Large frizzy brown hair that tangled in any gust of wind and had torn up bleached ends that were just begging to be chopped clean, was the only security I had when I felt a person’s gaze linger on me for a morsel of a second. It made me appear thinner when it was crushed up against my face on hot summer days, and it was so long that it hid my body. It was the eradicator of all my insecurities, yet I was jealous of the girls who could have shorter hair and still appear beautiful because behind mine, there was a face that not even a mother’s beguile could fool herself into believing the person behind the curtain was lovely.

Imagine my disbelief in high school, when the compliments began flooding in. “Your hair is so long! I wish I could grow mine like that.” I felt like I’d been waiting for that moment my whole life. The blanket that suffocated me for all that time, was finally allowing others to admire its warmth. My hair was pretty, that was all that mattered. Then, I dyed the tips of my hair purple. Again, people who had never spoken to me before, stopped and told me my hair was gorgeous.

I didn’t feel so hideous anymore, until I took a second to look in the mirror. My hair had become a part of me that would physically hurt if I cut it off. I was so dependent on it, that it hid myself from reality. So, for the first time since middle school, I decided to braid my hair back. It made me feel exposed like a docile sheep thrown into a lion’s cage, but I fought through it. In the end, hair is just hair and if a person doesn’t like me because of it, then it isn’t the end of the world.