Dermaplaning: A Follicular Fallacy

The first time I tried at-home dermaplaning I nicked myself on the cheek. As blood streamed down my face, I had two thoughts.

One, I kind of hope it scars.

I always fancied myself as a sort of ruggedly handsome woman, a quality that I have always thought would be accentuated with a face scar.

Two, what do men do when they nick themselves shaving?

Following that second thought, I grabbed a small piece of toilet paper and stuck it to my face. As I looked in the mirror at the bloody tissue I had a realization...

When you leave the spa after a dermaplaning session you’ll be roughly $150 poorer with a face that’s less… dead. A trained aesthetician takes a sterilized surgical scalpel and scrapes your stratum corneum (the top layer of your skin), removing dead skin cells and vellus hair (peach fuzz).

The at-home process can get some of the dead skin, but it’s mostly focused on the fuzz.

To dermaplane, you’ll need a clean and sharp single-blade razor (a dermablade, fittingly) and a clean face. Much like the spa process, your face should be dry but you can use a little oil (ideally jojoba) for lubrication if needed.

You hold your skin taut and work, top to bottom, at a 45 degree angle. Shave in the direction of the hair, not against it. When you’ve finished up, you can do whatever you normally do after washing.

At-home dermaplaning focuses on the fine hairs, not coarse ones, which is why the razor is different from the one used for shaving beards.

The razor has to be sharp for dermaplaning, if it’s snagging your hairs or slowing down then it’s time to replace.

So, that’s how you lie to people about not shaving your face.

Speaking of lies, dermaplaning won’t make your hair come back thicker or darker or whatever, you’re just going to feel a different texture when it regrows. Don’t freak out, this is perfectly normal.

Don’t buy into the bullshit. You can get a bunch of these razors for cheap. You could also pay a lot of money for good branding and features you don’t really need.

I see a trend of products advertising a “real” at-home dermaplaning experience.

Don’t try to remove deep layers of your own skin. That’s a bad idea. Plus, let’s be real, we’re just doing this to shave the hair anyway.

My mom doesn’t shit and my mom doesn’t fart. If you try to claim otherwise, she will deny it. As her daughter, I inherited her body shame.

I remember the humiliation of living on the streets with a severe stomach bug. I went from place to place, begging to use their bathrooms just to be turned away. I was too poor for bathrooms, too feminine to poop.

It’s better to hold in farts until we are blue in the face. It’s better to pretend to peel off layers of our skin than to admit to growing a few stray hairs. It’s better to be crushed by our own bodies than to admit that we are human.

I’d rather just take a shit.

Xoxo,
Arielle