REAL Woman Wednesday: My Roots…

Are Showing!

To some of you that may not be a big deal, but for me…with more gray than blond now…it is a major disaster.

Honestly, I have dyed my hair off and on since my early twenties. My natural color was this mousy blond/light brown. I always felt cheated because my great-grandfather, mother and brother all had lovely red hair. But not me with the green eyes to match it perfectly. No, I was just dish-water blond as it was sometimes called.

So I took to coloring it. Usually the red that it should have been. Strawberry blond. Then auburn. Once or twice I colored it a lighter blond.

Thing is that I have had black hair for over a year now. I colored it last summer when I went to Comic Con as Wonder Woman. It was supposed to be temporary. It would come out after 23 washes. Guess what? It doesn’t! In the end, I have compounded it by putting layer upon layer of permanent black on top.

Why? You ask.

To cover those greys. 

While I am rather proud of my legs, even my butt that is not quite what it used to be but not bad for a woman my age. My saggy tits don’t bother me much either. Yes, I cringe at the muffin top from my pregnancies that has turned into the whole darn cake. But I cannot bring myself to consider a tummy tuck…as I am just too frightened of anesthesia. So I just try not to look in the mirror too long.

My hair though is another matter. It is my vanity. It is thicker and softer than almost any woman my age…and many much younger. It is so soft that Cookie Monster often rubs my head and kisses the top of it.

I have toyed a few times with the idea of having this too dark black stripped and going back to my beloved strawberry blond. But I am afraid that harsh process would dry it out or burn it.

So I have just kept reapplying the black over and over again. But I grow tired of it. I am thinking about PURPLE. Who would have guessed?

Thing is…I wish I could be like Judi Dench or Helen Mirren…just accepting them as part of ageing. But I am not there yet. As vain as it sounds…the fifty year old, mother of six, just cannot bring herself to accept going gray…no matter how much I have earned every single one of them.

Ironically, it seems that these days it is fashionable for young women to color their hair…you guessed it…GRAY?!?! Would someone please tell them to stop? They will get there soon enough.

What is your vanity? Do you fight the ageing process? How much of it is societal pressure to be young and beautiful?