A Cry For Help Disguised In a Makeover

“It’s short enough already” my mom says as she’s about to put down the scissors after finally agreeing to give me a haircut that I had been asking for weeks. “No, keep cutting it. I want it shorter” I assure her as she’s getting ready to walk away from the scene. “If I cut it any shorter, you’ll start to complain that I went too short the same way you always do.”

 My mom has always been my personal barber, who runs after me every couple months with a pair of scissors in her hands telling me that it’s time to cut my hair as they have gotten way too long and the bottom looks as if each individual hair strand got into a fight with the other. 

I force her to stay back and insist that she keeps snipping until I say so to stop. My sister who is recording the entire scenario, as if it were some live event, signals to me from the mirror that I should not go any shorter, as she knows I have always feared a short hair length and If i go any shorter, I might have an emotional breakdown. 

Both my mom and my sister have seen how much I cherish my long silky hair and they have also noticed how stingy and specific I have gotten in the past each time I have sat down for a haircut, specifying that “only the rough ends should be cut and not an inch more.” 

They have seen how much I love growing it out so I can style it in different ways. I see it as an asset of mine and my favorite part of my physical appearance. They have seen how much I have dreaded haircuts or even trimming because of the fear that it may never grow back. 

What they saw was simply a girl who loved long hair. But for me it was something so much more. 

… 

I walk into my dentist’s office for my monthly appointment for my braces, not knowing that this would be the last one I would have to be going to. “How would you feel if I removed your braces today?” My dentist asked me with a big smile knowing I would be very happy as I have dreaded the whole process of wearing uncomfortable and painful retainers and getting 4 teeth removed all in preparation for the worst part which was getting braces. Then showing up for these monthly appointments to get them tightened which made it literally impossible to eat, sleep, and even breathe due to the excruciating and hair pulling pain. The past year and half was full of so much tooth pain that his question was like music to my ears. 

Finally, the time had come where I would get to smile with an open mouth and not hide my teeth when laughing. 

I thought that the year 2019 would be my year as more positive changes were coming my way. 

It’s almost summer and the end of my sophomore year of high school. A great year for me overall. I was in mostly honors classes and soon going into AP, which meant I had above average grades and got to attend classes with some of my friends, while making new ones, finally feeling as if I fit in. 

Like every year, soon I would be going to Pakistan to spend the summer at my uncle’s house, but this year felt different. I was fifteen, finally feeling a little bit older and mature. Being the youngest in my group of cousins, I always felt as if maybe I didn’t fit in or was always too immature. However, I was adamant on making sure that this year will be different. This year I have not only matured mentally and emotionally, but also physically as well. 

 I was so excited to be going soon that I had everything planned out and since my cousin’s wedding that we all had been waiting for would also be taking place, I spent the remainder of the time before my flight preparing for the trip. 

And this time I had something different in mind. Something that would not only get people to finally take me more seriously, but also something that would help me make a statement that I have indeed grown up and can be classified as an adult or at least a young lady. 

I walk into the Salon with my uncle’s soon to be wife, Aysha who since I had met has been persuading me to dye my hair however I like. She had been dyeing her’s for some time now and had all the knowledge and experience needed. We would discuss how I wanted to dye it and how light I wished to go. I would tell her “I just want to go a little lighter than my own hair color, so the change is noticeable but not too much” and how “I don't want to touch the roots of my hair.” We settled on a chocolate brown and lowlights. She knew the exact spot to take me and soon had booked my hair appointment and planned out the whole day. 

It was a warm and sunny day on May 22nd, 2019 and I was excited yet nervous as I was a little afraid of taking such a step as I had never done something like this before. Aysha showed up at my house to pick me up at exactly 12:30pm. The appointment was for 2:30, so she suggested that we first go grab some breakfast. One bagel and a cup of coffee later, we arrived at the salon. “Finally” I think in my head, “the moment I have been anticipating all week” as I walk into the air conditioned salon with stylists running around back and forth. 

The salon lady seats me down and hands me a hair color booklet asking me to point to which color I would like. As a 15 year old, with no prior fashion sense, I was very confused and nervous, but Aysha guided me through and we picked out a color similar to what we had already discussed, chocolate brown and lowlights. Aysha walks the lady through on how I want my hair to be done while I sit there sipping on my grande iced caramel macchiato. At that point, I had given her complete liberty to talk for me as I knew I wouldn’t know what to say anyway. 

I stared at myself in the mirror as the lady began preparing to give me what seemed at that time, a makeover. As I stared back at myself in the mirror, I wondered what I would look like once my hair was done. Would I look better or worse? Would I finally appear as grown and mature as I feel? Or would I look like a teenager trying to act all big and grown up? All these questions circled my head as I slipped into a whirlwind of thoughts. 

Growing up I never had long hair. Long luscious silky hair that fluttered around each time you moved. Hair that could be styled in any way and would still appear as beautiful and eye-catching as the hair that the models had on a box of hair color dye. 

A curly headed child with hair almost the length of Dora the explorer. Whenever my hair would dry after a shower it would appear as if it was struck by lightning. This is who I was. I could never style my hair in a pretty and girly way as there was just never anything to it. 

I watched my sister, who did have that long luscious and silky hair that I dreamed of, style her hair or sometimes not style it at all and would watch it fall perfectly even when she wasn’t trying to make it look good. 

I dreamed that maybe one day I could have hair like hers and maybe once I did, people would admire me and take me as seriously as they took her. 

And as if my short hair wasn’t enough to make me feel insecure, there was one more thing that kept reminding me of my ugliness - my teeth. 

Bug Tooth Becky, a nickname given to me by my cousin, who was always more like my brother (we have a special and loving bond and expressed that through nicknames). Being called Bug Tooth Becky never really made me feel insecure about my teeth, I always knew he was just joking. Though deep down I would wonder how it would be if maybe, just maybe I had perfectly straight teeth, that I did not have to hide each time I tried to laugh wholeheartedly. 

Exactly how my sister’s teeth were. 

And while I have the time I will like to make a public apology to anyone who has seen me in my Bug Tooth Becky era. Sorry that I put you through the misery of watching me laugh with an open mouth full of teeth layed out in a zigzag pattern with two front teeth appearing like windows, one open and the other closed. 

I snap out of my thoughts and notice small pieces of Reynolds aluminum foil wrapped around different strands of my hair. “Aluminum foil?” I thought to myself “do I look like leftovers from last night's dinner?” I shrug my shoulders and continue to sip on my coffee. 

The wait is finally over and it’s time for the big reveal. The hair stylist, who’s name I wish I remembered, takes me to the shampoo station and applies on different types of shampoos, one that’ll make my hair silky, soft and smooth after the damage I just caused it and one that will bring out the new color of my hair in a more vibrant way. 

She blows dry it in a fancy way that makes my new hair appear even better and fluttery, exactly how I always dreamed of it. She finishes styling it and asks me how I feel about it. I smile up at myself in the mirror, this time with my teeth and give the new and improved me a good long look in the mirror. 

Everything I have wanted and dreamed of, long silky dark brown hair at the top that slowly turned a chocolatey brown at the bottom and let’s not forget the perfectly straight teeth. 

“It’s perfect” I say smiling back at her and Aysha who also seems pretty shocked and impressed by the makeover.       

Days pass and the day of the flight finally arrives. 12 hours and a three hour layover later, we finally landed at the airport. The hot and humid air mixed with the smell of cigarettes welcomes us with open arms. 

I was excited to see how my cousins would react to my new look. I felt this sense of confidence and was sure they would be impressed and ask me all sorts of questions about how I managed to quickly grow up and start looking more mature and pretty. 

Instead, I received blank stares and whispers under breaths of jokes like “what a bold move for such a young age” and “dyeing her hair at this age, her sister was never like this.” Some of these things weren’t even said, but I felt it all from indirect jokes being cracked of me being too overconfident and bold. 

What I considered simply a transition in my life, turned out to be an opportunity for others to find a way of judging me. 

With each subtle joke made about me, I began feeling less and less pretty and confident and grew angrier with each passing day. Crying easily which led to another remark made by others about how “she’s too sensitive” or if I got angry and spoke some harsh words, I would hear them go “her temper is very bad” and that “girl’s should not have such a bad temper and they should always remain calm.” 

The harshest comments I received were the ones that continuously compared me to my sister. Oftentimes people thought that when they brought up my sister while trying to describe me, they were doing me a favor and teaching me to be more like her, calm, mature and innocent which is how all girls should be. Everyone always loved being around my sister. The mature, pretty and sensible person of the group that everyone admired and followed. 

So I began doing exactly what others had expected from me. I would imitate my sister and do and say exactly as she did. Talk the way she talked and sit the way she sat. Hoping simply that one day people will like me, just as much as they liked her. I had totally let go of my own personality, wondering each night if I ever even had one of my own. I would go to bed each night and hear echoes of the painful words said to me, “be more like your sister,” “she never did this and that, so why did you?” 

As beautiful as I may have appeared on the outside, I felt totally broken on the inside. A girl soon turning 16, with no personality of her own. Keeping all the true emotions of resentment and insecurity hidden under a facade of maturity, patience and happiness. 

I would think back to that time of growing out my hair and never wanting to cut it also as a sign. Maybe it was all a cry for help and wanting to be seen. Maybe I knew of my flaws as a person and wanted to hide them all under physical appearance. Maybe I knew that I would never match the level of my sister’s maturity and so I tried to appear like her. 

The effort of trying to look like her, talk like her and act like her never truly paid off. I still never received the attention I had craved. I remember spending nights in my room hiding under my blanket, suppressing cries and longing for some sort of clarity or maybe a helping hand that would reach out and say to me “you’re perfect just the way you are and don’t have to act or appear like someone else to prove it.” 

The clarity didn't come and neither did the helping hand. 

 I was once again left broken and felt as if I was back to where I started from. Soon I felt myself becoming my own helping hand. All the nights spent pulling my hair out and suppressing my cries in my room may not have taught me anything, but they taught me one thing, and that was patience. I have learned that once you learn to pick up your own broken pieces, after shattering completely you no longer need anyone else. 

I have spent some of my darkest hours, consoling myself and reminding myself that if I continued to let people’s words get to me, I would forever remain broken and confused. I have spent the past years rebuilding myself from scratch by becoming my own best friend and letting only God be my harshest critic, which was another thing I was grateful for. I am currently at that point in my life where people’s words no longer affect me. They may still see me as someone with a short temper and overly sensitive, but I know now that’s not who I am, at least not anymore. 

I have grown so comfortable in my own skin that even now when someone brings up a flaw of mine from the past, I laugh it off and remind them and myself that, that may have been who I used to be, but is not who I am today. 

There are two things that these painful years have taught me and it’s to never compare two people, even if they are siblings because all of us are different no matter who we look up to or follow. I have learned that comparison doesn’t help someone be a better version of themselves, but only brings about insecurity and feelings of resentment towards oneself. And the most important lesson is to never judge someone based on who they have been in the past, but rather to see and appreciate them for how far they have come. 

My mom continues to chop my hair as I tell her that she can stop once the length reaches my shoulders. With each sound of “snip snip” I feel all the years of past anxiety, fear and insecurity falling to the ground as I once again shake off the labels once attached to me. But this time, carrying my own personality and identity with me. 

The wait is finally over and it’s time for the big reveal. My mom puts down the scissors and I remove the big black cape over my shoulders to give myself a look in the mirror. My mom and my sister stand there waiting for me to freak out and yell “it’s too short.” Instead I said, “it’s perfect” and turned around to see them shocked and impressed by the makeover and how good the short hair looked on me.