Originally Posted By: john_pifer
When I got into aviation maintenance a few years ago, I'd shave every day, but it seemed that most of the guys I worked with had beards, so I decided to grow a full beard for the first time, really, in my life, other than just experimenting with not shaving when I was a teenager/early 20s. It also seems to be in style here in Nashville, and, perhaps, in other areas of the country, as well. One reason, I think, is the popularity of beards among special forces guys in the military who have been deployed to Afghanistan, where beards are a regional tradition, and beards help our guys blend in amongst the local population and not stick out like a sore thumb.
Anyway, I grew my beard out for a while a couple of years ago, but ended up trimming it after about 3 or 4 months. I wore a short beard for a while, and then ended up going back to shaving every day.
Fast-forward to this past December - I ended up deciding to grow my beard back out, and it's been going, now, for almost 4 months. Couple that with the fact that I'm growing my hair out, too (I've been accused of having Bieb hair), and I've started getting some funny comments. I've had a couple of guys at work jokingly tell me that I looked mean and that they were intimidated by my beard. Some of the guys have started calling me Chuck Norris, and a guy who left and went to work somewhere else and came back didn't even recognize me at first, even after looking right at me. When I went over to say hello at a hangar meeting, he said, "whoa, you're looking like Grizzly Adams!" Honestly I'd have to look Grizzly Adams up, as I don't know who he is.
Anyway, for a month or so now, I've been getting some dry, irritated skin on my chin, underneath my beard. I pulled the beard hair out of the way and the skin on my chin seems to be a bit red and irritated. It's not super bad or anything, but I never had anything like this when I was clean-shaven or had a shorter beard.
Not really sure what was causing it, I started looking online for some kind of moisturizer, and I found that there is literally an entire cottage industry for what is called beard oil. There are websites, YouTube videos, etc. on this subject. It turns out that shampoo, which I was using to wash my beard every time I took a shower, daily, or sometimes twice daily, is the likely culprit, in combination with the cold, dry winter weather. I've learned that even though the shampoo I've been using is a 2-in-1 (shampoo and conditioner) product, and does just fine in conditioning my hair, it is too harsh for facial skin, since it has detergents that are designed to clean the scalp, which is much oilier than facial skin. As a result, it's drying the skin on my chin under my beard.
Anyway, in looking around, I found a website that sells what seem like some good beard oils that contain jojoba oil, argan oil, coconut oil, castor oil, etc. A few drops of this oil, combed through the beard, is claimed to solve the problem of dry skin under the beard. It also helps condition the beard hair and adds some shine and prevents the wild hairs from being as wild. And they're formulated with essential oils for scent (there are multiple scents including cedar, citrus and tobacco).
I ordered a couple of bottles of his oil, and a good quality comb. I went with one bottle of the Wildwood and one of the Orient Express, so, we'll see how it does.
Here's the website:
www.thebeardbaron.com
And the guy who started the company has a YouTube channel (that's actually how I found out about it) that has a lot of great (and funny) videos on beard care, etc:
https://www.youtube.com/user/thebeardbaron
Anybody else used beard oil? If so, do you have a brand/scent you like?
Maybe you can get some in Jet A.
