Evil Hair Day!

[purplerabbit]

So things are getting desperate on the hair front.

What is she talking about?, you ask. Hair is an issue for me.

Back story here: I was bald until I was two. When it did grow in, it was blond curls. Which made people really silly around me. Seriously. I did so not like being patted on the head. I had my hair short until I grew up. Then I grew it out in back in the 80s. Big big head of massive curls. In 1990, I chopped it all off except a set of long braided tails in back. Wore it that way until a couple years ago. Then shaved all my hair off. Wore a buzz cut for over a year. Then, after the last buzz cut in July 2004, I decided to grow my hair out again.

Problem? I have absolutely no *^$* idea what to do with it. It is now a mass of thick long brown hair that is always in my face. It isn't long enough to pull back easily and I am at a loss of what to have it styled like. I like having my hair long in back, but I also really feel more comfortable looking butch. Not to mention not having it in my face all the time.

A couple weeks ago I had it done into cornrows. Looked fantastic on me. Problem is that after a week, my scalp hurt and itched to much to keep them. So I am back to the mess again.

HELP! If I don't figure something out soon, I may resort to cutting it all off again. Sigh.

Comments

[punzel.livejournal.com]

Good with a cold snap: tie a bandanna on your head, the kind where you fold the diagonal to make a big right triangle. When you tie the two narrow corners behind at the nape of your neck, you can make it look butch/pirate instead of workin' maid by lifting up the loose center points and then let it fall back down. It tucks in the two side flaps. For extra pirateness, tie the loose flap into the two tied side corners.

Color matters. Something that flatters your eyes can look amazingly hip. I wear a dark green one, makes my eyes look almost the same shade of green.

[purplerabbit.livejournal.com]

Yeah, been doing the bandanna thing. So far it makes me look to mainstream and like a maid. Also, big problem is my hair is so thick and soft that everything slides off it -- scarves, hair ties, barrettes. The things that don't slide off, brake.

Also, it hasn't been cut at all since the buzz cut, so it is kind of wild. I do need to figure out a "style" for it. I was trying to let it grow long enough to braid it all back. Just running out of patience.

I will try the pirate look thing and see if it helps.

[hopeforyou.livejournal.com]

Noooo! Don't cut it off! I haven't even had a chance to REALLY play with it!

My thoughts:

Talk to siodhchan. She has curly hair that's been unruly and knows how to tame it beautifully.

Think about getting a layered cut. Shorter on top, longer in back... but without the 'mullet' look. I've seen it work, and work well.

Broader braids. Sometimes one or two long braids off the front of the face really help with the evil hair days.

If I have more ideas, I'll let you know. But those 3 seem like a good start...

[purplerabbit.livejournal.com]

[Noooo! Don't cut it off! I haven't even had a chance to REALLY play with it!]

Hey, you are one of the folks who said you would make it worth my while if I grew it out. So when are you going to play with my hair? Big grin.

[lady-equine.livejournal.com]

Back when I was growing out bangs, I would take the top of my hair, comb it up and back to the crown, and make a braid of it, starting up there at the crown.

Since the rest of my hair was long, I would do a second braid with the rest of it. I was known for my twin pair of braids for a very long time.

Not sure if I described this well enough. Good luck. As I child, I often used hair head bands to hold back my hair away from my face. They make these now in hard plastic with teeth now too.

[purplerabbit.livejournal.com]

Do you have a photos of that? It would help to see it.

[lady-equine.livejournal.com]

First, the hair bands. These particular ones are way too froo-froo, but there are plain ones out there too. I have pretty thick hair, though not extremely thick, so I really sympathize with most clips, ties, barrettes, and scarves sliding right out because of hair weight and/or softness. http://www.dressytresses.com/store/hbands.asp

Next, the picture is actually of someone starting a french braid, which I'm not recommending as it takes some practice and takes longer to do. But the starting location is about right, maybe even a little further back on your head depending on your hair length. When my bangs were still shorter, the braid started up pretty high like in the picture. As they grew longer, I would start the braid farther and farther back and down. The first two pictures are the applicable ones: http://www.dressytresses.com/hair/gallery/instruct/hair-braid/default.asp

[cyan-blue.livejournal.com]

The inside-out French Braid is the one I did on you, Purplerabbit.

[beanolc.livejournal.com]

Speaking as someone with a lot of very thick hair (each strand is thicker than normal, and I simply have a hell of a lot of the stuff growing out of my head -- it's also wavy and likes to be unruly), I echo the merit of head bands. Good ones are hard to find, but I have a couple I've owned for *years*, they're that good. I like them plain and wide -- 1-2" wide are best for me. The ones with teeth lady_equine mentions are a bit of a pain to re-adjust; my hair likes to tangle and will get caught in the teeth as I try to remove and adjust.

I also lived with scarves rolled up like head bands; they required a lot of adjusting during the day, but did the trick. As my hair got longer, it would require less adjusting because it would also get heavier.

For barrettes I buy specifically for thick hair. The french style ones are the only ones I can use, but even then there are plenty I've tried only to have break during the day.

For a cut, I loved how my hair looked layered, but it was a total pain to maintain. The middle stage of growing out one's hair is a TOTAL PAIN IN THE BUTT but worth going through.

[perlandria.livejournal.com]

A cheating 'french' braid that doesn't take any braiding would be to make the highest ponytail you can, then make a second one an inch down or so being sure to include the tail of the previous one, and then another elastic, and another, until you have a row of elastic ties holding your hair up and centered on your head in what feels and looks much like a french braid but doesn't take the work.
Lemme go see if I can google a picture of what I mean.

[freeimprov.livejournal.com]

The problem with growing your hair out is that it goes through an awkward period, and the ONLY thing you can do is let it be awkward. It'll clear up in six months to a year, and then you'll have LONG hair, which is far easier to deal with.

But that only works if you can resist cutting it.

[purplerabbit.livejournal.com]

Thanks.

By the way, that photo of me you took at ICON is fantastic. May I use it? Did you get any of Harry Potter?

[goldfish42.livejournal.com]

Eh, I don't know, I know quite a few women who wear the classic butch mullet, and I think it's kinda nice, and immanently practical. Long in back for vanity, short in front for out-of-the-way, and works super well on thick bushy hair.

[godmoma.livejournal.com]

Find a good, passionate, gay, hairdresser, and tell him he has free hands.

Seriously.

We did that when we got Thomas hair cut, and I've done it many times before in my life. Works like a charm - they love it when they get to actually *do their job*, and not have to deal with clients who say "I want my hair like such-and-such celebrity", who happens to not have the same type hair or facial shape, or anything.

[cyan-blue.livejournal.com]

That is an adorable baby picture :-)

How did you like the hairstyle where I french-braided the top part of your hair, just enough to keep it out of your eyes? I could teach one of the guys to do that hairstyle on you, if you like...

[maiasaur.livejournal.com]

Perhaps (I hate to say this) the mullet would work well, short in front and long in the back. I know, I know, it's a *gasp* mullet, but on you I honeslty think it could look good and allow you to keep the length in back that you love without being high maintenance in having to be braided or tied back every day.

[vvvexation.livejournal.com]

You might get even more suggestions from the longhair community.

Another style idea

[punzel.livejournal.com]

If you want it all up, you can also approximate a "gibson girl" style by doing a twist braid/roll with 8-15 tiny claw clips (which most people refer to as "little clippy things.").

More likely, you can make yourself a headband out of your own hair by gathering a lock near one ear, twisting it a bit, gathering neighboring hair into what you've got, twisting some more, clipping that roll to some scalp hair, gathering some more, twisting the locks then clipping to the scalp hair, and repeating the gather-nearby, twist, clip until you get to the other side.