“I told my boyfriend I was growing my pubic hair. Then my reaction shocked us both.”

After spending almost two months overseas in a country with limited access to running water, let alone a good beautician, it’s safe to say I’d let myself go when it came to personal grooming — the main culprit being my nether regions.

That’s right, I’m talking about my pubic hair.

That was the thought consuming my mind as I was lying on my partner’s bed after not having seen each other for an extended period of time. It was safe to say what was going to happen next. He began pulling my pants down and it immediately dawned on me what Sasha* was about to uncover. 

Thinking back, I couldn’t actually remember the last time I’d let my pubic hair grow out completely. It’s safe to say the last time I would’ve been possession of a full bush would have been in early high school. Even at that young age, I still remember it being drilled into me (mostly by pubescent boys) that having a lady bush was plain gross. So once I hit 15 or so, I quickly took to shaving.

WATCH: Is pubic hair back on trend? (Post continues…)

Sasha had never seen me with a single hair on my vagina.

Not one.

We’d been together for almost two years and in that time, he’d never once been acquainted with my full lady bush. Heck, I didn’t even really know what my full lady bush looked like anymore after all those hairless years.

It was after one particularly heinous experience with an ex-boyfriend (you’ll understand why shortly) that I swore I would forever aim to maintain a pre-pubescent appearing vagina. Not a hair in sight, I promised myself.

John* was the asshole I dated before I met Sasha, and he made it very clear about how he felt about my pubic hair one night when he unexpectedly invited me over after I’d been at the gym. We began messing around when he quickly commented on my short sprouting hairs.

It had been a couple of days since I’d shaved and while they weren’t long at all, they were almost black and quite obvious. Not having expected to do the deed that night, I hadn’t shaved in advance and after his reaction, boy would I regret that one.

As he looked down he laughed and asked “what’s going on down there?” I laughed back and snubbed it off as him being a prick. I’d forever regret not schooling him on the fact that yes I’m a woman and yes, women do grow hair. 

But I didn’t. Instead, I began shaving more frequently and going to visit the beautician for a wax when I could pluck up the courage to lift my left practically over my head in front of a complete stranger.

That’s why my reaction to what Sasha said to me took me by such surprise. “Babe, you can grow your hair. I don’t mind. I even like it,” he said to me. I was overwhelmingly smacked in the head by one feeling.

Gratitude.

I had complete and utter gratitude for this man that was telling me ‘it was okay’ for me to allow my body to do as it had always done and grow long, curly, black pubic hairs.

Was this seriously what I had become? I felt so conflicted. On one hand I felt as though I’d hit the boyfriend jackpot by finding someone who accepted me as I am.

“He’s so amazing!”

“He’s so special!”

“How lucky am I that he accepts me for who I am???”

My brain began going into overdrive but then a few days later as I came off my pube cloud I began to think. Are we really that deluded as women that when we come across a man that doesn’t expect us to pluck, wax or laser our bits until a single hair is too scared to grow, we thank our lucky stars that we’ve found someone we can drop the curtain in front of?

How pathetic.

I let the bush grow free and wild for a few months simply out of protest. I am woman! I am fierce! I am strong! I can bear children! And I have PUBIC HAIR! After that, it got a little too much.

To start off with, having long pubic hair can be pretty uncomfortable. I didn’t like the feeling, especially when I was at the gym. Spring was also coming up and I knew sooner rather than later I’d be peeling back those layer and the last thing I wanted was a vagina bump at the beach.

I decided to go back to the terrifying beautician and have her wax it all off again. She looked at my bush and told me how much it would hurt due to the length. Served me right I guess, for trying to make some sort of protest using my pubic hair.

She waxed it all off and yes it hurt like hell, exactly as she promised.

I’m currently still in possession of a hairless vagina. But at least it’s because I’ve come to discover that being hairless is my personal preference.

And that, I can definitely live with.