I recently decided to tackle braiding my daughter's hair. I know how to braid her natural hair, but she wanted "long" hair, which meant extensions. I had a friend that had offered to do it for me and my daughter was very excited. We went and bought the hair and her excitement began to increase. Unfortunately the day of the "event", my friend was unable to do her hair... that left me in a tough spot. I could simply try to explain to a five year old why she wasn't getting her hair braided or I could give it a shot. I have been doing their hair for awhile now and basic braiding was not too hard - "How hard could it be? We already have "beauty night" on Fridays and I paint their nails etc... so what is a couple hours more work?"
After a quick search on Google and a couple pictures I had convinced myself I could do it. Five and a half hours later we were done. Not too bad for a first timer, but I still had room for improvement (I am a perfectionist at times, so you can only imagine). That was about a week ago - last night I tackled removing the old braids and getting them a little longer and more consistent in size etc. The first time I did her hair, they were a little longer than her shoulder blades and took two packs of hair. I had to steam the ends (drama in itself) and since my daughter liked to chew on them you can imagine how they were fraying a bit. This time I bought a braid sealer and four packs of hair. They are now all the way down her back and look pretty good - if I do say so myself.
I am writing about this, not to brag but to share what made all this mean something to me. My daughter was so excited and happy, there is nothing better than to see your child happy and know that you helped make her happy. Throughout this whole process, any person that has gone through a divorce and the custody fights can relate, there are good days and bad days. At times you question if you are doing the best, are you just screwed up in your thinking, and even sometimes question if you can handle all of it. When I picked my daughter up from school one of the teachers complimented me on my daughter's hair and told me that she could not believe I did it. Then she walked over and gave me a hug and told my that she was just "blown away with the way I care for my girls." I can not explain how I felt. It means something when people that know you say things like that, but somehow it means something different when someone with nothing invested in you makes that comment. It was an encouraging word that helped pick me up a bit - what she did not know is that I had just had a phone call with my lawyer and we were discussing the custody issue and his ever increasing bill. I was feeling pretty beat up and down, her hug and words of encouragement helped me so much.
So next time you interact with a parent, or especially a single parent, and if you admire something they do - Tell them!! You just might be that little pick me up they need. Also if you know how to do something or want to learn something - share your knowledge. There are enough single parents that we can pull together to help each other out - a CO OP of sorts. Just because we are single with kids does not mean we are an island. I also encourage you to break the gender barriers - heck I am a "Marine" and I braid hair and paint finger nails.... don't get caught in the stereo types and gender biases, do it for your kids and do it for yourself. I can not explain the feeling when they look at me with those big brown eyes and smile.
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