'Khloe Kardashian's mum made her wax her armpits at 13. There's nothing wrong with that.'

Khloe Kardashian has shared the trauma of having her mum Kris Jenner spring a surprise armpit waxing on her when Khloe was just 13.

‘I remember when I was like 13 years old, my mom made me get a facial for the first time,’ she told People magazine. ‘I guess I’d started growing hair under my arms [at the time], so during the facial she had someone wax my underarms. But she didn’t warn me! I was like “What is happening!” It was so traumatising. I remember being terrified, and I didn’t want a facial for years because I thought that was part of it.’

Still, it could be worse, like not being allowed to start hair removal until way too late.

I wasn’t allowed to begin any form of hair removal until I was 16, around five years after the hair on my legs transformed from the light, unnoticeable fuzz of my childhood into darker, more prominent fur.

It was humiliating.

I was a teenage girl in high school battling all sorts of teen-angst with the added burden of being forbidden by my mother to shave under my arms and under my legs. The hair under my arms was easier to hide – as long as I continued to avoid participating in the school swimming carnival or any other event requiring sleeveless tops – however the hair on my legs was the bane of my existence.

Winter was fine. Our school uniform meant I got to wear tights and tracksuit pants. However during spring and summer my life was pure torture.

As long as I stayed out of the sun I was okay.

I’d encourage my friends to hang out undercover where we could sit or stand in the shade. Much to my horror they decided to migrate to the front of the school and sit on a grassy hill in the glaring sunlight that highlighted every, single dark strand of dark hair on my legs. I was mortified.

I’d try and cross my legs and then spend the entire time pulling my school uniform down between my legs to avoid flashing my undies to the boys playing football on the field in front of us. I blame those boys for my friend’s decision to change location.

My girlfriends would sit on the hill in a pose similar to something you’d see in one of those nature documentaries narrated by David Attenborough.

The female of the species lays by resting back on to her elbows and stretching her legs before her so as to gain the male’s attention and begin the mating ritual. The males will be prancing around in a sort of seductive dance involving a pig-skinned ball and much activity.

Every now and then when my crossed-legs would start to cramp I’d stretch them out for a bit, praying that my friends wouldn’t notice all the hair (of course they did, they just loved me enough not to say anything) and while on the outside I looked exactly like the rest of them, in my head was the loudness of my frantic internal monologue about how I really should be allowed to start shaving or waxing my legs, about how my mother didn’t understand me and how I couldn’t go on like this for ONE MORE DAY.

Then I cracked. I waited until my mum had gone to bed, sneaked into the bathroom, found a rusty old razor and shaved both my underarms and my legs while I was totally dry. I did a terrible job of it, having never had it explained to me exactly how to do it.

It’s hard enough to be a teenager, particularly when it comes to our bodies and our insecurities. After I started shaving my legs I was able to go back to normal teenage girl behaviour like Sadie in the movie This Is 40 when she throws an epic tantrum. 

There were patches of hair and cuts all over the place. I was still faced with the dilemma of hiding my underarms and legs except now it was because it looked like I’d been attacked by a mob of angry cats.

I decided I needed to wax them instead so a few weeks later I went to a local beautician and had all the hair removed. Just a couple of hours later I came up in a hideous rash all over my legs.

I confronted my mum, showed her the rash, blamed it all on her and had her promise to explain to me exactly how to shave my legs from now on. I was terrified talking to her like that. She was pretty scary back then. It just got to a point where I’d rather face her than have to continue to endure my tortured existence.

After surveying the women in our offices it seems that most of our mums were reluctant to let us shave or wax our legs and none of understood why at the time. I think it had something to do with them not wanting us to grow up too fast. They subconsciously felt that if we started shaving and waxing our legs we were suddenly grownups, no longer their little girls.

Considering the fact that most of us already had our periods, that point seems redundant. Then, nobody could ever accuse my mum of making any sense when it came to such things.

I am now projecting that experience onto my daughter who is only six but will one day be ten, and I will facilitate her in the art of hair removal as soon as she comes to me and asks to have it done.

Her monobrow is cute right now, but I know as she gets older it will darken and become disfiguring.

Her underarms are bare now, but I know that one day she’ll sprout thick, course, Italian hairs.

Her legs are adorable at this stage with the hair almost invisible, but she’s already hairier than many of her friends.

Before it ever becomes an issue for her, I’ll be there waiting with some hair removal cream (for her top lip), some tweezers, a vanity mirror, shaving gel, lady shavers and an at-home waxing kit for under her arms.

It’s not our fault we are hairy. It’s because we are Italian. It’s not our fault we are judged for being hairy. It’s society’s.

Why women ever thought it was a good idea to appear to be hairless, I’ll never know. It’s just not natural. For anyone who has ever shaved all the hair from their arms will know, it gets pretty darn cold when it’s all gone.

Women aren’t meant to be hairless but we are judged for not being that way, so I’ll let my daughter wax and shave as soon as she wants to because I want to avoid her going through what I went through. My job as a mum is to make her life a little easier than mine was at her age.

I’m sure she’ll find something else to be anxiety-ridden about but at least it won’t be that.