Haven't done a body shave before and not sure about epilation, waxing etc at the moment.

Planning to do the initial removal of the forest with a razor and then use an electric body shaver to keep it down. Does this sound like a decent strategy? My hair is quite soft and fair rather than wiry. Thinking of switching to electric after the initial hack for convenience and speed so I don't have to spend ages with a razor every couple of days or so.

One other question. Is there much difference between male and female razors and electric body shavers or is it mainly colour, packaging etc? Would prefer buying female ones unless someone tells me it's not a good idea for some reason.

Christine

I think the men's razors tend to get a little closer if I'm not mistaken. But I could be wrong; I've only ever used men's razors. An epilator could be useful though. It's a period of discomfort to do it, but afterwards you don't have to worry about it for at least a few weeks.

From my experience, men's razors tend to miss more hair. I haven't really compared the heads but it seems like perhaps the blades are closer together or something.  Also, women's razors tend to have more in terms of Aloe strips and such which makes a huge difference when shaving more sensitive skin like on your belly or chest.

As far as your plan, I would use an electric trimmer to cut it as short as possible before you hit it with a razor.  Once you knock it down with the razor the first time then an electric razor from there should be good for maintenance.  Get a good one though.  There is a difference in the closeness of shave that you get from different electric shavers.

My first time I cleared the growth with a beard trimmer first. Then used a lady razor to shave with. I have found a few lady razor brands work so much better on my facial hair also. I can shave in the shower with a bit of body wash and never get cut once. With a normal men's razor I would always get a nick or two even using a mirror and shaving cream.

I have used a home IPL on my face which has thinned it a bit but one of these days I'm going for laser removal.

Oh yeh, I have used an epilator on my legs a couple of times before vacation. The big difference is the much slower return of hair and way less red bumps from shaving my upper legs. Also no day after itch on the back thighs. That day after stuff kinda sucks.

I have kept my forearms shaved also. I can say since starting HRT the hair there has really slowed down. Much seems to be loosing it's dark color and is now more brown than dark almost back like it was. However working in a male field, they are starting to get noticed. No one has said anything but one guy next to me the other day looked at me a bit then kinda looked at his own arm. On the plus side there, at this point if I recently wiped a razor across my arm, the growth is so slow it looks like there is no hair there at all. Although running my hand across it I can feel a little stubble, I love the feeling of my skin being so soft. 

5-10 minute hair removal cream followed by a razor where needed works pretty good for this task.

I'd say men's razors are designed more for the face for closeness and they seem slightly better, you won't need that for body hair though, and if your hair's started to become a bit softer they'll last a bit longer I guess... I think female hair grows slower, no?

I just had a really bad experience with hair removal cream.  I used Nair facial hair remover cream and followed the instructions to a T and now I have pretty bad chemical burn on my face where the beard and stache were not removed.  I had already shaved down and only had one days worth of growth, it still removed none.