On Friday, I happened to complete the most dreaded task of the year: getting my hair cut. To understand the depth of this horror I’m going to have to share some hair history. I have always preferred my hair long. My hair is my favourite feature, all throughout my childhood it was so thick and luscious (hello, modesty), something I didn’t think about and brushed off when people mentioned it, but now years later I wish I had appreciated it.
I started losing hair throughout secondary school. Not noticeably to others, but to me it was conspicuous. There was also a dismal incident in Sixth Form where my hair got majorly tangled over a course of time, and my best friend armed with a fine comb attacked each and every knot in our History classroom while I cried. Friendship. My hair felt horribly thin at this point.
Years past and my last haircut, prior to Friday, was in March and I left the salon fighting a torrent of tears. By the time she was finished my hair felt so thin because she’d cut so many layers, that I couldn’t speak. I didn’t know what to do so I left and called my Mom. It was an awful week for me, for reasons I won’t get into, but this was the icing on the cake. The dam had broken and I cried in my room feeling helpless and ugly. It sounds so ridiculous, that my hair has such influence on how I feel about myself as a person. It is intrinsically linked with my level of self-confidence.
Unsurprisingly, I vowed never to get my hair cut ever again. People at work and my friends were really nice about it, in fact many of my co-workers commented on how “lovely and thick” my hair looked but I always received their remarks with incredulity. Were they on crack? Did they not see what I saw? The problem was I didn’t care how my hair looked to them I cared how it felt to me and it felt thin and fine. Like most vows, this one, too, was broken. My hair was begging for a trim so I bit the bullet and asked for recommendations. A friend suggested a salon and I finally experienced a haircut that didn’t break my heart. Here are my tips for surviving a trip to the hairdressers.
- Firstly, if you are visually impaired like me, for God’s sake, wear contacts. The utter lack of control you experience when you are in that chair, hair dripping wet, fuzzy image of your reflection in front of your face is terrifying. I wore contacts this time around and this settled my nerves instantly, I could stop her if I wasn’t sure what she was doing and I could see how it looked every step of the way.
- Trust. Most of my friends and family have one person they trust to cut their hair, it’s like a brow specialist. I only have one woman in the world I trust to go near my brows and whenever I strayed I always regretted it and ended up spending a small fortune on brow products to fix their fuck-ups.
- Less Is More. The first thing I asked for was a trim, I think it is best to start small and then after you see how it looks see if you are ready for something different. I asked for an inch taken off the ends and then for an inch to be taken off my layers after scrutinising the result to add some more dimension.
- Honesty. Be up front and transparent, regardless of how much of a fool you think you will look. Explaining to a stranger how anal and paranoid I am about my hair was beyond embarrassing but it paid off. She reassured me throughout, and told me exactly what she was doing and why. She was kind, attentive and most importantly completely understood how I felt.
- Dry Cut or Wet Cut. Opt for a dry cut, as amazing as it feels to get your hair washed by someone else (it is pure heaven), this way you can see what your hair will look like in everyday life. What you will wake up in the morning with, not what it looks like after it’s been conditioned and blow dried to perfection. A famous stylist said that on a podcast I listened to recently and it makes so much sense.
Thank you so much for reading, please leave me a comment. I would love to read about your hair horror stories and preferences. Hoping I am not the only one who feels this strongly about hair (hangs head in shame). You can follow my blog via Bloglovin’, all my links are below, to stay up to date with new posts, I certainly appreciate it. I also created a new Snapchat account, username: alittlekiran, let me know yours in the comments below. I would love to find some fellow beauty addicts to follow! I included hair inspiration photos from the IG account @bombayhair and celebrities whose hair is so poppin’. Obviously a lot of them wear extensions but this does not stop me wanting naturally thick Selena Pantene-commercial perfect hair. Take care.
Do you have any hair horror stories?
Love ❤
Kiran