I have been enjoying my first partial shaves with the straight, and while I have no strop, I am finding the newspaper is doing the trick for now.

Because I have bumps from ingrowns, I have had to avoid those areas with the SE and just use the M-3 around those areas while they heal.

I'm wondering if anyone else out there who is prone to ingrowns has used anything that has worked at preventing them?? I have seen many types of salves and balms advertised, but because I am presently trying something called "bump eraser" to no avail, I am suspicious of trying something else that probably won't work.

I've heard it's these multi blade cartridge razors that gave me the bumps in the first place, but is it solely the fault of those razors? Or is a combination of my skin type, my technique AND the multiblade?

Is there actually something out there that can heal and prevent them from coming back? It's quite irritating, especially when I have a few on the chin growing at once.

I'm wondering if investing in a DE would be a good idea to hit those areas I can't get to with the straight because of the bumps. Because I figure contiuning to shave around those bumps with a multi, might just make me go into a perpetual ingrown hair bump cycle? I can't remember the last time I had a completely clear face without ingrown hair damage. It's been at least two years. I actually got a syringe that I use solely for "freeing" the hair from under the skin. Beats the old method of scratching the layers of skin off until the hair popped up.