Sometimes You Just Have To Go Ahead And Cut It - My Hair Trimming Experience

Girls, there comes a time in your life when you have to go to Sally’s, and look the lady over the counter dead in the eye, and say, “Please give me the sharpest pair of shears you have, and I don’t care how much it costs.”

You take the plunge by making the purchase, and then you go home, and jump in the deep end by cutting your ends.

I have been walking around with tumbleweeds at the ends of my hair for the last couple of months, and I felt as if I was trapped in a vicious cycle of detangling and tangling, detangling and tangling. It was absolutely ludicrous how horrible my ends were, and how long it took me to make the decision to go to Sallys, look the lady at the counter in the eyes, and admit my wrong doings.

So I purchased the shears, spent what I would consider a reasonable amount, because I had to take care of these ends immediately, and my plan was to cut as many inches as I would need to for my hair to look and feel decent.

How do you know when you need a major trim?

I have already mentioned one clue, and that is the excessive tangles. You find yourself detangling your hair, and within seconds, your ends are all over each other, as though you did not use the wide tooth comb* and the fine tooth comb right afterwards. By the way, never use a fine tooth comb to detangle – I was just having a moment.

Another clue would be super thin see through ends that indicate breakage in some areas, and splits in others. Your hair might be long, but you will do yourself a huge disservice if you do not get them healthy. There are no products in the world, other than the shiny, sharp ones at Sally’s, which will solve that problem.

The third clue will become evident once you straighten your hair, and notice the balls at the end of your straight hair that resemble dry, disrespectful tumble weeds. No matter how many passes you do with the flat iron*, you will not get rid of the balls, because nothing solves that problem, other than scissors.

The fourth clue is pretty easy to figure out, but you have to be aware of how your hair behaves to know something is wrong. My hair did not look right in any style: Bantu Knots, Braid Outs, Twist Outs, straight, or curly; nothing looked right, except a bun, and a tight one at that!

How do you know how much to cut?

I will give you my personal experience, even though there might be some sort of salon standard that a stylist would be better at explaining. In my bathroom, my rule was if I had at least and inch of horribleness, I would cut a little more than that inch to make sure it was all gone.

In some areas I had almost two inches gone. I was not worried about it being uneven, because ‘Operation Eradicate Tumble Weed’ does not care about everything being even.

Once I got rid of the mess, then I went back in, and madesure things looked even. To be honest, I didn’t spend a lot of time doing that – I just made sure it did not look weird.

Life after a major trim

Girl! I can’t even begin to tell you how amazing my hair feels and looks. My curls are popping; my roller sets are sleek, and my ‘bad hair days’ are non-existent. Your curls will have new life and meaning, they will clump better, and the clumps will not tangle as much. You will find yourself wearing your hair out more, despite the style, as every style looks amazing.

This is no exaggeration – your hair will be noticeably shorter, especially if you had to take off an inch or two, but you won’t care when you look in the mirror, and wonder where that person had been all your life.

How to get past the short hair stigma

If you desire long hair, you won’t have it by holding on to damaged ends, and that’s just the honest truth. There is a myth that says the more you cut your hair, the longer it grows, and while that is absolutely rubbish, I know where that comes from.

The thing about cutting your hair is that you are able to get rid of the damage that will cause even more damage. When you have splits and thin ends, they will literally reverse any progress you have made – we guarantee you that.

So forget about having long hair, when you need a trim. Focus on trimming your hair on a consistent schedule suitable for your hair, and you will notice that you are retaining more length than ever.

Do I consider this a setback? No way! I love my hair so much now with fresh ends I could kick myself, because I waited so long to get my hair life back.