When I decided to adopt a child of African descent, many people felt comfortable sharing their thoughts about hair. Looking at my run-of-the-mill wavy hair and, I guess, figuring I was clueless about “ethnic hair,” white folks with white kids advised me to keep her hair short. White parents of children of color warned that I would be judged harshly by African Americans if I cut my daughter’s hair short or didn’t do a good job styling it. African Americans shared hopes that my child would have “good hair” and dispensed advice on products and salons.

One thing all of these people assumed was that by virtue of being white, I was completely unfamiliar with the potential emotional baggage and conflict associated with hair and how it’s styled.

They were so wrong.

My maternal grandmother spent her early years in abject poverty. By eleven, she was parentless and adopted by a family where her role was part child and part nursemaid to younger children who were biologically related to the family.

Although she never discussed the details of her childhood with me, it seems unlikely that she got much one-on-one time with either her biological or adopted mother in front on the mirror having her hair fixed.

She had a first daughter who died in infancy. Her second daughter, my mother, had the most gorgeous hair. It was shiny, black, thick, and board straight. My grandmother took her duties in grooming her only child very seriously.

According to my mother, too seriously.

My grandmother kept my mother’s hair long with bangs cut straight across. She styled it in two braids that were looped up and tied with gingham ribbons. It’s easy to tell from photos that the braids were incredibly tight. My mother’s eyes had a slight upward slant. She was adorable but never looked comfortable.

In terms of personal style, my mother and grandmother could not have been more different. My grandmother never left the house in anything other than a perfectly respectable matching outfit, shoes, and handbag. She went to the “beauty parlor” to have her “hair fixed” religiously every week. My mother, on the other hand, spent the entire decade of the 1970’s running around in silk lounging pajamas or gauze sundresses with her gorgeous long dark hair blowing in the breeze.

When it came to fixing my hair, my mother was determined to do everything the exact opposite of the way my grandmother had. Only one problem with that, me.

As much as I hate to admit it, I am an almost perfect blend of these two strong women who came before me. But when it came to hair, I was firmly on my grandmother’s side. Unlike my mother’s thick straight hair, my hair was kind of wavy and thin. It didn’t stay in barrettes or braids. Before long, it was hanging in my eyes, driving me crazy. Every morning, I sat at the mirror of my mother’s dressing table. She brushed through my hair, swooshed it around artistically, placed a barrette or two, and called it done. I ripped out the barrettes and whined, “It’s not eeeeeeven! Do it again!”

Some days, she’d make a second, in my estimation feeble, attempt. Other times, she’d flat out refuse, undoubtedly knowing full well that there was no way to please me anyway.

This was 35 years ago. The trauma had faded into mildly humorous family lore, until my little curly-top girl entered the picture.

In addition to the cultural differences and expectations, her hair could not be more different from mine. It’s kinky curly and very dry. I’ve entered a hair world where I neither know the language nor understand the physics.

My only saving grace was that when she first came home she had very little hair. I had time to learn before she had a full head of hair, and I was so grateful.

Then came our first hair trauma: the lice she brought home from the orphanage in Ethiopia. Bionic freakin’ Ethiopian lice. I nuked the hell out of both of us with over-the-counter and prescription extermination treatments, plain old Listerine, and mayonnaise. By the end, her hair was like a Brillo pad. Even my oily hair was so brittle I cut my bob into a pixie.

I knew her hair was a terrible mess, but I could not bring myself to cut the little bit that was there. What would people think if I cut her hair? Would they assume I thought it was too much trouble? That I didn’t love my child enough to learn how to care for her hair?

I would not take the chance. I would buy every organic product for African hair on the market. I would spritz, condition, and pomade those sprigs of hair back into health. I would will it to grow and fill in the bald spots. I would be Wonder White Mommy!

Eventually, it did grow but, because it was so damaged, it was terribly knotty. With great trepidation, I started styling it. I tried puffs. They looked like tiny Brillo pads. On to braids. I was a miserable failure. This was probably because 1) I had no experience, 2) I don’t have an aptitude for braiding, and 3) she still had bald spots so her hair wasn’t contiguous. I finally hit on twists and viola, my kid’s hair was well groomed, and you couldn’t tell how damaged it was.

Problem was, she had to sleep in the twists in order to keep her head from becoming a mass of tangles, and it took forever to restyle in the morning.

Second problem, the tight little ponytails that were curled to make the twists brought back traumatic memories for my mother, who was not afraid to share her thoughts on the torture I was inflicting on my daughter. She argued for a short haircut as often as she could work it into conversation.

I had created a whole fun ritual, including a song and dance, for “twist time.” My daughter didn’t seem to mind. She certainly wasn’t traumatized.

Then I read on a website that a good indication that African hair needs to be trimmed is if things stick to it. I had to face reality. Anytime my child’s hair was loose of the twists, within minutes her hair collected dog hair, lint, and all sorts of household debris.

She was getting a haircut, and it wasn’t because I didn’t care or was clueless. It was because she needed one.

I made an appointment and planned on a trim. Once in the chair, it became clear there was no saving the majority of the length. As my daughter sat happily in my lap, I watched the dark curls fall to the floor around us. I took deep breaths, reminding myself that there was nothing I could have done to keep her hair long. She’s an adorable child. She’d look cute with a shaved head.

And then something amazing happened. With all the frizz gone, an Ethiopian princess emerged. Her beautiful East African forehead took center stage, along with her elegant Somali neck. I knew my kid was beautiful but I had no idea, really.

I no longer cared if people thought I cut her hair for convenience. I knew I didn’t, and she looked gorgeous, perfectly East African.

Our morning routine of the “twist dance” is now replaced two minutes of hair fixing followed by playtime and picture books. It’s awesome!

If she wants long hair in the future, that’s fine. If she shaves half her head and dyes her hair silly colors like I did when I was young, I’m okay with that. She will be free to express her culture, musical taste, or politics with her hair as she sees fit. I vow not to make an issue of it, no matter what.

My grandmother manifested her issues about insufficient attention from a mother figure in the hairstyling of her daughter. My mother is nearly 70, yet her traumatic memories about braids remain vivid. I am 40-something and still bristle at the memories of wanting my hair “eeeeeven.” It is possible that my daughter, whose hair texture type warrants documentary films about “good hair,” could be the first generation of the family to have hair that’s just hair and not a topic of therapy later in life.

TAGS: Alison Aucoin, bad hair, beauty, braids, Family, good hair, grandmothers, grooming, hair, hair trauma, inter-racial adoption, lice, mothers and daughters, puffs

Alison Aucoin is descended from people who spent their weekends dressing up in costumes and taking silly photos of one another to send to relatives who were serving in the Pacific during WWII. She makes her living as a freelance grant writer but is much happier squeezing playdough with her two year-old Ethiopian daughter, creating photography/audio projects, crafting manifestos on her blog (http://endebetehyemhoneyelem.blogspot.com) and making costumes with her trusty glue gun. She is one of only about a half dozen Cajun Jews in existence.

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This entry was posted on Thursday, December 17th, 2009 at 4:54 pm and is filed under Essay, Nonfiction. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.