They call themselves bearded women and some are no longer hiding their hair on their faces and have begun to share their experiences.
They are active on social networks and have even created groups to make themselves visible.
At BBC Mundo we spoke with two of them to understand how their process of accepting themselves with a beard has been and what their relationship has been with the explanations that medicine gives to their facial hair.
These are their stories:
LUTA: My name is Luta Cruz. I was born in Chile, I am a woman, Afro, I compose songs, I sing and I am hairy.
Very hairy.
I even get hair on my fingers.
I became aware of my hair for the first time when my sideburns appeared. They started to grow quite a bit when I was like 00 years.
My mother took me to the house of a friend of hers for me to wax.
I think he wanted to protect me because I was already, let’s say, weird: I was an Afro girl in Chile and now In addition, he had hair on his face.
A NA: I am Ana Dino. I am a woman, illustrator and visual artist. I’m from Mexico and I have a beard.
At 13 years I had not noticed my beard, when a boy told me that He liked me, but I had a lot of hair.
I didn’t pay much attention to the subject until in high school I started to notice it more hair and people started pointing at me.
I felt the hairiest of all and decided to shave.
Every day I removed my hair with tweezers as much as possible. I could and then I would pass a rake (razor blade), but as happens with men’s beards, there are some black dots that I pinched out.
Then I had to put ice on it because it was very swollen and I put makeup on top.
LUTA: With my mom we thought of a more permanent solution. She raised money to give me laser hair removal.
For six months I underwent a treatment in which a tiny needle was inserted into each pore to burn the root and then pull the hair out with tweezers.
It was horrible.
I ended up with a very swollen, red face. It also gave me a lot of allergies.
In the end the laser reduced the volume a little, but the hairs continued to appear.
I tried the razor blade but it didn’t work either. It irritated me and it lasted very little without hair.
I had to resort to wax and tweezers.
Once a week I waxed my whole body and every other day my face.
ANA: When I went out with friends I had to carry a whole “survival” kit hidden: the lamp, mirror, tweezers, wax, makeup.
I didn’t tell anyone about my beard and my waxing routine. I lived for many years with shame and trying to hide it.
LUTA: I saw a doctor for the first time in my 13 years. He was a gynecologist, he diagnosed me with polycystic ovaries and explained that this caused excess hair.
He told me I had something called hirsutism and prescribed birth control pills indefinitely.
Hirsutism:
Hirsutism is a disease that mainly affects women and and results in excessive growth of dark or coarse hair in a pattern similar to that of men, especially in the face, the chest and the back.
Development hair has several stages.
One of them is the anagen , which is when rapid growth occurs and the hair acquires maturity and a darker tone.
“The extension This phase is what we identify as hypertrichosis or hirsutism”, explains Dr. Viviana Felizzola, a specialist in Internal Medicineay Endocrinology.
Hirsutism can occur for different reasons.
“There are two main causes: the increase in the production of male hormones (andrógenas),c Like Testosterone, and the increased sensitivity of the skin to these androgens“, indicates Felizzola, who also who is Full member of the Colombian Association of Endocrinology.
“But you There may also be associated metabolic problems and there is even hirsutism that is of unknown cause and occurs in almost 5% of cases”, he added
LUTA: For ten years I took birth control pills, but the hairs remained the same.
When I fulfilled 15 I decided to look for a definitive solution. I was tired.
One medical appointment led to another, until I arrived at an endocrinology consultation.
I had several tests and they told me that the diagnosis of my 13 years did not match. She did not have polycystic ovaries.
She had taken pills that she did not need.
They thought, then, that she had hyperplasia Congenital Adrenal (CHS).
I remember thinking: my God, what is this? I’m going to die, it’s going to give me something… Why such a long name?
They did a lot of lab tests.
In the end they found me healthy.
Hyperplasia Congenital Adrenal:
It is a disorder genetic that affects the adrenal glands, a pair of walnut-sized organs located above the kidneys, which produce hormones that help regulate metabolism, the immune system, blood pressure and other essential functions.
Between hhormones that they elaborate are found androgens such as testosterone.
TONA: When I fulfilled 26 years ago I went to a concert of the Krudas Cubensi, a Cuban hip hop group that includes a girl named Odaymara.
She has a beard like mine and at the concert she shared a poem. I think she ends by saying, “If being a woman is shaving your beard, then I’m not a woman. But if being a man is having a long beard, I’m not a man either”.
I started crying in the middle of the concert. She was very strong for me
Until that moment, the only references she had were from the humiliation. The “exotic” women who had been part of circuses or were exhibited in museums.
But that day, for the first time, I saw an empowered woman in a public space.
I began to think that I could leave it too.
LUTA: Letting my hair down was also an issue with my partners.
I had a boyfriend who worried that his friends might think I was trans or a transvestite.
I always avoided caresses on the face. I did not allow them for fear that they would feel the hair.
This caused me to have a more withdrawn personality, with less self-confidence, less self-esteem, with less understanding of who I was as a woman.
I got tired of it and started telling the people close to me. It was like a first step to empower myself with this topic.
ANA: When the earthquake occurred in 2017 in Mexico I had not left the house for several days because I was editing a video. And I hadn’t waxed.
That day everything was chaos. Around my house many buildings were lost.
Seeing everything destroyed gave me perspective, I understood that I could not live hiding anymore. I started to let my beard grow.
It was not easy at all, I was surprised to see myself.
Something that helped me a lot was painting it.
I spent several years with a pink beard and that was much more disruptive. They looked at me and it was like “ah! not only does he have a beard but he likes it”.
L UTA: When the pandemic hit and I had to be locked up, I decided to stop waxing my face. After all, I wasn’t going to see anyone.
A week later I had a beard, I had never seen it complete and it didn’t bother me anymore.
I understood that by letting my hair down I had a better quality of life. I began to accept myself as a woman with this hairy body.
The definitive jump came when I recorded a video for social networks. I was very scared, but I did it anyway.
A lot of people saw it and they told me everything, from that I didn’t take care of myself and why I didn’t go to the doctor, to asking me if I was sick or trans.
There were also people who supported me.
I went through many emotions. First I felt fear, then I felt sorrow, then anger. I didn’t understand why people gave so much opinion.
Until I started to take it as something positive.
I thought that the people who gave their opinion didn’t know who I was. I thought they thought because bearded women are special.
Since then I show that bearded women are not only hairy women, but that we are very brave because we have spent our whole lives listening to others give their opinion about our body, to doctors telling us that we are sick just because we are out of a standard.
What does the measurement offerna
A of the difficulties to treat the excess hair is what is will associate to hormones that cannot be measured, as dihydrotestosterone
Women with hirsutism are often prescribed drugs that helpna decrease the amount of androgens.
But it is not a definitive solution a, since that androgen sensitivity is so high in the skin that it is very difficult to counteract
What’s more, We have to consider the side effects that many medications have.
“Birth control pills, for example, can make reduce the libido”, points out the expert.
ANA: The really traumatic thing for me happened when at one point I began to have uncontrollable vomiting.
I ended up in a very good public hospital, but when they saw me they immediately assumed that my beard was the disease and that the symptoms that I was presenting for sure had to do with that.
I was referred to endocrinology and underwent many tests, but they did not show anything conclusive. That was when they misdiagnosed with CAH.
With the pandemic everything was worse.
My gastric condition worsened. I was very weak, almost malnourished, I thought I was going to die. Someone close to me decided to publish my case on social networks.
To my surprise, the publication aroused the solidarity of the people and several people donated the money so that they could treat me in a private hospital.
Finally, and after almost two years since they first saw me, I had an appointment with a gastroenterologist.
I diagnosed with Cyclic Vomiting Syndrome, he prescribed me a pill and I lived again.
If the doctors who saw me for the first time had not obsessed with my beard, surely they would have diagnosed me in time.
I felt very discriminated against.
LUTA: I expected the bullying to stop when I was an adult, but it only increased.
It doesn’t matter if they call you ugly, it doesn’t matter if they tell you that you’re not attractive or whatever they can tell you.
it is more difficult for them to tell you that you are a man.
It hurts that he sees you Do not come to say who you are, when you already know who you are.
It is difficult for them to question your gender.
In the times we live in, everything is so media, everything is so fast, that if you don’t give a good answer they can end your life.
ANA: It is no coincidence that women who are managing to make their beards are women who are in the artistic field.
If you go to an office to work wearing a skirt you cannot have hairy legs. It is not written nor is it a law, but there is a social sanction.
With my beard I think I could not be a lawyer or financier, it would not allow me.
Al In the end hair removal for women is not a choice, it is an obligation, and our bodies with hair are pathologized all the time.
LUTA: To the girls of 13 years that begin to have hair and a beard I would tell them that the most important thing is how one feels.
The hairs are not going anywhere, so it is best to understand that other people are not always going to understand who we bearded women, hairy women, are.
And I feel that one of the small missions we can have is simply to make ourselves visible.
ANA: I would tell the young women that the What is wrong is society and not them. And if someone doesn’t like it, it’s that person’s problem.
The beard is not a disease.
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