Face Hair Removal

Embarrassment Keeps Women With 'Manly' Health Problems From Treatment

For 10 years, Jeannie Bush rose at 4 a.m. and slipped out of bed to shave her face before sneaking back under the covers, terrified that if she didn't, her husband would snuggle up to her in the morning and become disgusted at the hair on her jaw and chin.

"What an absolute turn-off I felt that would be," Bush, a 55-year-old electrologist in La Crosse, Wis., told LiveScience. "So I hid it."

Hiding her facial hair defined Bush's daily life for decades, starting when she was a teen and continuing until, at age 35, she met a doctor who recognized her excessive hair as a symptom of the hormonal condition polycystic ovary syndrome (PCOS). Treatment for the underlying condition, along with electrolysis, freed Bush from her daily shaving regimen. But she still remembers the shame she felt about her "unfeminine" symptom . Even the moment when her doctor noticed the facial hair was embarrassing, Bush said.

"At first, I was very hurt, because I thought I hid it so well, and she saw it," Bush said.

'Manly' symptoms

The embarrassment Bush felt about her symptoms isn't unique. Many people go without treatment when their medical problems involve stigmatized body parts, such as the bowels; journalist Katie Couric's on-air colon cancer screening in 2000 was an effort to combat that stigma surrounding the disease that killed her husband. But when symptoms are traditionally associated with manliness, the shame is often rooted in a fear of being unfeminine or undesirable. [ 5 Reasons Being a Woman is Good For Your Health ]

"As a woman, I think you really start to feel less than a woman, because you're very different," said Sophia Wastler, 36, who directs an enrichment program for preschool kids in Virginia Beach, Va. Wastler has hyperhidrosis, or excessive sweating , which went untreated until she was 31.

"You know, with women, you don't want to be someone who is sweaty," Wastler told LiveScience. "It's kind of more of a male characteristic than a female characteristic , so it's quite embarrassing."

Hiding medical problems

In some cases, the effort of hiding the symptom spills over into the doctor's office, meaning they don't seek help. Bush's complaints about her excess hair had been brushed aside by doctors before, so she hadn't intended to mention it to her new doctor until the woman gently brought it up. Wastler was used to making excuses about her sweaty palms, but shaking a new doctor's hand one day, she finally snapped.

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