Sense and Sensitivity: More About Hair

[cereta]

DEAR HARRIETTE: My best friend is convinced that bleaching her hair after a bad breakup is the only way to get over her ex. Clearly, this isn't true and will completely ruin her hair for years to come. I don't think the damage is worth it and have never even dyed my hair, yet I've gotten over breakups just fine.

I already told her this would be like drinking poison and expecting someone else to die, but she is not having it. Have I done enough as a friend to stop her? I don't want to be the soundboard to her complaints after she goes through with this. -- Bleach Blonde, Las Vegas

DEAR BLEACH BLONDE: People find all kinds of unusual ways to say goodbye to bad relationships. While bleaching absolutely does damage your hair, for most people, the hair will grow back, and you can cut the dry, bleach-burned hair off. In other words, your best friend's way of exorcising her grief may not be the worst choice she could have made.

As far as you having to listen to her lament the state of her hair sometime down the line, it will be up to you what you do when she starts the complaints. You can foreshadow your intended reaction by telling her now that when her hair starts falling out, she shouldn't come to you for sympathy. But in the moment, you will have to speak up and tell her you are unwilling to hear to her sob story because you really did predict that it would happen. Good luck with that!

Comments

[cereta]

WTF is it with everyone and hair?

1. It's none of your business.

2. I don't know what century you're living in, but dyeing hair blond does not have to damage her hair, and certainly not for "years."

2. It's none of your business.

3. Your simile is overwrought.

4. It is still none of your business.

[minoanmiss]

Years? What does she think bleaching entails, a gene transplant?

[xenacryst]

^^ this.

[the_rck]

Yes. This.

The letter writer's reaction is way over the top. I'd find the response more in line with the friend having suggested vivisecting kittens or something. 'Drinking poison'??? Really? Unless something supernaturally weird is going on, no one is living or dying based on what this person does with her hair.

[greenygal]

Have I done enough as a friend to stop her? She's not jumping off a bridge, she's dying her hair. Your responsibility as a friend in this situation will be fulfilled if you say "I hope that makes you feel better." If you don't feel that's sufficient, maybe you could find her a good stylist.

[cereta]

I used $9 box color to go blond, and my hair was pretty much only as fried at the ends as it always is by my curling iron.

[kaberett]

What the fuck.

[torachan]

Having never dyed her hair, I wonder if the LW is imagining the bleaching process to be just like, pouring raw bleach over your hair or something? That's the only way I can make sense of this.

But seriously, hair bleach is harsher than hair dye, but it's still not a big deal, especially if it's not used that often. Most people who use it before coloring their hair almost certainly use it much more often than this person would be doing so, unless they have a bad breakup every few months.

[jadelennox]

I have a 25 year history of shaving or buzzing my hair in reaction to terrible life events. It makes me feel better (operating somewhat like self-harm in the sens of it being a thing I can control), causes me no damage, and grows out, if I let it, in less than a year. Bleaching your hair, unlike shaving your head, is a completely mainstream fashion choice that people make every single day. WTH is up with this person?

[jadelennox]

I've stopped dying my hair, because going blonde enough to take dye on my hair turns it to the consistency of a brillo pad. But I've done it plenty of times, and if I didn't currently value the quality of my curl more, I would do it again.

[redbird]

I could come up with a long list of worse ways to deal with a breakup, things that would be either more harmful, more permanent, or both.

In Harriette's shoes, I might have suggested that the LW ask why her friend thinks bleaching her hair is the right answer, and the only thing that will work. Maybe it's a "screw you" to an ex who was controlling about her appearance, or a thing that she can control (if she was broken up with rather than the other way around), or an easy and inexpensive marker of the change in her life.

[vass]

It's. JUST HAIR.