How Wet Shave Harmful In Acne

On average, men shave over 15,000 times in a lifetime, using 3,500 hours in the process. If we wet shave, many of us, even if we do not suffer from ingrown hairs, frequently do suffer the inconvenience and discomfort of nicks and cuts, razor burn, and, shaving-induced rashes. With rare exceptions, all these aggravations are the result of incorrect shaving techniques. The fact is, most men shave on automatic pilot, never thinking about what they do and therefore repeating endlessly any bad shaving habits they learned when they first started to shave or picked up along the way.

The correct way of wet shaving is, therefore, worth learning and implementing. After all, it doesn’t take much longer (if at all) to do the job right and it’s much more comfortable.

Here, then, are the steps we recommend.

Step 1: Wet the Beard

This is very important for it softens the beard and makes cutting it easier. An easier cut means that the blade is less likely to catch on’ the hair and so pull part of the skin around it onto its sharp surface causing a nick (or a series of tiny nicks that add up to razor burn).

You can best wet the beard by using comfortably hot water. Naturally, a shower is the best way to do this, but if that isn’t practical, splash your face thoroughly with hot water over the sink. Then apply some pre shave oil. Finally, cover your face with shaving cream, rubbing it in (rather than simply laying it onto the skin’s surface).

Step 2: Use the Correct Razor

As noted above, if you are prone to ingrown hairs, use a razor that carries blades with a single cutting edge. If ingrown hairs are not a problem, you can use double- or triple-edged blades. In all cases, however, make sure that the blades are sharp. Dull blades will pull at. Your hairs and skin and thus increase the chance of nicks and cuts.

Step 3: Shave with the Grain

You can easily feel in the direction in which your facial hair grows, i.e. its grain, by running your hand over your beard. For most men, the grain is primarily downwards, especially in the mustache area, but may run in a different direction on the cheeks and in the neck area.

Once you have established in which direction your hair grows, shave with the grain. If you have been doing the opposite, you will find that shaving with the grain is so smooth it may feel as if you are not shaving at all. You are. What you are no longer doing is pulling at your beard and thus pulling the surface of your skin upward where, like as not, its surface will be sliced off. The result of shaving with the grain is that your shave will be just a tad less close-which, as we have said, is all to the good.

Step 4: Clean Your Razor

As you are shaving, the cut fragments of your beard, mixed with the shaving cream, gather on the head of your razor. If you do not rinse them off between strokes, some are likely to end up between your skin and the edge of the razor’s blade. This means that, instead of a flat blade edge cutting the hairs uniformly, some parts of the blade edge will be closer to the skin than others. The result will be an uneven shave and the need to shave some areas several times, both increasing the likelihood of irritation and the chance of cutting some hairs too closely, thus increasing the likelihood of ingrown hairs.

Step 5: Apply Aftershave

Finally, apply an aftershave moisturizing cream (not an alcohol aftershave which will dry out your skin). If you don’t like the fragrances of many men’s aftershave products, use a standard fragrance-free moisturizer with a sun block.