Tag Archives: Black Woman

Long Hair War

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The following is a comment from one of my readers that I thought was too poignant to just remain in the comment section. It is today’s post. Please give her your feedback and let’s keep the dialogue going.

By Nicole “Nikki” Parker

Nicole Parker used to struggle with women hatin' on her for having long, fine hair. Through Christ, she has been set free!

Nicole Parker used to struggle with women hatin' on her for having long, fine hair. Through Christ, she has been set free!


My hair wars are sort of different, to an extent. I always had long hair. I have fine, thin hair that grows like wildflowers. I didn’t have confidence in my hair. Quite the opposite. Though my hair is fine, I permed (relaxed) it to fit in, and I cut it to make it less obvious that it’s long. I didn’t understand how my hair had anything to do with who I was and so in turn I felt if I walked in a room I should naturally apologize for my long hair, what most people would call “white girl hair.” After I got over the perm pressures about 10 years ago, my hair grew healthier and longer and I would get the same “OMG” and “How long and pretty your hair is” looks and comments. These comments made me feel uncomfortable because the tone wasn’t “You really have nice hair”; they were more like, “I wish I had your hair and you MUST think you’re all that.” So about five years ago for every summer thereafter I would cut my hair to my neck in a bob and that would keep the comments to a minimum except for the initial shock that I even had the nerve to cut off “all that pretty hair.” I never appreciated the hair God gave me because I wasn’t secure in who I was in Him.

I realized my insecurity had nothing to do with my hair, just how I felt about it and what I was trained to believe growing up: that hair somehow defines me and puts me in a typical stereotype of light skinned/long haired females have no depth and are superficial. That is the complete opposite of who I am, NOW, anyway, because people will have you thinking one thing about yourself so much, YOU start to believe it! But when God showed me I can’t take credit for anything, especially the length or grade of my hair, I seriously I had to get a grip and help other women realize that the outer appearance is not even worth mentioning if our hearts aren’t right before God. The battle continues because women are always looking at the next woman to compare themselves to, and it’s not necessary because our eyes should be on Christ alone and then and only then can we accept who we are and that our physical man, including hair, is just clay.

We represent Christ so I’m not suggesting we don’t take care of what He has given us. However, I am saying as women of God we should seek first Him and he’ll take care of everything else. He’ll teach us how to carry ourselves in modesty. He’ll teach us how to be sensitive to others who have not had the revelation yet that the inner man is far more valuable than the outer man. He’ll tell us through the Holy Spirit when we’re tripping and going too far or not far enough. He’s a God that is involved! So with that in mind I can walk around with all of my “long pretty hair” and not feel like apologizing but smiling, representing that the old stereotypes are dead to me because my Daddy told me to love what He created in me and every woman I see with locks, press and curl, fade, bob, waist length, shoulder length, long and flowing, tight curls, afros, etc. It doesn’t matter to Him; it’s our heart he’s after!

Cut the Locks

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In 1992, I made the huge step to wear my hair in its God-given state. For years I had said I would lock my hair when I turned 60. I chose 60 because I figured I would be established in my career and would have great influence with those around me so no one would have the power to force me to change my hair. Well, I didn’t wait until 60. In 1992, I decided no more relaxers for me and cut my straightened hair until my natural coils formed a nicely cropped fade. It was cool, but I longed for the locks I saw the confident women in my African dance class and a black women’s academic conference at MIT wear. The way they moved and expressed ideas had to have something to do with the hair, I reasoned. It was as if the assurance of their bodies and minds had positioned itself on the top of their heads, and I wanted that type of assurance.

In May 1994, I got my hair twisted to begin the process of dreadlocks and my confidence followed, not confidence accepting the hair that God gave me, but confidence in my locks being “the best” or “the neatest I’ve ever seen,” as people constantly told me. I would smile and give a proper thank you, but inside I would be gloating, talking to myself, saying, “I know. I hear that all the time” or “My hair is beautiful, isn’t it?” To my knowledge, no one knew this ugliness was in my heart. No one even suspected it was there, except for God, of course. And in July 2001, He told me I had to cut away the ugliness, symbolized by cutting off my locks.

My initial objection to His request made me realize how deep my ugliness ran and let me know that I had to be obedient. “No, I’m going to be on HGTV so I can’t cut my hair,” I said aloud, and I heard the vanity of wanting to have fabulous hair when featured on my favorite network at that time. In an instant moment of spiritual sanity, I got the scissors, went to the mirror and cut my locks along with a stream of tears. My momentary sadness had turned to joy, knowing that I was pleasing God and on my way to healing from hair pride. I knew my journey was about complete when I felt led to lock my hair again in 2003, after two years of obedience to no professional haircuts. Since I was four, there was never a time when I didn’t have regular salon appointments. In those two years I learned that the salon contributed to my hair pride, and I needed to get healthy in heart before allowing a professional to style my hair. There’s so much more to this hair journey. Even now the story is still being written. I’m finished for now but still would love to hear your stories.

Copyright 2009 by Rhonda J. Smith

Hair Pride

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My hair once looked like these:

Cropped with china bangs

Cropped with china bangs

Faded with auburn color

Faded with auburn color


Baby dreads with color on tips

Baby dreads with color on tips


And these:
Faded Hair Gumby-style

Faded Hair Gumby-style


The Afro

The Afro


When I got grown, I was happy to wear my hair the way I wanted to, and took it to the hilt. When I was a child, I vowed that I would wear my hair the way I wanted to as soon as I could. This heart decision happened at four, when I was standing in my hall mirror watching my natural hair dry; my hairdresser wasn’t available that week so my hair was being done at home. “Oooo, ma, can’t I keep it,” I said as I admired my impending Afro, but my mama declared “Un, un. We gonna press that nappy” head. And press we did. Every two weeks where I also got two ponytails and a bang. Once, when I was five, I convinced my hairdresser to style me three ponytails instead of my regular two and a bang. My mother wasn’t having it. Two ponytails and a bang was how she could manage my hair in between two week appointments so when she arrived to pick me up she had Mrs. Barrow restyle my hair, after putting me in my place for deciding what I would do with my hair, and I wasn’t paying for it, and I was the child and the nerve I had…..

So from a young age I have wanted to wear my hair the way I wanted to wear my hair, and natural was at the top of the list. The pressing comb traumatized me, and I have always thought there was nothing wrong with kinky hair, even when my 5th grade boy nemesis said my hair was hard, and in 7th grade my arch girl rival (who I thought was my friend, BTW) compared her long flowing hair to my cropped mushroom by asking “How long is your hair?” as she stretched a few locks of mine while tousling hers. These incidents set the foundation for me eventually having pride in my hair. I was determined to do what I wanted to do and never let a mama, a Ronald or a Lauren make me feel bad for how I decided to wear my hair. I, like many of us women with hair woes, obsessed over my look, would pout when I didn’t like it and would try a new look just to stand out from my last style and among other women. God challenged me about this hair pride when I began wearing my hair locked 17 years ago. I’ll tell you about that the next time. In the meantime, does my story sound familiar? What are your hair war stories? I invite you to comment and look forward to the dialogue.

Copyright 2009 by Rhonda J. Smith

Family Pride

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My birth family circa the early '90s: (from left) my sister, Sharon; brother, Curtis Jr.; father, Curtis Sr.; mother, Santranella; and me

My birth family circa the early '90s: (from left) my sister, Sharon; brother, Curtis Jr.; father, Curtis Sr.; mother, Santranella; and me

When I was growing up in the 70s the kids on my block called my family The Brady Bunch because of the harmony in my home. Then in the 80s they called us the Cosbys (or Huxtables) because I came from a home with two college-educated parents who had professional jobs. And like all families, we had certain ways we did things and with those certain things came certain expectations for us and others: Every summer we took a family trip—“Hasn’t every family been somewhere together?”; We insisted that people eat every time that came to our home—“Why didn’t they offer us something to eat the whole time we were at their home?”; “We don’t handle things like that in our family”—“Why did they say that? Their family is tacky!” I can’t even recall the countless times that my mother was proud of the excellence displayed that she placed in us, her children. Whenever she witnessed or heard about one of our successful presentations, she would celebrate us like any proud parent would, but then she would go a little further and say something like, “I know you mine, but you were the best.”

My family dynamics and the words from my mother gave me great pride in my family. I became haughty—if only in my heart and most times that’s where it was—when a grown woman didn’t know how she should dress or what she should say and when she should say it, things that I learned in my family. She would rarely know how I despised her and exalted myself. These thoughts often remained with me (except when disgust would creep onto my face but would never show the depth of what I was feeling). To my mother’s credit, she also taught us to help others who may not have learned what she and my dad taught us. So I would help these unwitting souls, but for me, the pride message was stronger and went deeper. I really didn’t want to be bothered with no trifling women who didn’t know how to act. I wasn’t their mother and didn’t have time to teach them.

As I have grown in Christ, I have put away this strong black woman attitude and have taken on the Christian mantle of the strong understanding of the flaws of the weak (Romans 15:1). The Kingdom of God mindset is for us to remember that none of us was created equal, we are all members of one body that function differently, and we need each another (1 Corinthians 12). Even those outside of the Kingdom were created in God’s image and should be treated with the love and respect given to the almighty creator, Jesus Christ himself. Yes, pride can make you idolize your family, but being renewed by God’s word truly can help you to be a new person (2 Corinthians 3:18). I am changed so I know that God’s word has transforming power.
Copyright 2009 by Rhonda J. Smith

Pride

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This Mother’s Day I got treated to rest and dinner. My husband took care of my one-year-old all through church service and fulfilled most of our children’s demands throughout the weekend; I ate at my favorite restaurant (The Blue Nile, Ethiopian); and I finally watched the TD Jakes’ movie Not Easily Broken with Morris Chestnut and Taraji P. Henson.

For those of you who haven’t seen the movie, it’s about what happens to a married couple that doesn’t keep God at the center of the marriage. In this movie, selfish desires take precedence and allow bitterness and blame shifting to become basis of the couple’s interactions. Ultimately, pride is what keeps each of them from continually pursuing the other to make amends. But a conversation with her mother led the wife to a revelation of her complicity in destroying her marriage.

In defending why she encouraged her daughter to put her husband out of the house, her mother said: “Black women have to be strong and you know that.” “And in all your lessons about how I need to be strong and proud and independent, Mama, you left out some very important things. How to love, Mama. How to really care about somebody. How to forgive.” Oh, this struck a chord with me. My mama, too, like many of our mothers, gave us the reality lesson of the double struggle that comes with being black and a woman: People automatically discount your strengths so you have to work twice as hard to be considered half as good. And for me and others I know, this made us work more than twice as hard because we wanted to be considered more than half as good. This excellence, for me, resulted in pride. Not the kind that prompts you to have good self grooming and appreciate how God made you (this is good pride), but the kind that says, “I’m all that. I’d rather just do it myself to make sure it gets done right.” I became self-reliant and in my recovery, I have had to learn how to have God esteem, not self-esteem, and let people help me.

Pride has been my source of strength, my vice, for many years. We know that pride comes in many forms, and I have dealt with a good variety of them: intellectual pride, family pride, sorority pride, material pride, just to name a few (Yes, there are more. I will be delivered, in Jesus’ name). As I prepare to reveal my proud self in various areas of my life, tell me where you struggle with pride. How has pride been a hindrance for you? Talk to me.

Copyright 2009 by Rhonda J. Smith