I've started growing nipple hairs

On ageing as a woman

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I looked down at myself in the shower and noticed something that wasn’t there before.

Nipple hair.

Not the gentle, fair peach buzz that blankets the whole human body, but black, curly, stray hairs protruding from my areolas.

‘Hmm. That’s new’, I thought. I reached for my Laura Mercier tweezers and began plucking away. The more I looked, the more new hairs I found.

What has now become a monthly ritual–scanning my boobs to find the culprits whilst chuckling away at how bizarre I must look in the bathroom to my boyfriend–is something that would have panicked my younger self.

You must be hair free from the nose down at all times. Like a baby.

Read that again.

Like. A. Baby.

How incredibly bizarre and down-right stomach churning that that has been our goal?

I mean, I still pluck those nipple hairs. I’m not quite ready to let the Amazon rainforest take over my chest quite yet - and that’s probably partly because I’m still feeding into those paedophilic narratives set to us by old men. The beauty standards that keep us chasing the unattainable. Youth.

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Staring down at my boobs made me realise how much I’ve changed – how much my body is changing – especially in the past 5 years.

From the second that I entered my third decade, my body became something I no longer recognised.

Smile lines that don’t leave, even when frowning. My acne has finally disappeared (this one is a big hallelujah). I can simply look at a brownie and instantly gain 5lbs. The light behind my eyes blown out (I jest - sort of).

I look at pictures of my younger self: cheeks full, gaze bright and body small. I catch myself yearning for her, even in the knowledge that she herself is chasing further thinness, clear skin and to be desired. Covered in inches of make-up to appease people whose names she’ll long forget.

I know in another decade, I’ll be looking back on the current version of myself writing this article. Wishing for her youth, her beauty - not appreciating it when it was there. The cycle is tortuous.

At 40, will my nipple hairs start to grey? Will I long for the days where they were pigmented?