My 6 year old daughter just got her first “big girl” haircut today. She’d gotten hair cuts in the past, but for some reason this one felt different for me. I think it’s because we’d always trimmed it, while steadily letting it grow long like Rapunzel. She’d wanted hair like Rapunzel for the longest time and so we’d been working solely to keep it healthy so that it could grow.
Recently, one of her friends at school got a haircut up to her shoulders, which prompted a new desire within her to get her hair cut shorter. I struggled a little with whether she wanted to cut it for the right reasons as she never wanted to have shorter hair before. I questioned it a bit and then decided that I would allow her to cut her hair if that is what she really wanted to do, regardless of the reason. After all, who am I to decide what the “right reason” is. I simply want to make sure that she isn’t being peer pressured into doing anything that she might regret later and protect her from any type of major damage. In this whole inner dialogue, I came to the determination that a haircut, even if it came out awful, was not anything that she could not recover from.
As a parent it’s hard sometimes to remember that they are their own people and that our job is not to control them or cloud them with our own fears and judgments. Although it was her haircut, it triggered some things within me. I felt an odd sense of her Rapunzel goal slipping off into the grave with this event and it was an odd letting go process for me. It felt as though a little of her childhood innocence was dying in that moment. As we were at the hair salon, after I’d questioned her a few more times to make sure she really wanted to go a lot shorter, I felt myself feeling nervous and anxious over the initial cut that said there was no going back.
In some odd way, I felt like I was letting go of my little girl and getting a new version of her that wanted a more mature look. I was letting go of my little girl who had the fantasy of being Rapunzel for a young lady who picked out her own hair style on Pinterest. She was trading in Disney princesses for fitting in with her friends, which made me sad. It also made me feel somewhat nostalgic and brought up some sadness around the close of one chapter in favor of another.
As I sit here and write, I must admit that I also fear that we are opening the chapter of comparison, which opens the door to insecurities. As a parent all I want to do is protect her from those who might break her down and make her doubt her worth. I want her self-esteem to be rock solid and knowing she wanted to cut her hair because another little girl got a hair cut frightens me because I know that part of it was about feeling accepted. Reflecting on this, I know that we all crave acceptance and I know that this is a slippery road because sometimes needing acceptance leads us on paths that are beneath us. I know this from personal experience.
I also felt that my experiences of haircuts past were coming back to haunt me. My own feelings about my hair were surfacing on my daughter’s experience. I remember wanting new styles and then going to salons that didn’t know what they were doing with curly hair always ending up disappointed. These experiences made me really cautious about who I selected for her “big girl” haircut. Usually we just go to the cheap place down the street from us for the trims since, an inch all one length is doable for most stylists. Knowing she needed a styled cut, I did my research and made sure she got someone with a lot of experience working with curls. I finally felt comfortable with the selection, which eased me into today.
This leads me to the truth of how most of us do not see the world and the experiences we have as they are, but how we are. We all look at life through the lenses of our past experience. This whole haircut, though a small event, brought up some major insight for me and forced me to back off and let my daughter’s experience be her experience. It forced me to keep my own fears out of the situation in favor of supporting her in what she wanted. It helped me to see some of the ways that my vision is clouded by my own “stuff” and reminded me once again to live in the present moment… not allowing my past experience to color it and not allowing my fears of the future to impede upon it. I had to reset so that my fears of her getting an awful haircut didn’t ruin the experience. I had to clear all of the crud from my past related to seeking my own form of acceptance.
I had to step out of myself and realize this was not about me, but about her. It was about her claiming her identity. It was about her asserting herself in a hair style that felt suited her. It was about her growing out of her Disney princess dreams in favor of something new. she got her hair cut, she was bouncing around the salon with the largest smile on her face and I knew I’d made the right decision in taking her to get it cut in the way that she chose. She was overjoyed with her new do and I was able to enjoy it fully with her because I got myself out of the way. When we step back and realize that most of life is not about us and we take ourselves out of it, the moments become so much fuller.
Yes, it was just a hair cut, but it was also another step in my journey to becoming love, becoming healed, becoming free. One I am choosing to celebrate today!
What changes have you gone through with your own children that have forced you to face your own “stuff”? Share in the comments. I’d love to gain some insight. We’re all in this together!