Until recently my son has preferred his hair long, like below his shoulders, which I’m fine with. As a curly girl myself, I have a different perspective about hair than those whose hair is considered family property and is always dictated by how it is worn and cut, I notice their hair tends to be straight, tidy, shiny, and picture-perfect. That was never me, so that isn’t high on my list of priorities, I tend to think as long as it’s clean and brushed, my son can wear his hair however he wants.
I also tend to think the kids that are most controlled at home as they are growing up are the ones that tend to go off the rails a little (or a lot) when it comes time to leave home and make their own decisions, suddenly drunk with freedom over themselves, their choices and their lives.
Besides, I’m not going to be following him through life telling him how to wear or cut his hair and he is old enough now to take care of it himself. I have always let him know he has options, short, long, or medium, but I trust in his own sense of self to decide how he wants to look. And I would rather he feels comfortable enough to try on different looks and images in his quest for his own identity to just play with it while still at home. Why Not?
Parents often just dress their children to fit social expectations and norms, and children are not expected to rebel or question it. I got to do that for a couple of years, from birth until he was around three. And then he started to have very definite ideas about what he wanted to wear, to the point of epic meltdowns. It was about this time that I realized I was not prepared to die on that hill.
Most of the time it was because he preferred comfort and wanted to wear track pants instead of jeans and a t-shirt instead of a polo shirt or button-down, (which I kind of thought was ludacris on a toddler anyway) and it was around this time that I understood the “choose your battles” sentiment so often heard with toddlers and close relationships in general, I decided it wasn’t worth the both of us getting upset about what he wanted to wear when all that really mattered was that he was wearing clothes and that they were clean. Honestly, I totally understood. if I could wear super comfortable clothes all the time, I most definitely would. And at that age, everything he owned I had bought for him anyway.
The mental weight that was released with that revelation was immense.
Although living in the deep south of the U.S, I would be aware of every other little boy dressed as if they had stepped out of a kids’ clothing catalog. I used to take this to heart when he was in elementary school, imagining people at church judging us, looking down their noses at my child with his long hair, in his track pants, Jimi Hendrix shirt, and slip-on Vans.
Upon closer inspection, I realized these people probably looked down their noses at me too, most of them were not very friendly to the woman at church with no husband present, (it’s ok, he’s sleeping off a hangover after hanging out late at night with his female co-workers again, but you know, he’s loyal-ish to his marriage and family, he just tells his friends he loves them and they text him a hundred times a day, but he says he loves us more, so apparently that makes it all ok. – I, however, was very definitely not ok), although I soon came to realize I wasn’t going to church to make friends – sure, that would have been nice, but the “friends” I would make for a hot minute, did that thing where they pretended they were interested in me and wanted to be friends, but really it was just to find out about me and my situation, and once they knew the shit show that was my life, my good time husband and solo parent existence – because I have this character flaw where I’m honest and vulnerable, (turns out around here, it just enables people to be as toxic and superficial as possible towards you, which you think means you have new friends until they decide you do not fit into the box they keep their friends in, and then you’re ghosted- very adult, church like and supportive. NOT)
Hey, but at least my kid didn’t look miserable with a brand new crew cut and a starched polo shirt with the collar up, and golf shorts with a matching belt like all the other little boys.
His clothes were clean and I was actually a little proud he had such a distinct sense of style. And when I picked him up he was excited to see me, chatting the whole way out to the car, telling me what they did or showing me what they made or sang or learned.
I felt the connection I shared with my son was more important than whether or not he looked like a clone of all the other boys his age. Apparently, I never got the email outlining the way families are supposed to dress to be accepted in good southern society. But honestly, I was not interested in forcing my child to look a certain way, just because everyone else did.
For what? The hope that these people would see that we fit in and played along. Why? Yeah, Nah.
His dad doesn’t like his long hair, being a good southern boy himself, he’d always had nice short tidy hair. Which seems to be the standard. As a stereotype, the buzz cut is the family haircut of choice in the south. You can usually tell if a boy’s parents are from somewhere else simply by the haircuts on their sons.
Even though his opinion was taken into consideration, ultimately I left the final hair decision up to our son. I was not buying into the idea that the parent who spent the least amount of time with our son could swoop in and dictate how he looked. So he would resort to bribery, and paid him a couple of times to get it cut. Which of course was encouraged by my little entrepreneur. Once for $60 (he was 9 and we were about to go to NYC – so seized the opportunity to make some spending money) and instantly regretted it, hating the old man’s haircut he had been given until it grew out. That was when I shared the no-freaking-brainer basic rule with my husband: to make sure the person you take your kid to for a haircut is capable of giving your kid a haircut, you must say the words: Do you cut boys’ hair?
The second time he paid him around $150 just before school went back for 7th Grade, he may have paid him more, I don’t know, I leave the deals made between them, between them. Again, it was awful, the hairdresser I took him to was the one I had been going to for over a year, and she assured me she cut boys’ hair. I don’t know if she was drunk or tripping that day, but we both had to go back to have our hair evened out and cut properly. Which was the last time I went to that particular hairdresser.
I do think that if he is given the freedom to move through each phase unhindered, exploring different looks and styles, then he is less likely to rebel against being controlled by doing something extreme, and if he did want to do something extreme with his appearance, he would know we could talk about it first.
That being said, he just got all his hair cut off. It’s not short, still kind of long and shaggy around his face, but it’s about jaw length. We went for a trim and he asked the hairdresser to cut off about 4 inches, I don’t know what they talked about but she did say if he wanted it shorter to come back within a week or so and she would take more off. So we did. He said he was sick of long hair. I get it. Maybe he’ll never have long hair again, but maybe he will. But he knows it’s his choice.
I’m happy to let my boy be himself, and look how he wants. Because I think it’s more important for this amazing soul under my care and guidance for such a short time, to feel that he is loved no matter what and even if. That home is a safe place and that my love for him does not depend on how he does his hair or if his shirt is tucked in.
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