Bullied Into Cutting

I have a sad story to tell today.

Sofie began asking if she could cut her hair short last week. She became more and more insistent that what she wanted was to cut her hair. I'm personally of the opinion that it's her hair, so she can do what she likes with it. I talked it over with her father and we agreed that we would allow her to cut to midback length.

As the stylist began cutting away her beautiful locks, she asked why Sofie wanted to get her hair cut off. Sofie told the stylist that Madison (not her real name, of course), a girl in her class, had been making fun of her and told her that she was ugly. Madison told Sofie that she'd better cut her hair off, or she'd be ugly forever. This may sound ridiculous, but Sofie is only five years old.

As I heard my daughter telling the story, I was fuming. I couldn't believe that my daughter was bullied into cutting her hair!

Once her hair was cut to the middle of her back, Sofie turned to me and said, "It needs to be shorter, Mommy. Madison will be mad if it isn't up to here." She indicated chin length.

"Absolutely not!" I said, "Mommy and Daddy decided that you could cut to where it is now and I absolutely will not allow you to cut more just because someone else told you that you had to cut it. If you decide that you want to cut it shorter later, we'll talk about it."

She seemed worried, but didn't argue. She hasn't complained about the length of her hair except to mention once or twice that it needs to be shorter because of Madison.

I sat down this morning and wrote out a long letter to her teacher about what had happened. I asked the teacher to set up an appointment with me to discuss what had happened. I am so mad! Sofie had beautiful hair and seemed really happy with it. The fact that someone else made her feel bad enough about her hair to make her want to cut it just really ticks me off. I'm mad at myself, too, because I didn't ask the simple question "Why do you want to cut it, Sofie?"

It is hair, though, and it will grow back, if that's what she wants. Her hair grows incredibly fast, too. I'm just worried that she'll succumb to bullying in other ways. I'm interested in what the teacher will say about what happened. In the teacher's defense, the bullying seems to have happened in the cafeteria, where the teacher is not present and the children are supervised by lunch monitors. Sofie may have been scared to tell her teacher (and me) that someone was bullying her.

I'll definitely update after I talk to the teacher. Bullying is not okay, whether it's about hair or anything else.

New Tutorial: How to S&D

Aamba, this one is for you!

The Truth About Trims

I've recently taken up a new hobby.

I know it sounds crazy, but from September 2007 until May 2010, nothing sharp touched my hair. No trims, nothing.

I started to doubt the health of my hair. How could one go two and a half years without a single haircut? People didn't believe me when I told them that.

It's true, though. I remember my last haircut because it was a doozy. After that, every time I thought about getting a trim, I remembered my last haircut.

I was told that I needed to trim in order for my hair to grow. That somehow, your hair grows faster if you trim. That doesn't even make any sense! Your hair follicles magically know that your ends have been trimmed and that stimulates growth? B.S., I say.

I do think that it may have the appearance of faster growth. If you're having breakage from the bottom, it's going to seem like you're not growing. You are growing, but your growth is breaking off. If you need to trim (and a lot of people honestly do,) you are having decreased breakage, causing gained length.

I guess I'm one of those super lucky people. I don't want to sound like I'm bragging, but I wasn't always this gentle with my hair. I remember ripping a brush through my wet tangles, listening to the sound of my hair breaking and thinking nothing of it.

When I finally started to evaluate my hair, last November, I surveyed the damage, thinking I would have to cut a huge amount of my hair off due to self-inflicted damage. I was amazed to discover my length was in pretty good shape. I started pampering my hair, using moisturizing treatments, gentle combing through tangles with a yak's horn comb, and giving up the elastics for wooden hairsticks and forks and I think it's helped a lot.

So, new hobby. I've started to S&D. That's "Seek and Destroy" and it involves bright light and a sharp pair of scissors. I literally go through my hair, strand by strand, looking for split ends. Once found, I snip them off just above the break. It's time consuming, but it's fun to do while watching reruns of Buffy and it's just so damn satisfying. "SNIP!" Plus, I preserve the length.

I know that if I went into a salon and asked for a trim, they'd probably insist on cutting inches off (because that's what's happened every time I've been in a salon.) I know my hair isn't damaged. The longest split was under an inch and most are just at the tip of my hair. The vast majority of my hair is split-free. No need for a drastic cut.

So, if you're looking to grow and want to forsake the salon, S&D. I think you'll find it's immensely satisfying to cut the split ends out and watch them fall to the floor.