Hair Today, Gone Tomorrow

About a week ago I came to the conclusion that I wanted to cut my hair.  My hair was a couple of inches below my shoulders, which was the longest it had been since sophomore year of college. 

bye bye long hair!

I started to grow it out last spring when I could no longer afford to cut it.  I was at the very beginning of my depression and the growing of my hair was an inevitable result.  I couldn't afford to cut it and honestly I took so little care about my appearance that I didn't care.  When it started growing it was chin length and by the end of the summer it was close to my shoulders.  In the fall when I started to get my life back I decided to just keep letting it grow.  I still couldn't afford to get it cut, but at this point I tried to make it a positive.  I made it an experiment.  I knew I hated my hair long, but I convinced myself that I wanted it.

Then when I realized that the summer months were rapidly approaching, I got the idea in my head about cutting it.  So many people love long hair and think that its sexier than short hair.  They equate long hair with being pretty, but that was never me.  I honestly think that it takes a lot of self confidence to have hair really short, and the last time I had cut it uber short was the last time I attempted to lose weight and was confident about myself.  I feel like hair is something that people hide behind and I am tired of hiding.  I made up my mind that my long hair was the last thing connecting me to my old self.  The insecure, severely overweight version of Maia. A person whom I've come to despise.  The hair had to go.

I made the appointment last week and was looking upon it with glee.  I don't think I had ever been so excited about a hair cut in my life.  It was all I thought about.  Every day I just kept thinking, "One day closer!"  I felt like once I made the decision to get rid of it, that it was just this foreign substance.  It wasn't a part of me any longer.  It wasn't part of who I am now.

When I got to the salon today and finally sat down in that chair though, I fully admit that I started to get nervous.  Some old insecurities popped into my head... "What if it makes me look fat?"  "I'm not thin enough to pull off short hair"  "Will people look at me like and think I look stupid?"

I quickly shook those insecurities out of my head though and watched with relish as my stylist began hacking away with the razor.  After she initially cut it, I actually asked her to go shorter.  (She had initially left it longer than I asked to make absolutely sure I was ready to go this short.)  When I looked at the final result in the mirror I felt as if a weight had been literally and figuratively lifted off my shoulders.

As soon as I left, I felt a renewed sense of self confidence I hadn't felt in the past few weeks.  A new spring was in my step and a smile couldn't be wiped off my face. 

The new Maia now has an official new look and she likes it.