This economic downturn is having a very serious effect on everything in my life. But most worrying is what it's doing to my vagina.

Radical Mommy: When times were "good," I thought nothing of spending $100 for a mani-pedi, $600 to get my hair done, and $75 to get my bikini line waxed. Sadly, those days are gone, gone, gone and I've been forced to come up with ways to achieve maximum beauty (you'd be laughing at that if you saw what I look like) for minimum cost.

One of my more brilliant ideas to save money was to attempt to wax my OWN bikini line. That's right, ladies, I decided that I would heat up a pot of wax to just about scalding and then apply it to my "pussoire" with a wooden stick.

In case none of you have been thrifty enough (read: downright idiotic enough) to try this, there's a reason that we actually pay other people to manhandle our (lower) lips. The reason? Because it's damn near impossible to stand up, bend over, apply wax and rip it off yourself without falling over.

After trying it standing up once -- and damn near killing myself -- I decided that I'd probably be better off if I sat on the toilet seat and applied the wax. At first, I thought this was a FAB idea ... but as I started applying the wax and as the wax started to start dripping down my beav like lava out of a volcano, I realized I was wrong, very wrong.

Before I knew it (and before I could do anything about it), my poor, delicate punany was stuck to the toilet seat. In case you're not sure what that's like, allow your mind to wander to that sweet little boy in the classic holiday tale "A Christmas Story." You remember him -- he decided to lick an icy-cold pole and his tongue got stuck. Well, imagine if that was your vageene stuck to the pole - then you might have an idea how much pain I was in!

After recovering from the initial shock of being stuck by the lips to a toilet seat, I was able think rationally. I called out to my husband who was in the other room and ordered him to bring me a knife -- STAT. I won't even go into the questions I had to answer to get him to actually get me the knife but suffice to say that I convinced him of its necessity and was handed a steely cold dinner knife.

What happened next is not for the faint of heart. After evaluating what was wax and what was lip, I began trying to pry the wax free. At first, I gingerly tapped away at the wax hoping that it would come free of the toilet seat. It didn't. Determined to free myself, I started hacking more viciously - so much so that I actually took a little chip out of the seat. Finally I was standing, free from the toilet seat's death grip on my ho-ha. It wasn't over though. I still had to face the fact that my most private parts were smothered in dry wax -- not good.

After further investigation (imagine me with one foot on the seat and my torso contorted), I decided that the only chance I had of getting rid of this hideous mess was to just rip it off. And that's what I did. I grabbed one side of the blob and just rrriiiiiiiiiippppppedddddd. Thank God the wax came off, but not without a lot of pain, some skin and all of my dignity.

Needless to say, I will not be trying that again and I only hope that both I (and my husband) can adjust to the new recession "au natural" me.