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October 18, 2005
Under the covers...with Nick Bell
Dear Nick:
My boyfriend of five months has disgusting armpit hair and every time we go for a swim or do anything else that involves him taking off his shirt I am completely apalled. I didn’t notice it at first, but the more often we are intimate, the more i think about it. Sometimes I even suggest that we have sex with our clothes on or in very dark places. It’s gotten to the point where my girlfriends are calling it “Yeti Spaghetti.” It’s so disgusting! It creeps me out and makes me want to ask him what he’d think if I stopped shaving my underarms. I don’t mind seven or eight inches of manliness here and there but not in the form of pit pelt. How can I tell him to get rid of it? Or do i have to get rid of him?
Betty Yeti
My poor darling Betty, I have nothing but the deepest sympathies for you. But there is a simple solution to your problem. You need to take a bold step and say something to your boyfriend about his hairy pits, rather than whine to everyone else about it. Your relationship will be stronger and last longer if you develop better communication skills together. It’s always a bad sign when your friends develop bizarre nicknames for disgusting aspects of your significant other. Also, you sound like you’ve already made a decision to get rid of him if he refuses your request. He is probably completely unaware that his his profuse amounts of hair has become disgusting to you. And of course, all this goes on while all your
friends make monkey noises when he calls you on the phone.
Perhaps your disgust is a bit culturally based. Western culture practically demands that women remain hairless and trim their hidden parts. If these demands on women are not met, one could be asking for social ostracization and unfriendly criticisms pertaining to the nature of one’s hygiene. Does anyone remember Paula Cole?
On the other hand, Western culture’s views on male body hair has changed significantly. Do you find Burt
Reynolds or Charlton Heston attractive? I’m guessing you don’t, but lots of people used to. These were two men considered chock full of sex appeal and they were pretty damn hairy. Reynolds even had a nude photo shoot for Cosmo in the 70’s. Nobody found it disturbing then.
Nowadays, we like our men hairless too. Facial hair can be sexy, but we don’t like treasure trails and hair
on men’s legs, arms, pits, and pubic hair should not be even remotely comparable to the amount of hair on one’s cranium. Just don’t got to Europe if you hate armpit hair.
If you don’t want to say anything directly to him, but want to save your relationship, trim his pits while he’s sleeping. If his armpits are as disgusting as you say they are, and he doesn’t seem to notice, I’m bet he won’t notice if a good chunk of it was missing. If you can’t do that, the only thing left is to talk to him about the situation. If he’s good enough to be intimate with, he’s good enough to be forewarned. And who knows what issues he may have with parts of your body that he’s more than willing to overlook.
Disclaimer: Nick Bell has aspirations of being a sexpert but no professional training. To submit a comment or question, e-mail it to oracle@hamline.edu or drop it off at the Oracle office (DS 106).
Posted by msveum at October 18, 2005 11:31 AM
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