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Curly Fuzzy Snaggy Shaggy

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I am one of Those Women.  I’m letting my hair grow for my wedding.  And I’m going to whine about it.  And then I will probably cut it all off the day after my wedding.  I am living the cliché.

Some background: My hair is what my shampoo bottle calls “hard to manage.”  I like to call it moody.

Growing up, my hair could best be described as “perpetually tangled,” which in my girl scout years I resolved by having an awesomely hilarious bowl cut, and in my teen angst years I “resolved” through intense conditioning and time consuming blow-drying.

When I was 19, I cut my hair short.  Then shorter.  Until I had “a boy cut” (a misleading name name considering the fact that the average hairstyle of a college aged dude was much longer than my hair). I LOVED having short hair.  But I also got annoyed with the necessity of regular haircuts.  And I sometimes missed the ability to “do something different.”  [I am bad at accessorizing, and moreover, cute headbands weren't in style like they are now.]

My last year of college I started growing my hair out.  I found the growing-out process completely miserable.  When my hair was finally all one length again, I realized that it was now curly.  Which was really fun and exciting!  Now I live in terror of my hair up and deciding not to be curly anymore.  Because the curl doesn’t always form, if, for example, my hair dries too quickly or I use the wrong product.

Now:  Whenever my hair goes through a bad mood, I always think about cutting it all off.  Shortly before the engagement I had a particularly bad pang, such that I actually went to the salon thinking I would do the big chop.  But I told my stylist about the imminent engagement, and she reminded me of how much growing out hair sucks and what if I decide I don’t want to be a sexy cool bold short-haired bride?  Then I thought, what if Collin, who met me well after the shift to long curly hair, doesn’t like the short ‘do?  What if it doesn’t flatter my more grown-up face?   I shied away from the risk.

My stylist gave me a great shape-up trim and my hair started to behave somewhat more often.  So, for now, I’m sticking to the long-hair for the wedding mold.  I’m curious if within a year I can get past my collarbone, which my hair hasn’t seen since I was in middle school.  My hair normally stops growing longer and starts growing messier when it hits my shoulders, but I never give it much chance after that point.

I remain less than confident that I will actually make it a whole year without grabbing a pair of kitchen shears and cutting off all the hair I can pull away from my scalp, then speeding to the salon, sobbing all the way, barging in and begging, “FIX IT DEAR LORD FIX IT.”

Anyone else deviating from her normal hairstyle (or fighting off desire for major change) in the name of her wedding?

24 Comments

  1. Seriously, I just posted about the same thing earlier today. I want to cut it all off right now.

    Also super short hair = not paying someone to put it up pretty because I’m incapable of making longer hair look good.

    • [Oh boy, now I am reading the back catalog of your blog instead of studying.]

      Good point about saving money on wedding day hairstyling! I also miss how having short hair meant one bottle of conditioner could last half a year. Then again, I spent more on monthly trims (I guess regardless of length they recommend six weeks, but with longer hair I go every other month at best) and fancy hair wax when I had the short cut. I don’t know how the relative costs net out.

      • I guess I figure that I’ve already factored the cut into my regular budget. But my hair grows so damn fast that no matter how long/short it is that I have to go to the salon before six weeks for it to look decent. I’m okay with paying $40-50 for something that lasts me a few weeks, versus paying that kind of money to someone for a fancy style that will be for only one day (and with my hair luck, won’t even last the whole day). Even if I do really like my hair stylist.

  2. “I am living the cliché.”

    Ha! I did the same thing. I almost didn’t cut my hair after the wedding, just because it’s so expected. LOL.

    I didn’t mean to grow mine out, it just kind of happened… And then it was long and I didn’t know what to do with it, so I just wore it down/curly for the wedding.

    It sounds like we have similar hair; mine became unexpectedly curly during my teen years, but it turns to frizz on “bad” days, so it’s always kind of a wild card.

    Have you ever tried the “curly girl” method-thingy?

    • I haven’t tried the curly girl method thingy. The no “cones” part is the thing I can’t handle because every product I put in my hair with the exception of Johnson & Johnson No More Tangles have dimethicone as like the third ingredient. It’s hard to cut that cord. The only people I know who have done it have tight curls, and mine are much looser, so it’s hard to guess if it would work for me.

      How about you? Ever tried it? Any luck?

      • I tried curly girl when I was like 20, and it worked amazingly… for a while. Then I just started to feel like my hair was getting greasy-looking. I still think parts of the method are smart, but when I’m busy, I default to the regular ‘ole way of hair washing.

        Now, I it seems like I try something different every day, LOL. It’s tough to find no “cones” unless you buy organic, $$$ stuff. I have loose curls or sometimes just waves, so they get weighed down by a lot of curl/no frizz products. I ordered a sampler from http://www.jessicurl.com/, and some of the stuff was great, but their heavy-duty curl enhancers made mine droopy. Right now, I’m liking John Frieda’s “Curl Boosting” Mousse (used that for the wedding and it worked well!).

        I have found that doing a baking soda scrub + an apple cider vinegar rinse makes my hair look better than most commercial shampoos or conditioners.

        And I can never find a stylist who seems to get my hair… is that just me or does everyone feel this way? I *always* kind of hate any hair cut (esp. when they blow it dry and my curls turn into poofy frizz). :P

  3. Hey! I’m living the cliché, too.

    True Story: For my junior prom, I was mad at my date who told me he wanted me to grow out my hair and dress like a catalog model from J. Crew. I ended up getting a cut so short that I had a weird tan line on my neck and had to wear makeup on the back of my head. When my date arrived, the first look that crossed his face was “Oh, holy hell!” He quickly recovered into a fake smile, but I would rather not see that look on my wedding day. So I’m growing it on all cliché like.

    • Tan line on the neck! Amazing!

      Semi-related: I was just telling one of my dude friends about how when I cut my hair short I kept getting sunburn on my ears, and he was confused about how there were parts of my ears that had gone 20 years without seeing much sun.

  4. I am currently growing my hair out for my bff’s wedding in August, because she wants us all to have fancy updos. Yeah. BUT THEN I am all befuddled as to whether to chop it to my shoulder-length normal ‘do or keep it long in case we decide to get hitched sooner than later. Because my hair is limp and stringy when down, so I don’t really want to wear my hair down for my nuptials.

    So yeah. I am currently living the cliche for someone ELSE’s wedding, and still have no damn clue what I want to do for my own, ha.

    • I originally started growing out my short hair for a friends’ wedding. But it was my decision, not hers.

      I had shoulder length hair last summer when my sister and Collin’s sister got married, and I had fancy hairdos for each wedding. It can be done!

  5. I have had the same hairstyle for two years now, and I’m bored to tears. I can’t even say that I am growing it out, because if it gets much longer than this, my hairs automatically split, like FFFWHUMP, and the ends look all broomy. Since she’s afraid to cut it shorter before the wedding, my haircutting lady delicately refers to this as “maintenance.” So each salon visit is like my own private Groundhog’s Day, where I walk out looking exactly the same as I came in. Over and over and over again. Hooray!

    BUT. I have to honestly say I hadn’t thought of what I’d do with my hair AFTER the wedding. Now I am getting excited. OMG! I can do something totally crazy with it! Maybe an asymmetric cut! Maybe a mowhawk! Maybe I can dye it blue! Maybe all of the above! I cannot wait to be a crazy married lady with an ill-advised hairstyle!

  6. I typically grow my hair out to a length where I’m finally happy and then promptly chop it all off because I also have finally become bored. I have been bored for six months now and itching for a radical cut. Also, the damn bangs from the LAST time I got bored are really not looking cute in their growing-in stage.

    So yeah, I’m a cliche too. I want a loose, low updo a hairflower so I’m sucking it up (the awkward hair phase and the contradictions.)

  7. I’m not so much growing my hair out as just not cutting it short.

    I feel like having waist-ish length hair for so many years would be a waste if I didn’t keep it for the wedding.

    I’ll do the chop afterwards though!

  8. I can say with all honesty that I had no idea how I was going to do my hair all the way up until the day of…but I wanted to keep my options open. Turned out that I didn’t need to grow it out, but who knew?

  9. i am growing my hair out too and cannot wait to chop it all off after. basically it works for how i want my hair the day of but on a day to day basis, I am crazy lazy and can barely be bothered to comb it. good luck in your growing it out venture!

  10. Hand raised high with the tangled do. When my hair is long, it is just a tangled mess.

    When I was in high school, I also rocked a real short hair cut. I went pixie. However it was a nightmare to maintain it. How do people find time to schedule that many haircuts into their lives?

    Unfortunately, when I grew mine back out, it never went curly. Mine’s stick straight. I would love curly hair, but grass is always greener on the other side, right?

    I think I’m going to sport my current hairstyle which has been with me for awhile (and was the one when I first started dating Mr. Beagle). Just shorter than chin length.

    I’d say, do whatever feels right and makes you look like you. Even if that’s long hair and you’re normally not a long haired girl.

  11. I’m one of those girls too…I’ve even stooped so low as to take pre-natal vitamins every day because they help my hair grow faster! But they give me so much energy I’m just going to keep taking them…

  12. I was so, “I’m not going to be the girl that grows her hair for the wedding.” Then I hit 24 and felt really really old, so I grew my “grown up lawyer” haircut out to a chin length bob. I’m now growing it out into a shoulder length cut. I think I’ll get bangs after the wedding though :) .

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