In the Philippines, it’s summer for the entire year, which means your bikinis don’t need to take a rest. You can wear them anytime you like.
Sometimes, though, those dark bikini lines can make you feel less confident. That’s much easier to deal with now with many effective whitening products, some of which contain vitamin C and glutathione that stimulate the skin to lighten.
But you may also want to know why it’s happening in the first place. It turns out there are a lot of possible reasons:
1. Melanin
When you have more melanin in your skin, it is harder for the sun to degrade it. You’ll be able to stay tanned longer with less exposure time in the sun. Your bikini area is basically another part of your body that contains melanin as skin pigment. Therefore, it has a better chance of resisting or delaying the degradation due to sunlight exposure.
2. Tight Clothes
Tight clothes can cause friction in certain areas when you move too much. Friction, in this case, means contact with air between fabric layers, which can lead to heat buildup and darkening from the perspiration/sweat that comes with it. There are ways to avoid this: wear looser clothing or a swimsuit that covers the bikini area.
3. Lots of Hair in the Bikini Area
Hairs, in general, don’t make your skin more sensitive to sunlight. When they are situated over or near oil glands, they may cause issues with tanning and darkening due to sweat/perspiration.
Since your bikini line is one of those areas, chances are you’re more prone to having black bikini lines than other girls would be (but not always).
If you want to get rid of those hairs, go ahead and shave them off if removing hair isn’t an issue for you. Remember, though, that shaving will only remove hair from the skin surface. If you want permanent results, you’ll have to remove hair from its follicles, which may involve using laser treatments.
4. Hyperpigmentation
If you’re one of those more susceptible to hyperpigmentation (dark spots), your bikini area will likely darken easily due to exposure to the sun. Hyperpigmentation is when melanin cells grow in clusters instead of being spread evenly throughout the skin, making certain parts of your body darker than others.
If you’ve been tanned for a long time already and notice that only your bikini line has darkened while the rest is still pale or white, then chances are this condition is what makes it stay that way. Allowing hyperpigmentation to heal and go away on its own would take a long time, but you can speed up the process by using creams that can help lighten their appearance.
5. Light Skin Tone
People with lighter skin tones tend to develop black lines faster than those with darker ones. This is because the natural color of light-skinned people (especially in areas that don’t see much sun) is white, and they typically don’t have as many melanin cells in their bodies.
When they tan, it’s usually easy for this pale-white color to show through underneath once they’ve reached dark brown or golden tans, which makes dark bikini lines appear faster and more obvious on them.
If you’re one of those girls who have naturally fairer skin, there’s not much you can do about it other than preventing exposure to sunlight, if possible, by wearing loose clothing over your bikini line or using sunblock.
6. Thin Skin
A skin that’s thin and not so durable can easily tear or get scraped off if it’s not protected when exposed to friction or other forms of stress, which can come from shaving or waxing, for example. If this happens, you may notice circular black marks that look like bruises.
To prevent these kinds of marks, avoid exposing your bikini line to anything harsh or something that will cause strong friction: don’t shave too closely, go for laser hair treatments instead of waxing/threading/plucking, and skip those exfoliating scrubs.
Overexposure to sunlight is also one thing to watch out for. A tan over thin skin can cause dark marks to form.
7. A Lot of Moles or Freckles in the Bikini Area
When the sun hits the darker parts of your body, you may notice that it makes those spots look even darker than usual, and this is true even if your skin tone is already pale. This happens because the extra melanin cells on top make these areas look browner/redder than what they would be otherwise.
Moles and freckles are not the same thing, but both increase in number when exposed to sunlight, making them show up more as a result (mostly noticeable on pale skin), especially when tanned from exposure to sun outside or UV lamps at places like tanning salons.
In this day and age, the mantra is to embrace who you are—flaws and all. But if it makes you feel more confident to have a much lighter bikini area, then go for it, especially now that you know what causes it.