Defining My Roots

My father is Nigerian and my mother is Canadian and white, making me a light-skinned mixed girl. People used to question my relation to my parents, even though I have my mother’s eyes and my father’s face. This quickly became one of my first insecurities, feeling as though no matter where I go, I don’t belong. 

In kindergarten, I realized that not a lot of people looked like me. Most of my classmates were white and had straight hair. Only a few students were Black. There was no in-between, no place to be safe. And it felt like my hair was the main thing that made me stand out. It was short and coily, a mini Afro. People often thought I was a boy, which killed my confidence as a young girl.

One year, we were asked to make turkey-hand masks just before Thanksgiving. There was no way my big hair could fit in a small paper mask. The same issue came up when we had to watch videos on our computers. My hair couldn’t fit under the flimsy headphones. Sometimes, my teachers sent me into the hallway with my Chromebook to listen to the assignments out loud. If we had to watch a video in class, some classmates told me I should sit in the back, since my hair was so big.

As I got older, people started to ask me if my hair was real. Strangers asked to touch it, like I was on display. In middle school the questions went from simply invasive to disrespectful and racist.

“Are you even Black?” and “Can you say THE word?”

For a while, a group of boys followed me home, teased me, and messaged me from anonymous accounts—just to make comments about my hair and tell me to straighten it. The beauty standards all around me sent the same message. In movies and on TV, the main characters had blue eyes and straight, long hair.

My parents raised me to be proud of who I am and encouraged me to connect with my culture through art, food, and language. They taught me that my natural hair is my crown, a celebration of my culture, and I felt grateful to honor it everyday. But eventually, the comments and unwanted opinions wore me down. I started to think of my hair as a burden.

Becoming a Teenager

In 8th grade, like most teenagers, I started to experiment with my appearance. Before, I didn’t put much thought into makeup. I would just do an occasional smokey eye—then I started to experiment with lip liner, concealer, and mascara. I discovered endless possibilities for self-expression, and I was drawn to alternative fashion, inspired by grunge and punk. With thicker eyeliner and lashes, I felt older—and like my new alt girl dreams were coming true.

As I tried out different styles, I started to think more and more about changing my hair. I remember asking my parents if there was a way to make my hair longer somehow. They didn’t realize this was because of bullying at school—they thought I just wanted to try out something new, like the makeup and the clothes. 

I kept the bullying to myself and continued to talk about my hair’s length until my mother mentioned relaxing it—a procedure many Black women use to loosen their hair. 

“But once you straighten your hair chemically,” she told me, “it’s going to be very difficult to get it back the way it was.” She emphasized that my hair reflected my heritage—it was something to be proud of.

I went back and forth on the decision. But people’s comments about my hair had gotten to me. I didn’t need totally straight hair, but I felt insecure about having a big and voluptuous Afro. I wanted my hair to fall onto my shoulders and down my back, which would make me feel more feminine, like the girls I grew up around.

Throughout middle school, I had remained resilient and strong. I’d spent all four years wearing my crown, my hair. Now, as 8th grade ended, I just wanted to feel confident in myself. I decided relaxing my hair would give me more peace.

I settled on something a bit different from traditional relaxing: a “curl softener.” It would maintain my curls but make them looser and wider, adding length. I could hardly sleep the night before, and I was telling everyone how excited I was. 

At the salon, when I saw people finishing their curly cuts, I almost wanted to change my mind. They had hair just like mine, and their curly cuts looked great. Carefully defined curls that bounced when they shook their heads. I thought maybe I should embrace my curls as well—but then the mean comments replayed in my head.

I thought maybe I should embrace my curls as well—but then the mean comments replayed in my head

I laid back, and the stylist applied a smelly cream. It smelled like rotten eggs, and my scalp started to sting. But when she gave me a handheld mirror to see the results, I felt so much relief. The process loosened my curls, adding several inches of length to my hair, which used to float near my ears. I was overjoyed. 

When I arrived home, I immediately made a TikTok, something I never felt comfortable doing before. All the popular girls had hair that touched their shoulders—and now mine did too. I felt confident in a way that no makeup or clothing shift could replicate.

Journey to Self-Acceptance

My freshman year of high school, I’d had my heart broken for the first time. I asked my cousin Joanne to straighten my hair, and she made it pin straight. When I walked out of the bathroom, I felt like a newer and better version of myself. I instantly posted a picture on Snapchat, and the heartbreaker in question messaged me almost immediately.

Shortly after, people from my middle school started to text me, acting as if we’d been friends this entire time. A boy who had made fun of me behind my back texted me and said: “I’ve never seen you with straight hair before. Wow.” Many people clearly found me more attractive with straight hair than with my natural hair. It was difficult to come to this realization, even though I had reacted similarly myself

In the few days I had straight hair, I lived a different life.  People in the hallway passed by me as if I was a new student and I got compliments from people who’d never looked my way. I wanted to keep this hair forever. It made me feel so accepted and confident. 

But by this time I had made some new, “alternative” friends, who were mixed race with curly hair, and they begged me to bring my curls back.

“Don’t straighten your hair,” they told me. “Be unapologetically yourself.”

When I was younger, I had always wished I had someone to tell me those things.  Now I had that—a whole group of friends who were similar to me, who understood me and my hair. Their support was empowering. And it started to drown out the mean comments.

I had also started to wear more alternative, goth-inspired makeup and felt less like I had to fit in with the crowd. Less pressure to look like everyone helped me see my hair in a new light. 

I decided to stop even relaxing my hair, and let my natural curls grow back in. Why was I doing something so damaging to my hair for the acceptance of others? My new friends accepted me as I was, and they made me realize that you shouldn’t have to constantly change for approval.

But halfway through the year, while experimenting with my hair, I discovered a new way to style it—and it set back my progress toward self-acceptance. 

I’d always liked how my hair looked when it was damp—the water weighed it down and lengthened it. And by using generous scoops of gel and thick conditioners while it was still wet, I was able to freeze it in place, mimicking the look of wet hair even after it was dry.

Since then, every morning when I hop in the shower, I remove my hair tie and wet my hair, letting the water slick it down before I flatten it with loads of gel. Sometimes, as I glide my hands across my hair, I think about how I’ve spent most of my life trying to form my hair into something it is not, something that might make me feel more confident. I feel good that I’m not using relaxers anymore but I know, deep down, that my new routine is still a product of my insecurity.

But this routine is about more than just insecurity. It has stamped itself into an OCD-tainted part of my mind. OCD is a disorder that causes you to have unwanted recurring thoughts, resulting in specific compulsions, or repetitive behaviors that you engage in for self-comfort. Now that I’ve started doing this hair routine every morning, I feel like I have to keep doing it. 

I’m still learning to live with OCD, as there are different variants of patterns with different levels of urgency. These routines give me a sense of security. For now, OCD feels like a reassuring third party that I would be a fool to disobey.

But I’m confident I won’t continue this pattern forever. The cycles break. They always do. And I’m looking forward to the day I can start to embrace my natural hair again.

I’m a junior now, and I’ve been walking around with gel-soaked hair for two years. I only let my hair out naturally when I am in my house and I’ve only shown it to a few close friends. They push me to embrace it. I just smile and shake my head because I know I’m not ready for that yet.

But day by day I have been adding less gel, and trying to embrace the natural volume in my hair. It’s still a work in progress. But every day is a chance to get closer to my goal of self-acceptance. Maybe by prom I’ll be able to wear my hair how it was always meant to be, natural and defining my roots.