I hurt my daughter!
Aug 27 '00
I cried. I took one look at my daughter and burst into tears, collapsing on to the floor. Of course, this sent my daughter crying. How did this happen? Why did she do it? I couldn’t believe it.
MY DAUGHTER CUT HER HAIR!!!
My soon to be four year old daughter had taken the scissors that a friend off mine had left on a bathroom counter, and cut her hair. I must explain that my daughter was born with over 1/2 inch of hair, which mom’s know is more then usual. Her hair kept up this rate of growth all these years. Her hair was over halfway down her back. Thick, Beautiful. When people first met her, they always exclaimed over how wonderful her hair was.
Gone. It is gone. Four years of growth, destroyed in less then a minute. On one side, she had cut it just below chin length. On the other, just above. The back she pretty much left alone. The top of her head...some of it is less then 1/4 of an inch. Not all of the top was hit. Just a bit here and there. Where her cowlick is, it is about 1/2 an inch, and stands straight up, no matter what I do.
Salvage Mission. It is Sunday. I don’t know about where you live, but here in North Carolina I dare you to find a hair salon open! I could not let her go to school on Monday with her hair like that. We did find ONE place open, a store at the mall. Of course, since it was at the mall, it cost 1/3 more then our regular places. They did the best they could. They tied up the back of her hair, and off it came. I have an eight inch souvenir, a pony tail of her hair. I cried at the mall. The friend who had left the scissors out had gone with me. She had to drive home, I was to distracted.
Her side. Above is just a summary, missing several details in hopes not to bore you to much. I told it from my point of view, that of the mother. Now for her responses to the above situation.
I asked her “Why”. She said “I want to be beautiful for you mommy”. This was either a brilliant ploy to distract me from my sadness, or the truth. I believe the latter.
I told her “No more braids and no more ponies”. In non child talk, it meant I would no longer be able to fix her hair like I use to. She had always loved to decide how I was going to fix her hair for the day. Her response? She cried.
I told her how sad and mad I was. She cried harder.
I looked at her hair again, and I started crying again. She got so upset she threw up.
What does all this have to do with a child’s self esteem? I want to quote epinions header.
“What can parents do to help their children develop a strong sense of self-esteem? How does America’s obsession with beauty factor into a child’s self-image?”
I was upset because she had destroyed her hair. Because I was upset, she was upset. And when you get so upset you get sick, your self-esteem has to be non-existent.
Because I took her chopping her hair off so hard, I hurt my daughter’s self-esteem.
After I realized what I was doing, I started working on damage control. I tried to hide my pain, and concentrate on her. She was feeling terrible. I couldn’t lie to her, that would only cause more damage. So, I did the only thing I could. I promised that we would go and try to get it fixed. I had to explain that she had broken her hair, and that we had to get if fixed by getting more of it cut. That calmed her down some, but she was still hurting. I had rejected her. I was forced to put aside my own hurt to help her with hers. I had to stop carrying on about it. I sat her in my lap and told her that even though I was sad and mad, that I always love her. This is something I tell her often. She finds comfort in it.
However, it did not stop her from dreaming about it that night. Her mind would not let it go. Neither would mine.
Tomorrow she has to go to school with her new hair cut. It is styled in a bob with length just above her shoulders. Shorter in the front (had to even out to above chin length) and a little longer in the back. The parts on top? Hopeless, just have to wait and let them grow. I will be taking her in early, so I can talk to her teacher. I’m hoping that teacher will be able to help Sunshine through the difficult day ahead.
Summary Yes, I let the preconceived notion of beauty hurt my daughter this weekend. I over reacted to the situation. I didn’t count my blessings. I have to remind myself to smile when I look at her today, instead of just staring at her hair.
I share this experience with hope. Hope that other’s will not do the damage to their child’s self-esteem that I did. That if they find themselves in this situation, they will do the good things and skip over the bad gut reactions. To let them know that they are not alone with this. I sat back last night and thought.
I cut my hair myself when I was a child.
My best friend cut her friends hair as a child.
My daughter’s best friend has already cut her hair.
My brother cut his hair when he was 7.
My next door neighbor’s daughter cut her hair.
And the list goes on.
Is this a stage that most girl children go through?
My blessings.
I have a healthy child.
She did not get physically hurt.
She did not die.
She is still the same sweet child.
I am still upset. This will probably haunt me for a while. I need to learn how to cope. But my top priority is to let my daughter know that I love her, no matter what.
As always, feel free to email me or leave a comment!
 |
|
|
|
|
|
|
Epinions.com ID:
pennyruba
|
|
Location: NC
Reviews written: 54
Trusted by: 91 members
|
|
|
© 1999-2008 Shopping.com, Inc.