My grandmother has cute short wavy hair. Hers is very very soft but she’s had more or less the same hairstyle since about 1958. It’s not going to change.
My mother gave up on dyeing her hair when she was in her late forties. She’s a little past fifty now and has a few dark brown streaks in her white hair. It’s a bit thinner now than it was and has always been very straight. She uses Bed Head to give it kind of a spiky, mussed style. One day I’m going to come home and see her with purple streaks.
When I saw the movie Willow as a little girl, I decided from looking at Fin Raziel that I did not want to cut my hair short when I got old: I wanted it long and white and curly just like hers. I can’t find a good picture, here’s the best I’ve got: http://www.thelin.net/laurent/cinema/films/tt0096446/32885.jpg
My wife has recently cut her hair short (in a bob) because, as she says “It makes me look younger”. What I wanted to say was “what’s the point of looking younger if it looks horrible?” But I didn’t. I tapped into years of accrued wisdom and I kept my mouth shut.*
The thing is though, that if the majority of 40-ish women cut their hair shorter, then shorter hair becomes associated with ‘older’, and it therefore defeats the purpose. If you see a woman on the street from behind and they have short hair there’s a 90% chance they’re older than 40.
I also invited her hairdresser, who loves me, to dinner at our place and and casually bought up the short hair thing. She now refuses to cut my wife’s hair any shorter. I win (round one).
I’m only 34, but my hair is the longest I’ve had it in my entire life and it is also the most low maintainence it’s ever been. I think those short “mom” cuts make 30-40 something women look frumpier and older than they otherwise would.
When I get comments about how “young” I look for “my age” I attribute it to keeping myself fit and maintaining a personal style–including hair. I don’t think it’s so much that I look younger than my age, it’s that other women my age do things to make themselves look so much older. There’s no reason a woman in her '30s should look like an old lady.
I love long hair and kept mine long well past the age when a lot of women go for shorter cuts (I’m 50 and wear it short now). Unfortunately, my hair is ram-rod straight (and doesn’t hold a perm) and baby fine, and as I age there is less of it. If I wear it long, it hangs there lankly and is so thin my ears stick out between the locks.
I did a Google image search on “straight stringy hair” to find an example, but all the images I found showed women with hair that’s thicker than mine.
As a general rule long gray hair on women 50 and older looks like hell (hell is defined as a rats nest). At some point, even a good dye job looks creepy against the normal signs of aging. The same applies to men only more so. If you want to look older, wear a gray pony tail.
According to this yahoo answer:
**
They don’t dye their hair blue on purpose. They use a product called “blueing” on it in order to take the yellow out of their grey hair. Normally it should just correct the color and turn their hair a bright, clear grey, but they put too much on and their hair turns blue instead. I don’t think most of them even realize that their hair is blue**
I’m 38, and wear my hair about shoulder-blade length. It’s thick and curly, and it would actually be much *more *difficult to maintain a shorter hairstyle. As it is right now, I put a little styling cream in it and go. I don’t even own a blow dryer.
Besides, it’s pretty! I get compliments on my hair all the time. And like **Karyn **mentioned, if I want it off my face or neck, I just put it up. Long hair gives me more options. If my hair ever starts thinning or looking ratty, off it goes… but until then, why get rid of one of my best assets just because my “girlhood” is over?
I’ve always been told (by all the older women with short hair I know) that it’s because long hair emphasizes gravity pulling their face down as their skin ages and becomes less pliant.
Cutting one’s hair once the kids came along was kind of standard back in the day. Babies love to grab onto it and I guess it was more practical. I managed to keep mine long: Another me and Justin | Karlen Sanberg | Flickr
Go further back in the day and only young girls wore their hair “long” - once you reached seventeen or so you began to wear it “up” - it was still long, but for all practical purposes looked and “wore” short.
Part of this means we simply aren’t used to older women with long hair. Our grandmothers (great grandmothers) had it long, but we only saw them with it in a bun. Our mothers (grandmothers) cut it short. So it can cause a disconnect to see women who have older faces and longer hair.
Mine is thick too so even though it’s thinned a bit it doesn’t show. I’ve never owned a blowdryer either because all it would do it blow the curls out into frizz - all I do is comb it out in the shower with conditioner, shake my head and go. People comment on my hair all the time too so it can’t look that bad yet. My other reason is that my partner doesn’t want me to cut it because he loves it, and I don’t want him to cut off his long black either. He’s Lakota so he can get away with it without being considered a hippie. I’m retired now so conforming to conventions isn’t important to my career anymore anyway.
My grandmother kept long hair until she was past 80- and this long grey hair was appalling. I have no idea what it would have been like if it was short.
I’m in my 50’s and have a very short, kind of “punkish” haircut but I’ve always worn my hair short other than for a few brief periods here and there. I definitely wouldn’t grow it out now. As we get older, facial stuff starts to sag a little bit… chin gets loose, eyes develop bags under them, etc. The illusion created by having more attention drawn upward (hair on top of head as opposed to under the chin) is more lifting. Most older women I do know who have kept their hair long wear it up anyway.
There are absolutely older women who have beautiful hair and it looks lovely with some length but in large part ease of care and more youthful short styles make shorter hair attractive to many of us old broads.
Some women just either never received or have decided to disregard the memo that their prime duty in life is to look hot and decorative for men, so they tend to wear their hair the way they like it.
(usual disclaimers: I know not all men think that’s the case , this is directed at the OP; nor is this directed to women who wear their hair long because that’s how they like it, it isn’t even directed at women who wear their hair long/short whatever to please some-one else.Your life, your hair, knock yourself out. I am also aware that it isn’t just men who censure women’s looks. Oh and yeah, patriarchy hurts the menz, too, I know, I know)
Some women do take the above as their prime directive but the man or men in her life prefer short hair on her. Silly, I know, but some men have different views on female hotness than yours.
Some women do take their decorative duties seriously but sadly recognize that the time has come that short hair might reduce them on the hotness scale, but long hair takes them off that scale all together.
Aside: Many men who think that women ought to look as attractive to guys as possible are totally unaware that they also require women to pretend that that is effortless and natural, and that they always instinctively know how to balance the narrow line of attractive but not slutty, and age-appropiately looking neither too old or too young. An attractive woman just is, there are no complications with this whatsoever. And no work involved too! (her taking forever getting dressed to go out is just a silly typical girl thing, you see, as is her endless clothes shopping, and dieting).
What these men are also totally unaware of is that what they think looks good is always true and logical. Take this hair thing of the OP. It just totally fits with the effortless natural ability women seem to have to look their age appropriate non-slutty best. But, just like male hair, female hair tends to deteriorate with age. This oughn’t to be a surprise, as it is easily observable, but it is nevertheless kindly explained as new information by several people in this thread. Why would that even be thought to be necessary? Perhaps, the OP is blissfully unaware that female hair deteriorates with age, because many women are policed or chose themselves not to wear it long once it stops meeting esthetic standards of looking their best? Do guys like that not register the deterioration of older human hair because on the rare occasions they see an older woman with bad long hair, they just put that in a seperate category of just a woman pathetically trying to dress 'n act too young, or having a character flaw for not taking properly care of herself because female hair just magically looks good with just a tiny bit of effort? Or does he only see women with genetically good hair as worthy of notice, ignores the rest, and resents them not following his prime directive of looking decorative as is in her power?
It gets more complicated. What if your genetics allow for long hair passed that vague certain age? it’s still difficult to balance the seemingly easy directive of looking your possible best without not at least getting censured by some. As evidenced in this thread, a woman having the gall of having both dudely approved good hair and a good figure, without having a sign on her back to announce her sell-by date at all possible angles, is just too trauma inducing for some young men who found themselves attracted to her from behind. The horror of having ‘the goods’ combined with the sin of having an old face, ye gods.
Or to put it an other way: even if you can potentially pull of long hair past a certain age and still pass decorative norms, some women get told it is inappropriate to show it off, as in some segments of society there is a cut-off upper limit age for having long hair outside a bun. Long hair is associated with young women, but on older women gets you deemed old hag faster than having shorter hair. It is not stated , but it is one of those many unwritten rules about appearance. The cut off point varies in different social and geographical envionments. Sometimes the cut-off point is visible age, sometimes it’s actual age. Naturally, this goes together with slightly different satorial choices being suddenly not suitable as well. Really, looking your hottest best, just isn’t easy.
Nutshell: your short question imbeds an unquestioned directive for woman to look hot, your particular image of hot specifically. Even when desiring to follow the directive of being as hot as possible, it really isn’t a simple one to follow. Your view of hotness if one of many and an individual’s views of hotness has many implicit caveats. I am long past being angry with being designated the decorative role, but continue to be amazed how simple some designaters actually seem to think living up to that role is.
I have a friend in her 30s who takes a medication that causes premature hair loss and breaking, and her doctor has her taking Centrum Silver. The difference is amazing. Her hair stopped falling out and looks shiny again. I bought some this week because it can only help delay the inevitable.
Another thing - I have intensely curly hair but I am lucky in that it’s very thin. So I can keep it long, and it gives it body. When I keep it short it just curls like mad and tries to be a 'fro. NO.
As others have said, hair often thins out as we get older. Mine certainly did. Worse, it’s thin in only some areas, so the thin areas are very uneven. The texture changed also, most likely because of all the gray!
There just is no good hairstyle, at least for me, for long, thin hair. It just hangs there with big gaps.
So yeah, as I’ve gotten older, the hair has gotten shorter. But then, I’m going for neat and tidy rather than hot and sultry.
