When I was 12 I went home crying to my mum to let me shave my legs. Why? Because a boy made fun.

I can't remember what we were doing but we were allowed to wear whatever shorts we wanted for an activity my year 7 class was doing. I chose to wear my new denim shorts that I was so excited about so I went to the bathroom and changed out of my school shorts (that were much longer than the denim ones) and the second I walked into the classroom a boy came up to me and said 'oh my god your legs are so hairy! You need to shave them that's disgusting.' And it didn't stop there. He constantly reminded me of my hairy legs and how other girls had started shaving and that I apparently needed to too. I did the only thing I could think of and rushed to my teacher and told her I wanted to change into my longer school shorts (that hid more of my 'disgusting hairy legs') and ran to the bathroom and cried. When I got home I cried even more and told my mum that I needed to start shaving, which she eventually let me.

Looking back at it now, I think, 'why did you let some little gross boy make you cry about leg hair? He probably had more of it than you did.' But I was just a kid, a small, sensitive, kid that wanted nothing more than to fit in and look like everyone else.

I became obsessed with shaving my leg hair off. I hated it. It even escalated to me making my mum let little me get my bushy eyebrows waxed and at some point I was shaving my stomach too. Suddenly my body hair became something to be ashamed of, I mean, that is what the media was constantly telling the young, impressionable me, so it must have been true?

When I was 15 I challenged myself to not shave my legs for a month (which honestly everyone should do at least once). I'd recently discovered feminism and was learning more and more about how 'women'/'feminine' people were unfairly made to believe they had to look a certain way and shave everything but the hair on their head. I know that body hair isn't the biggest or most important feminist issue, there are certainly things more important to be focusing on, but for me it was something very personal that I knew I had to overcome. During that month I noticed that I was basically the only one that even pointed out or mentioned my growing leg hair. No one else seemed to care, which was a huge shock to me. A month quickly became two, then three, and then I just stopped really caring. I think in the past 4 years I've shaved my legs once.

I do understand that having people not notice, say anything, or care about my leg hair is most likely because I have blonde body hair which isn't as visible on my pale skin. It would probably be different if I had black body hair that contrasted to my white skin, because that would be much more noticeable. That doesn't mean that my legs aren't super hairy though, because they are.

Pretty much the only body part I shave now are my armpits, and the only reason I do is because I sweat a lot and having pit hair seems to make me smell fucking horrible. I've learnt to be ok with my body hair, and not dwell too much on it because honestly there are more important things to worry about. Shaving your legs every week can not only take a lot of time, but can also cost a Lot so....I'm glad I stopped and probably won't ever waste a second getting little cuts on my knees and ankles.