost apologetic.

How very dare I inflict my hair on the public?

It sounds absurd when I write it down, but that was genuinely how it felt. Somewhere along the way, I had absorbed the idea that my natural body was something other people shouldn’t have to encounter.

The activist in me wanted to stop complying with that particular beauty standard.

I wanted to see what it felt like to stop doing something simply because I had always done it.

It took time before it felt normal.

Interestingly, I haven’t made the same choice everywhere else.

I still shave my underarms.

I still pluck my chin hairs.

So this isn’t me writing as someone who has completely stepped away from beauty standards. I haven’t.

I’m writing as someone who has become more interested in noticing them.

Which choices actually feel like care?

Which choices feel like something I am doing because I have absorbed the idea that I should?

I think about this a lot because we use the language of self-care for so many things.

Waxing.

Skincare.

Dieting.

Exercise.

Anti-ageing treatments.

Sometimes these things really do feel good. Sometimes they are rituals we enjoy. Sometimes they are things that help us feel more like ourselves.

But sometimes they are also things we do because we are trying to avoid judgement.

The tricky part is that both can be true at the same time.

I find myself thinking about women with PCOS who experience much more significant facial hair growth.

I have spent years being mildly irritated by a few postmenopausal chin hairs. Then I think about women whose facial hair is much more visible, and what it must feel like to live in a culture where women’s facial hair is still treated as something embarrassing or unfeminine.

How much energy goes into worrying about whether someone has noticed?

How much time is spent managing something that their body is simply doing?

It must be exhausting.

And perhaps this is why I find the topic so interesting.

Because it isn’t really just about hair.

It is about all the ways women learn to monitor themselves.

The rules are rarely written down. Nobody hands us a manual. But somehow many of us absorb the idea that there are things we should fix, hide or change before we are allowed to feel fully comfortable.

And this is where I find myself caught.

Because we often say, “It’s my choice.”

And of course it is.

But I wonder how we know where our choices come from.

How much of what we prefer is shaped by the culture around us? How much comes from our own genuine enjoyment? How much is a mixture of both?

We don’t choose in a vacuum.

None of us do.

The food we like, the clothes we wear, the way we style our hair, the things we value about our appearance: all of these are influenced by the world we grow up in.

But that doesn’t mean our choices aren’t real.

A woman may remove all her body hair because she genuinely likes how it feels. She may enjoy the process. She may feel more comfortable that way.

And she may also have grown up in a culture that taught her hairlessness was part of being feminine.

Those things can exist together.

Perhaps the question isn’t whether something is completely our own choice, because I’m not sure we can ever separate ourselves entirely from the world around us.

Perhaps the question is whether we want to invest our precious time, money and energy in it.

Does this bring me closer to peace?

Or does it take me further away?

Does this feel like something I choose?

Or something I feel I must keep doing to be acceptable?

I don’t think freedom is found in automatically following the rules we’ve inherited.

But I also don’t think freedom comes from creating a new set of rules about what a liberated woman should or shouldn’t do.

For me, freedom comes from noticing, and then making a conscious choice.

Maybe one day I’ll take the same stand with my chin hairs that I took with bikini waxes.

And maybe I won’t.

The point isn’t the decision itself.

The point is that it’s a conscious one.

So perhaps the question isn’t, “What should I do?”

Perhaps it’s:

What brings me closer to the life I want to live?

What brings me the greatest peace and ease?

What do I want to invest my energy in?