Ep #165: The Haircut and the Healing: Reclaiming Who You’re Becoming After Divorce

Welcome to Co-Parenting with Confidence, a podcast for those courageous moms out there who want to move past the conflict and frustration of divorce and show up as the mom they truly want to be. My name's Mikki Gardner. I'm a certified life and conscious parenting coach with my own personal dose of co-parenting experience. Throughout my co-parenting journey, I have learned to become confident in who I am as a woman and a mother, and I'm here to help you do the same. If you're ready to learn what it takes to become a great co-parent and an amazing example to your children, we'll get ready and let's dive into today's episode.

(00:43):

Hey there, and welcome back to the podcast. So today, this is a little bit of a funny title, but it's all about haircuts and healing. And why are we talking about that? Well, I had an experience. I'm going to share a personal story about the worst haircut of my life. And when I say the worst, literally when people who knew me back then we talk about it, they cringe. They make the face like, oh yeah, that time it was so bad. So I'm going to dive into that, but why am I talking about this today? Well, you know what? Recently I've had a shift in this whole thinking and this conversation is really around shedding those outdated identities that we have shedding and releasing of the fear of becoming someone new and really learning how to choose the direction we want to go. Because if there's something that we know after divorce is that you are not the same after.

(01:43):

And oftentimes during really the messiness and the turmoil, we're just trying to survive. We are just trying to get through, and that is a necessary part of the journey. But what I find so often and when I'm talking with women and certainly in my own life, is that sometimes we forget to allow for change. We forget to allow that we can grow and expand and evolve. And that's what this haircut has taught me. And so I wanted to talk to you about it because you might be in the emotional limbo of divorce right now. It might be that you're in the middle of it. It might be that you just settled on everything. Maybe you're a year out or three years out or 10 years out, like me, wherever you're at, sometimes we can really find ourselves clinging to these old identities of who we were to keep us safe, but sometimes we've outgrown it and when we hold onto it too long, we're like just walking around in clothes that are too small or haircuts that don't fit us right?

(02:51):

So let me set the scene for you. Let me take you back here to my lowest point. And when I say lowest point, I literally mean I think it was, knock on wood, the lowest point that I have experienced in my life. And that was the night that I saw my husband's phone and a text from someone who was not me on it. And it was devastating. I mean, we're not going to talk about that period. This is about the haircut. But that period of my life after the devastation of finding out what was going on and all the things that I didn't know in my marriage, it sent me into just a spiral. And if I've learned one thing through my life, I'm an emotional haircut cutter. You can always tell. Or you used to always be able to tell where I was in my life by what was going on with my hair.

(03:47):

If I'm in a really good mood, I cut my hair. If I wanted to revamp myself or I'm going for a new job, I was not afraid ever to just cut my hair and have a new style. So I went into the hair salon at this really low moment with a marriage in shambles, just struggling to try to keep things together with a three-year-old at home, running my own business, feeling just gutted and worthless. And I went into the salon that day, and I just wanted a fresh look. I wanted a cute little French bob, and I wanted it to be so adorable, and I wanted to look sophisticated and put together. And when I went in, the hairdresser was in a little bit of a mood, which he could get in sometimes, and he was like, nah, I don't think so. And I said, no, no, no.

(04:38):

I really, I need this. I want this. And so he said, fine. Looking back, that was my first clue. Get out of the chair and go home. I didn't. I stayed instead of the cute little French bob that would've been angled just below my chin, I got the back of my haircut to where there was less than an inch coming off the top and then a straight angle down to my chin, which was off. One side was longer than the other. And the back of my head shaped when I tell you this was a horrible haircut. I don't know that I can do it justice. And I had the wherewithal at the time to not take pictures. I was so devastated. And I'll tell you honestly, after I walked out of the salon, I didn't know what to think. I think I was just shocked.

(05:29):

I was in complete and utter shock, and I was going to meet a friend that night for drinks. We were going to talk about everything going on in my life. I was excited to see my friend. I walked in and when I saw the look on his face, I knew it was bad. And he just said to the waitress, we need some vodka, please. And I proceeded to get hammered thinking, oh, I'm just in shock. It's just a new look. It's going to be okay. Well, fast forward to the next morning, waking up and looking in the mirror. It was not okay. It was not okay in any shape of the word. And I was a wedding planner at the time, and we were doing a giant wedding, and the hairdresser for that wedding was just a lovely man. I actually saw him this morning at the salon, and I remember I texted him, 9 1 1, I need help.

(06:22):

And he picked up the phone, he called me. He said, what's going on? I said, I got the worst haircut. And he's like, ah, it can't be that bad. He goes, but come in. I'll squeeze you in. I remember his face when I walked in the door. He said, oh my God, honey, what happened? Who did this to you? And everyone's sort of staring at my head as if a bomb had gone off, which it basically had. So he had to then cut it even shorter to try to even it out to try to make some sense of what was happening in my head at that time. And this is a long story to say that what happened during that time was not only was I at a real emotional low because of what was going on in my personal life, but I now had it written on my head that I was a mess and I was just gutted.

(07:15):

I couldn't look in the mirror. I wore hats all the time. It was just so sad. But in that moment, I sort of promised myself I would never get my hair cut again. And I will tell you, it's been about 12 years. My son's 15. I haven't cut my hair. Have I trimmed it? Yep, absolutely. But I will not cut it. I refuse to even get close to putting myself in a position where I'm going to be harmed in the haircut chair again. And what it really got me to thinking about recently is how much I am holding on to the trauma and to the grief. And I kind of wrapped it up in this really bad haircut, but it was really more than that. The haircut was just another example. During that time of all the things that weren't working, how devastated I felt, how broken I felt, how shattered I felt, but really I just realized that I'm holding onto a lot of grief and a lot of trauma that it's time to just release.

(08:22):

And so I've been in this spirit right now of having really difficult conversations with the people around me, in my family, in my loved ones, in my partnerships, in my co-parenting, and I'm having these hard conversations because I don't want to hold on to those old versions of me. So I went in today wanting a new haircut and wanting to sort of let myself step back into being able to make some changes, become something different, because I realized that we hold on to this idea that we can't change things. And if we change things, then everything's going to fall apart. And somehow I had equated this in my head to what was on my head in my hair, and I realized that after a lot of years of self-reflection, of personal growth, of healing, of healing my nervous system and learning to be okay in the body that I have in the family, that I have in the partnerships that I have in my relationship with me and trust with me, I realized today, actually in the last couple weeks, it's time to cut my hair.

(09:37):

It's time to start to let go of that weight and that fear that I have been holding onto all of these years and allow myself to become something different. And so it's been this sort of little process that I've been going through recently, but it really came out in this haircut, and it's not drastically different, but I love it, right? It's sort of a new fresh perspective. And you might say, Mickey, it's just hair. But I think for those of you who know, it's not just our hair. Sometimes it's how are we living? What are we holding onto from the past? What are the past identities that we're trying to fit ourselves into that might not be fitting anymore? Maybe it's an outdated role. Maybe it's values that actually aren't your strong values anymore. Maybe it's fears that are keeping you from evolving. Really, when we start to reclaim ourselves after divorce, it's having the courage and the bravery and the desire to allow ourselves to evolve into something new.

(10:46):

Because you're not meant to return to who you were before you were divorced. You're allowed to outgrow that version of you. You're allowed to evolve into something new. You're allowed to cut your hair. You're allowed to rewrite a story. You're allowed to become someone entirely different, and the other people around you may not understand it. They may not support it. It might feel awkward at times, but I want you to know that you get to reclaim yourself in little ways and in big ways. So I just wanted to share that little story because I really walked out of the salon today feeling happy and excited and loving my little new fresh look. And it has been years, actually, over decades, I can say since I had that experience because I was really holding onto that past to that trauma, frankly, of what was going on in my life and how shattered I felt and how alone that horrible haircut made me feel.

(11:52):

Right? It was just like a scarlet letter on me. But we don't have to wear that scarlet letter. We don't have to wear those wounds. We don't have to wear them anymore when they don't fit us. So my friend you are allowed to change. You are allowed to let divorce change you, and you are allowed to give yourself permission to become a new version of you, one that you haven't met yet, one that you are excited about meeting, and how do we do it? Well, that's all the other episodes that we talk about here that's really getting in support of other women that is getting in support of other parents who are going through this, that's doing the personal growth work. It's doing the nervous system, healing work. It's the self-reflection work, right? It is work. It takes time. And just like I realized that I've had 12 years of sort of growing my hair out, I can cut it and it's going to grow back, and I can kind of evolve and move from there.

(12:54):

But I just want you to know that who you were before the divorce, you get to choose the best parts of that to carry with you and the other parts you are allowed to set down. You are allowed to trim out just like a haircut, and allow them to fall to the floor and keep moving forward. You can take the best parts, you can take the parts of you that are strong and resilient. You can take the parts that are difficult, and you can absorb them and integrate them into this next becoming of you. And that's what I want for you. That's why I do this podcast. It's why I am a coach. It's why I support parents as they navigate divorce. But I just wanted to remind you today in case you needed to hear it, is there anything you're holding on an old identity, a past identity that might not feel like it fits anymore?

(13:45):

Maybe an outdated role, maybe friend groups that don't feel like they're for you anymore. Maybe it's values that actually just aren't aligned in this season, or maybe there's fears that are holding you back. Well, you are allowed to reflect. You are allowed to change and evolve, and it doesn't have to be dramatic to be meaningful, right? When we allow ourselves a gentle, compassionate way forward of changing and evolving and learning and growing, it will make huge results. But we have to sometimes shed the old version. And so if you are in need of a shedding of a new haircut like I was, I want you just to remember these words that you are so worthy, you are so loved, and you are so deserving of the most beautiful life, even post-divorce. And so you get to reclaim that version of you, and you get to decide what's next for you. And I hope you choose something big and beautiful and the most amazing because it's time to give yourself the permission to evolve and to change, and to choose yourself. That's my short conversation for you today. But I'm just sending you so much love and many blessings. I'll see you on the next episode.

Oh, and one more thing, the legal stuff. This podcast is solely intended for informational and educational purposes only. It is not intended to be a substitute for any medical advice. Please consult your physician or the qualified medical professional for personalized medical advice. Thanks for listening to Co-Parenting with Confidence. If you want more information or resources from this podcast, visit coparentingwithconfidence.com . I'll see you next week.