Why I decided to cut off most of my hair at 7 months into the going gray journey

The transition journey of going gray naturally is, as I’ve said before, a mind game no matter what route you take. It is weird hair has such an impact on our emotions. Good graycious, it is just hair. I sure didn’t know I’d ever care so much about it. That is, until I decided to stop coloring and let my natural gray grow in.

You must pick a route that works for you so that you’re comfortable with the process.

There are several options for going gray to choose from:

There’s the hard-core, cold-turkey, determined to just let it grow out, demarcation line and all way. This is the long enduring quest to keep the same length you started with route to gray. More power to those who take this route!
There’s the semi-permanent coloring until it grows out route. You keep coloring until the hair grows to the length you want and then just let the color fade away. That didn’t make sense to me, if I don’t want to color now, why would I keep coloring? More power to those who choose this route!
There’s the shave it, or go super short with a pixie cut and then let it grow – there’s no (or little to none) demarcation line. I did that type of hairdo once in my life. It’s easy, but not a favorite look for me. It is the super quick way to get rid of the old colored hair though. More power to those who choose this route!
There’s the stripping and color blending to minimize the demarcation line route. Again, I didn’t want to do so because of the chemical process. Some are happy and some dread the decision to go this route. It’s also a bit more expensive. More power to those who choose this route!

Frankly, it is nice to have so many options to going gray.

For 221 days, I was on course #1 . Yesterday, I took a leap and jumped to route #3. I decided my 4 ½ inches of outgrowth of the new gray needed to be liberated and freed from the camouflage of the old hair.

Why? For me, so often during this journey, I’ve sat in self-pity and self-shame because of the overwhelming presence of the old colored hair contrasting with the new gray hair. Frankly, more times than not, it just didn’t look appealing to me. It was weighing me and my spirits down. Some people can pull it off beautifully, I admire them. I just didn’t feel like I could do it any longer.

Who knows, maybe I kept on route #1 just for the silly sake to have something to blog about? Really? Yeah, kind of…(sigh).

But there’s more to why I switched routes.

Why, oh why couldn’t I stay the route of #1? This week I took a closer look at what I was feeling and why I was feeling so stuck in the past. After much reflection, I realized my hair, my silly obsession with wishing it would grow faster, settling for a look I didn’t love, nor wanted to share in public, all added up to the fact that I was acting beyond ridiculous. I got fed up with my pathetic old self. Really!?! (double sigh).

How sad and ridiculous it is to realize to myself that I was in hiding, not wanting to go out in public, unless I had to (aka, work), or if at all it was among my closest allies (aka, my family).

Don’t get me wrong, no one was telling me, “Oh my, that’s not the best look for you” or “Jeez…are you sure you want to be letting yourself go like that?” No, most people are genuinely polite.

It was the lack of eye contact that got me the most.

When people don’t make eye contact, it generally means they don’t want to stare or they don’t like what they are looking at. Think about it, when you don’t like the look of something, do you continue looking at it or do you look or walk away?

Holy ***t, reality check! I wasn’t going out in public that much to have people look away, so what the heck? Truth is, I was doing it to myself in the mirror! Yikes. I didn’t even want to look at myself in the mirror!! When I did I was struggling to figure out how to make my hair look less unappealing to myself.

I found myself resorting to just pulling it back in a bun out of desperation because, I didn’t want to cut it short to get rid of what I no longer liked to look at. I was holding on to my past by remembering the experience of how much I hate the growing out my hair stages.

I was holding on to the past. Yep, the past!

It is hard to let go of something you have finally gotten that you had wanted for a long time or worked hard to get. I finally had the length of hair I loved and I didn’t know if I wanted to let go or not. I love the versatility of long hair and how you can style it so many different ways. Why was I afraid of short hair?

When hair is short, well…it’s short and that’s it. Short. Period.

But…good graycious, I needed to get a grip and not fear short hair! If I was just pulling it back all the time, why not just cut it off?

Good point! Why not cut it off then?

You know what? I couldn’t come up with a great reason why not to cut it off other than I wanted long hair (…and the silly blog ideas). When I looked closely at what I want at this stage in the journey, I could come up with way more reasons to cut off the old hair and embrace the new hair!

Get on with it already! Move on from the past and my fears!

So I called my hair dresser. Actually, I sent her an email, and texts and questions and pictures (after searching for options on Pinterest). She was game to help! Ah…I felt a sense of peace at last. I had a new direction to go and a new added twist to this my “good graycious I’m going gray journey”!

My hair dresser is so supportive. After agreeing upon no more coloring, semi-permanent or stripping options, and my wanting to embrace the new hair and be free of the old hair without going tooooooo short, we talked our way to a new hairdo for the rest of the my transition to gray naturally (I’m back on course #1 again)!

I can now see more of the gray and way less of the old color. Hallelujah!

And…the verdict is, I love it. I love being able to see more of the gray than the old. Some of the old colored hair is sprinkled in with the new – like a reverse highlighting effect! Good graycious, finally some forward progress on the journey. Most of all I love the lack of seeing the old frizzy, fading colored hair when I look in the mirror.