Unexpected lessons from my son’s wish to grow his hair

Last year, my son announced to us that he was going to grow his hair long. One nonillion miles long, to be precise. (Yes, that is a real number!) He was nearly 6 at the time and obsessed with very large numbers. His best friend, also a boy, had hair that grew beyond his waist. He was fascinated with the idea and curious about how he would feel with long hair. Why not, we thought, it’s just hair. His hair, after all.

I thought that living in an extremely hot and humid place (having recently moved) would change his mind as soon as his hair grew to his neck. So I honestly did not expect his fascination to last beyond a couple of months. I myself had chopped off my waist length hair to shoulder length because I was having trouble adjusting to the heat after having lived in colder climates for two decades. But nothing could change this little fella’s determination. The sweltering heat and sweat didn’t bother him as much as they did me at the time.

As his hair started growing visibly longer, a few things happened. Some pleasant and some, not so much.

We realized that gender-stereotyping is still huge. HUGE. There were questions and comments like “Do you want to be like a girl?”, “But only girls have long hair!”. From young and old alike. I cringed every time I heard one of those. But I watched my son fight off gender-stereotyping beautifully with statements like, “Boys can have long hair too!” or “There are no rules in the world that only girls should have long hair.” or “There are many boys with long hair in the world!” and my favoritest of them all, “Eddie Izzard is a famous successful stand up comedian! He wears make up and nail polish and wears extremely colorful clothes! So there are no rules in the world!” I couldn’t be a prouder parent.

I also realized that being referred to as ‘she’ or ‘daughter’ did not bother him as much as it did me in the beginning. He was unfazed. He did not find being mistaken for a girl offensive. I let that sink in deeply into MY head and realized that I was the one with the qualm, not him. There is absolutely nothing wrong with being mistaken for a different gender as such. I found my own confidence in his confidence with who he was – quite simply, a boy with long hair. And nothing was going to shake that.

He had set himself a goal and followed through. Just like he said he would. Children give themselves plenty of opportunities to practice perseverance, determination, decision making and face all the challenges that come their way when they get to set a goal that’s meaningful to them. We don’t realize how much we actually stand IN the way of that process. We try to impose OUR ideas of building determination and grit, not realizing that they are quite capable of doing this in a way that works best for them, if we only let them. All they need is our unconditional support – they can figure out the rest.

Despite all the gender stereotyping and negative comments/questions, he also started receiving many compliments. This, frankly, was quite a pleasant surprise to me, given how jaded I had started feeling about people’s reactions to a child who wished to deviate from the ‘norm’. His hair grew out soft, flowing and had a gorgeous salon-level layered look to it. He got several, “Oh my gosh, look at all that beautiful hair!” or “I LOVE your hair cut!” and “I want your hair! It is gorgeous!” and even a fist bump from a skate-boarding instructor for solidarity.

It’s been a whole year and his hair has now grown to the point where he can pull all of it into a ponytail or a small bun. However, he is finally tired of it and has decided to cut it all off. His main reason – he hates combing it and does not know how to manage his own hair yet. I respect that.

I love that he did not change his mind due to the gender-stereotyping. He was able to take all of that, stand up to it and follow through on his wish. He also learned that not everybody will always be accepting of who you are or your choices, but life goes on anyway. And that we cannot and should not change who we are just to please people. (It goes without saying and the way we decide to style our hair, among other things, should never ever fall in that category anyway, but for those who wish to nitpick this apart, I will add explicitly – as long as we’re not causing active harm to others, of course).

Nothing brings out deeply ingrained biases until you’re doing something quite different from what is considered the norm. What started as my 6-year old’s simple wish to grow his hair has managed to be quite an interesting learning experience for him as well as us about biases, ingrained human behaviors and lack of acceptance.