Hi everyone,
I'm 33, I've been shaving since I'm 15, and my beard is coarse and my skin sensitive (upper lips, neck and jaw line in particular). I've been using Gillette Mach 3 pretty much the whole time, with occasional fancier Gillette or Wilkison (Shick) ones, as well as my grand dad's Phillips rotating electric razor (burned my face) and some fancy Braun electric razor (burned my face too as well as my wallet).
That was up until 3 years ago when I decided to try DE shaving. Started with my father-in-law old razor but it wasn't great quality at all. Then I bought an Edwin Jagger DE89BL, which broke from falling on the floor. Then a Merkur (I forgot which one) which I broke too in the same manner. And now I'm shaving again with a DE89BL because I had a spare.
I've tried all sorts of blades (merkur, astra, gillette, derby and personna).
I've tried all sorts of soaps (Tailor of Old Bond Street, Proraso for sensitive skins, The Body Shop, Palmolive, Nivea, L'Occitane, Baxter Of California, Shaving oils, whatever I can get my hands on to try)
I've tried all sorts of brushes (my first one was from The Body Shop, then I got a proper Super Badger brush which I still use now).
And shaving is absolutely awful, I absolutely hate it.
I can shave with the hair which almost never results in cuts or burns but I may as well not shave because it stays prickly and looks horrible after 2 hours. For this, DE Razors have been superior to everything else.
But as soon as I go side ways or from down to up and against the hair, it's a blood bath. With everything (cartridges or safety razors), it will burn, it will pull and it will bleed.
Lately, I've gone back to trying Shick Quattros and to my surprise, it wasn't as terrible (but still pretty bad). The blades seem to be pulling and not cutting so well but I'm able to go in all directions, get some spots very smooth but still that pulling sensation and not a comfortable shave at all.
I read about IForgotHisName's technique with the hot towel, the massaging, etc, but frankly ain't nobody got time for that.
I shave in the shower because that's where I have hot water (I'm an expat in Indonesia and there's no hot water anywhere other than the shower in my house).
Today, I received my personna blades from Amazon and was eager to try because of all the good things I read about them and how fed up I was with my Derby blades and their inconsistency.
I did my usual process: shower normally with hot water, put hot water on my face, prep the brush, warm the bowl up, make my lather in the bowl with The Body Shop shaving cream, apply the thick lather to the face for a while and start shaving with the hair top to bottom. Rinse off with hot water, warm the bowl up again, make a bit more hot lather in the bowl, lather up the face, go side ways chin to left ear, right ear to chin, same with neck. Pain starts, first blood. I rinse, lather up again, go bottom to top: neck first, then cheeks, chin and upper lips: more blood, more burn. This is already 3 passes and I can still feel hair patches. My hair grows in all sorts of directions around my neck, it's absolutely frustrating. So I go at it again on those patches only and grind my teeth through the pain again.
When I saw the blood in my shower mirror by then, I was so angry and thought to myself: f*ck it, I'm taking a picture of it and I'm going to badger and blade forums to ask for advice.
So here it is (warning: you will see blood and a bit of my hairy chest):
Spoiler:
Click to enlarge
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I don't know what to do anymore. I don't wanna buy cartridges anymore because they're so expensive. Our forefathers used to shave the good old way and they were fine. Why not me?!
What am I doing wrong? I tried all sorts of angles, it's the same result. I tried the warm towel, same thing. Massaging, same thing. Proraso pre-shave cream + shaving cream for sensitive skin same thing (although better than the rest).
Also note that there is absolutely 0 decent shaving resource in Indonesia. Indonesian men, as lovely as they are, have 3 hair fighting for attention on their chins and don't need anything more than disposables. Hell, even my F-I-L plucks hairs from his chin with tweezers! I made the mistake to go to a barber in Jakarta once (I actually tried several because I still had hope, when I didn't know any better): they ALL use a shavette with some gillette blades (saw some Astra once!) and Gillette basic shaving cream in an aerosol can. Needless to say, it hurt.
So all this to say that all my shaving equipment has to come from overseas, through Amazon or The English Shaving Company or friends or me traveling overseas. As if finding a proper shaving setup wasn't difficult enough, it seems like I'm playing the game on hard mode.
So... help? Pretty please?
Blood everywhere. Help.
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