It has happened again. I swear to god, this is the last straw. Never mind insomnia, mood swings, the midlife spreading in places I didn’t think I could spread any further, this -THIS- has tipped me over the edge.

What, I hear you say? You always do this – make these grand announcements and then leave us hanging! Just get to the point and say it.

Ok! Ok! But come closer, this is going to get personal.

What I want to know is, ( I’m whispering here, all Les Dawson-like.) What I want to know is, how come I go to bed perfectly fine – moisturised, teeth cleaned, a bit of Vicks on the nose to help with the snoring. How come I can go to bed fine and wake up with a beard?

Ok, I don’t actually mean a full beard, something yer man on the Gillette would be proud to stand there with, all manly with his 5 blades and rippling chest hair. I do mean six-inch-long wiry fuckers that appear on my chin or my cheek like some kind of menopausal Rapunzel escape route.

Has it been there all along and I’ve not seen it? How long has it been there? Has every other bugger I’ve met this week been staring at me squinty-eyed wondering why I haven’t just plucked the mass of rope off me chin.

Now, I should say that I think it’s perfectly natural for women to have body hair. I’ve never been one to do the full wax and polish, if you know what I mean. A quick trim when it looks like anything needs plaiting and shaving my shins in the summer and that’s about me. As a dark-haired woman, I have hair in places all the magazines deem inappropriate and to be honest if I started worrying about all of that it would be a bit like painting the Forth Bridge – I’d never stop.

So, it’s not like I’m uncomfortable with body hair.

In my younger years, I waxed my top lip – bleaching it gave me a Santa vibe that, in my early 30s, was not the look I was going for. Now waxing just gives me spots, so I look like a hairless glue-sniffer – again not quite the image I had in mind.

And these rouge hairs, there on my chin, are made of more than normal hair. Like steel they are, resisting all pulling and tugging with the tweezers when I finally catch hold of them.

They are hanging on in there.

And don’t be pulling away at them thinking they’ll just pull out. Oh no, they’re wily. The inexperienced will give them a sharp tug but that way they snap off, leaving a sharp little stubble that your fingers can’t help but play with but refuses to grow fast enough for you to have a second go.

Meanwhile, a whole chin full of whiskers could have sprouted while you wait.

My technique, honed now, is to gently, ever so slyly, slowly pull down on the buggers until they ping out of your face with a pop. They are in there deep, I’m telling you – I didn’t know my face was that thick – you could be pulling away for hours,  that’s how deep they are.

Then you go to bed, do your routine, moisturise and all that jazz and wake up looking like Desperate Dan again in the morning.

Tell me what am I meant to do?

Bloody hell, I’ve just caught sight of myself in the mirror and it’s happened again.

Now if you’ll excuse me, I need to find my tweezers.