PCOS ! ! !

[Bono]

After the last AEA convention, my Japanese friends visited me. We talked about the convention and I asked if there was (yet another) speech about PCOS … and, of course there was! My friends said that indeed nearly every AEA convention has a speech about PCOS … and they assumed that this condition must be EPIDEMIC in the United States … because it’s rare in Japan. (These people employ 2,000 electrologists, and have extensive medical input, by the way.)

In my 40-years of practicing electrolysis, I have only had two patients with PCOS … and most women were "hormone checked’ to be sure. Another veteran of this field (with more than 30-years of experience) said she had two clients with PCOS. So, what’s the deal?

Of course I would never minimize PCOS or dismiss a woman with "too much hair.’ But humans have HAIR! Men more than women … but women have hair too. And, it’s not always "a medical problem.’

Think about this. A man can have a full beard … or no beard. He can be covered in body hair … or have zero hair, be totally bald or have a full head of hair … and it’s just fine "because he’s a man.’ A woman has a few hairs on her upper lip and she’s convinced that she "has a medical problem.’ And, the medical profession is all too eager to treat her with medication.

I am not against having solid medical evaluation. I do think we should think about the "medicalization’ of women’s unwanted hair, because we so-easily take this approach with women … all the time.

I mean, big boobs used to be a rarity. Today, if women don’t have boobs the size of Jane Mansfield, they think they have a deformity. Take a look on-line to see how many "boob jobs’ are done each year in the United States. My 15-year-old client wants a "boob job’ because she thinks she’s "not normal.’

It’s all part of "pressure on women’ … and it’s NOT coming from MEN. Women, more than men, "medicalize’ themselves and seek medical intervention on too many issues. Anyway, that’s my thought for the day.

[system]

This is a really awesome topic to talk about.

I am sharing the exact same opinion, our society has a disillusion about the real nature especially of women.

The whole media produces an artificial and unrealistic level of beauty which can’t
be reached anymore.

This is a big problem for younger girls, who put themself under unbelievable pressure as they haven’t developed for mature confidence and personality against the industry.

I believe, this issue can’t be stopped, because the market increasingly requires the competition of beauty (digital revolution) and so the suffer will grow from those who are psychologically under it’s gun.

[EmancipatedElectroly]

I have a several that are confirmed PCOS, one of whom is a doctor, so I’ll take her word on it. Focusing on cis women, the vast majority of what I see, comes down to either being extremely self conscious (really, the vellus hair you see in your lighted 20x mirror isn’t noticeable from speaking distance, much less across the room), menopausal growth as the estrogen levels start to decline and testosterone begins binding to receptors that are no longer occupied with estrogen, or genetic (some people are simply more predisposed to hair growth). Then add in the people that simply hate having to shave their underarms, genitals or legs, are sick of waxing their brows, etc…

Maybe, living where I am, in an area that was heavily dominated by chemical manufacturing where decades of illegal chemical dumping occurred, the people here are just more predisposed to certain conditions that disrupt their endocrine systems. There are notably more thyroid problems here (I’m in the “goiter belt”) as well, which is yet another one of those glands/hormones that can throw off hair production and the rest of the endocrine system.

Getting back to societal expectations, the root cause is mass media… the prettiest girl in town is no longer the prettiest girl that someone is going to see in their lifetime - in fact, compared to models, she might be pretty average and, compared to photoshopped models, well, not even models look like them.

But it’s not just women that are being affected, more and more men are as well… Probably a quarter of my clients are cis male looking to be more perfect - backs, brows, ears, necks, cheeks, and genitals in particular, because they’re trying to look like the male perfection that is being displayed to them. More and more of them are seeking out plastic surgery as well.

and for both, it all comes down to the media and marketing warping our expectations into thinking that perfection exists and if we aren’t perfect, we aren’t good enough.