2 Years Ago I Shaved My Head

July 31st 2018

Last day with an (almost full head of hair). I was genuinely scared shitless. I have never had shorter hair than shoulder length when I was 10. But, I figured, if I never take the leap now, I never will, or I’ll forever be left wondering “What if I had?”

August 1st 2018

And boy am I glad I did it. Wow. Look at them. Are you kidding? Any nervousness I had dissipated the second the first strand hit the floor. (No going back now right?) During the first full shave month, I can definitely say I turned some heads, and I felt amazing. Physically, daily life is a lot easier when you don’t have hair. Emotionally, I felt a little exposed at first, but after a while I grew to absolutely love how I looked.

September 1st 2018

I was feeling SUPER cute this month. I actually think this is one of my favorite months. I definitely wasn’t completely bald anymore, but I was at a cute length that I still didn’t have to style. I experimented with my gender presentation, and hats, and generally had a good time. When your hair is super short, it’s really easy to see the growth basically happen right before your eyes.

October 1st, 2018

October and 1 whole inch of hair brought the fun of being able to spike my hair in the front. I was still fairly happy at this stage, definitely struggled with the fact that when I had long hair I felt a lot more comfy dressing more androgynously, and I for sure over “feminized” myself for the first 2 months. This month I think I started to let go of the qualms I had in my head about this a little more..

November 1st, 2018

November was when I realized.. Oh… having no hair makes your head cold. I still felt pretty cute this month, introducing hair products like waxes and pomades to control the longer back and spike the front at the advice of my brother.

December 1st, 2018

I will be 100% honest here: I felt so fucking ugly this month. When all of your hair is like a little shorter than 2 inches off your head, it creates a very awkward style of “too long in the back and sides, but not long enough on the top.” It was depressing me in ways I cannot express. My general rules for this journey were: don’t cut your hair, and don’t dye or bleach it.

Well.

January 1st 2019

I – uh – did not abide by those rules, for good reason. I decided that I was going to keep the back and sides trimmed for my comfort, but the rule for no major chops still stood. I hated this haircut at first- it was my first time ever going to a barbershop and I was so intimidated that I didn’t say much, but after a week of it growing in and growing on me I fell in love with how I looked.

February 1st 2019

I *claps* felt *claps* so *claps* goddamn *claps* cute *claps* in *claps* February. Sigh. This is like the hair length I would keep if I actually liked having short hair. So cute, so easy to manage, huge fan of this shorter undercut, 3 inches of hair lewk.

March 1st 2019

This is where we got to the point where every other month was a new challenge/awkward phase to rediscover how to do my hair. At this point, the hair on top was a little too long to manage with pomades, but couldn’t just be left alone. It was a struggle.

April 1st 2019

And just like that, a month and .66 inches of hair later, I felt so much better. So strange. I reshaved my undercut (the third haircut since I shaved it), and my hair was long enough to swoop back. I loved this look.

May 1st 2019

Annnnnnd we’re back to ugly. This is the last blunt undercut I did, right before graduation, and I definitely shouldn’t have because it did create a bit of a problem for growing out to a bob later. Again, the top hair was a bit too long to manage, but we got through it.

June 1st 2019

Okay I’ll be honest, this is literally the best hair day I had in June. I started relying heavily on the dreaded straightener to give me any semblance of sanity. My hair is naturally curly, and that was just not working at this phase with just a clump of unruly curls on top and no hair from my mid head down.

July 1st, 2019

I was IN LOVE with this month. My undercut was growing out, the top was really just doing some good things, and I think the two just worked really well together. I was super uncomfy with my body at this point of my life, unrelated to my hair, so every time that my hair would hit an awkward point it would just make it so much worse, so I’m glad July blessed me with this look.

August 1st, 2019

And with that, year 1 was over! This was another awkward month, still heavily relying on the straightener to keep me sane, but I couldn’t believe how far I had come. Looking at this a year later I cannot imagine being at this length anymore. In one year, the hair I did not cut reached a little over 8 inches.

September 1st, 2019

So in September, I started playing around with putting up parts of it, because I was again having to grow out the sides and back and the fact that it all wouldn’t just do or go one place was… infuriating to say the least. 

October 1st, 2019

This picture was taken on the day where I remember thinking “I think I can wear my hair curly and down from now on”… and I was kinda right. At the time I was like “I have a bob” and in hindsight I’m like “okay pal”. 

November 1st, 2019

Enter the next awkward phase- I truthfully had no idea what I would wake up to everyday of this month. I mostly stuck to straightening the top and gelling back the sides as best as I could, but I also would let it just do whatever. My biggest issues for a while (and still honestly) is that my sideburns are just simultaneously too short to be put up but too long to keep down.

December 1st, 2019

Rejoiced in an even longer “bob”- felt like Rapzunel from Tangled after she gets her hair chopped off. Big fan at the time, wouldn’t do it again. I will disclaim- I loved having super short hair, and super long hair, it’s honestly August 2019-March 2020 lengths that deter me from ever shaving my head again.

January 1st, 2020

January looks the same as December because the straightening of my hair really does extend the length by a good inch or so. I was definitely starting to get more comfy with my hair here. It got to a point where I could just kind of wake up and let it do whatever and that’s all I ever want tbh.

February 1st, 2020

February marks the 5th and final (to date) haircut during my 2 year grow out journey! I was starting to get increasingly annoyed with the difference in length, so I got the back evened out with the front (which has still never been cut). In case any one is wondering why this is the case- all of your hair grows at the same pace but it just looks longer on certain parts of your head. Like, the hair framing my face took the longest to grow because it needs extra length to fall over my face and not just hang straight down like it does in the back and on the sides. I was very happy this month.

March 1st, 2020

We are really starting to get somewhere! To be honest, once we reached March, the only growth was just down because all of my hair is even, so the growth was a bit less visible, but the next goal in sight became finally getting all of my hair into a full ponytail. I was a fan of this month, I started to feel more and more of myself.

April 1st, 2020

I attempted to stray further and further from using any heat on my hair because part of the reason I shaved it to began with was to grow nice and healthy hair. Seeing my curls, now with a bit of weight, was really satisfying. Ponytails/just trying to put up my hair during these months was annoying admittedly.

May 1st, 2020

Speaking of putting my hair up, I wanted to show that I mostly could by May. With the help of bobby pins and hairspray, I would rock a pony/updo for most of May. During quarantine is a great time to go through some awkward phases with a hair grow out, I will say.

June 1st, 2020

In June, this became one of my favorite hairstyles, along with using a bandana as a headband, because my biggest gripe was not being able to put up my hair to just get it out of my face. I grew tired of having to make ponytails a full day look like in May, and wanted alternatives to be able to just throw my hair up or out of my face if I wanted, and these were good solutions.

July 1st, 2020

I really started falling in love with my hair again. I’ve never had any of these hair lengths in my teenaged or adult life, but we’re getting to a point now where it’s the closest I’ve been to “long hair” in 2 years. My hair is long enough that when I move my head it brushes my shoulders, and I never thought I would rejoice that much at something so simple.

August 1st, 2020

So, that brings us to today. Wow. I told myself I couldn’t severely cut or dye my hair for the first 2 years of this journey, so on my 2 year anniversary, I used Overtone to color it purple. I cannot believe how long its grown and how crazy this journey has been. It was full of ups and downs, but I’m so glad I made the decision to do it. I wouldn’t trade it for anything, but I definitely am excited to be getting back to where I feel most like myself

On to year 3!!.