Babysitting and Haircuts

[Shoo]

There is a rule, and grandparents should know it: No Grandparent May Get a Grandchild's Hair Cut Without the Express, Direct, and Wholehearted Approval of the Mother. (No, Not Even Dads Are Allowed to Permit This--Only Moms.)

Seriously? Dad's doesn't get a say? What's the rational behind that? 

What if mom's not in the picture anymore? Does that mean that noone gets to decide?

If mom's out of the picture, of course the dad decides.

I agree with Toots on this one.  A little girl's hair is the mother's prerogative if the mother is the one who has to brush it and style it.  In my experience, when mother and father are both present, it's been the mom who is responsible for the daughter's hair.  So with that in mind, yes, it's the mom's decision and Dad doesn't get to make a decision/take action without clearing it through mom first.

That's the way it is in my family (but this would never even come up in my family because my husband wouldn't even attempt something like that).

[camlan]

There is a rule, and grandparents should know it: No Grandparent May Get a Grandchild's Hair Cut Without the Express, Direct, and Wholehearted Approval of the Mother. (No, Not Even Dads Are Allowed to Permit This--Only Moms.)

Seriously? Dad's doesn't get a say? What's the rational behind that? 

My interpretation of what Toots said is that dads shouldn't make such a decision without consulting the mothers. I can see a situation in which the dad drops a child off at his mother's house, and his mother suggests giving the child's hair a trim. The dad shouldn't just agree, but insist on getting approval for the hair cut from his wife, as well. Not that the dad can't have a say, but that, unless he is solely responsible for the child's hair, he doesn't get the final say.

Perhaps because it is usually the mom who has to deal with the results of said haircut?  Toots and AmethystAnne have given examples in this thread of on-going problems created by unauthorized haircuts.

[postalslave]

Interesting. I guess I just don't get the big deal. It's just hair, it will grow back. Sure it can be frustrating but life can be lol.

I read these comments and they almost make me sad, like we're setting an example for little girl's that her hair determines her success in life (And yes, NO ONE SAID THAT, this is just how I as an outsider see's this, its my opinion only and I do not want to see this thread locked).

[camlan]

Interesting. I guess I just don't get the big deal. It's just hair, it will grow back. Sure it can be frustrating but life can be lol.

I read these comments and they almost make me sad, like we're setting an example for little girl's that her hair determines her success in life (And yes, NO ONE SAID THAT, this is just how I as an outsider see's this, its my opinion only and I do not want to see this thread locked).

The hair is just the medium. The message being sent is that the grandparent gets to make decisions for the grandchild, not the parent.

You (general you) might not be upset over a haircut, but might get upset if the child were fed food the grandparents knew the parents didn't want the child to have, or if the child were not given naps at the grandparents' house so the parents had to deal with a cranky child after every visit to the GPs, or, as in another thread that is current today, the grandparent baptized the child in the grandparent's religion, after the parents had already baptized the child in their own.

[postalslave]

The hair is just the medium. The message being sent is that the grandparent gets to make decisions for the grandchild, not the parent.

You (general you) might not be upset over a haircut, but might get upset if the child were fed food the grandparents knew the parents didn't want the child to have, or if the child were not given naps at the grandparents' house so the parents had to deal with a cranky child after every visit to the GPs, or, as in another thread that is current today, the grandparent baptized the child in the grandparent's religion, after the parents had already baptized the child in their own.

Thank you, I understand now. English is not my first language

[Judah]

There is a rule, and grandparents should know it: No Grandparent May Get a Grandchild's Hair Cut Without the Express, Direct, and Wholehearted Approval of the Mother. (No, Not Even Dads Are Allowed to Permit This--Only Moms.)

Seriously? Dad's doesn't get a say? What's the rational behind that? 

Normally I would disagree very strongly with the idea that a dad doesn't have equal say and in all things concerning his children, but I agree with Toots on this one.  My husband never had to brush the tangles out of my daughter's hair, or put it into a pony tail, or try to get her gossamer strands into a french braid. Her hair was my job alone, so I got to decide what it looked like.

[Hmmmmm]

Interesting. I guess I just don't get the big deal. It's just hair, it will grow back. Sure it can be frustrating but life can be lol.

I read these comments and they almost make me sad, like we're setting an example for little girl's that her hair determines her success in life (And yes, NO ONE SAID THAT, this is just how I as an outsider see's this, its my opinion only and I do not want to see this thread locked).

If you've never had to deal with unruly kid's hair or trying to grow out bangs, I guess I can see where you might think "it's just hair".  But it's just hair that has to be dealt with on a daily basis and just like wearing clean clothes and brushing your teeth, having groomed hair is important to most people I know, even kids.

It's not just a little girl thing, it can be a little boy thing too.  When DS was young his very thick, very straight hair would stand straight up if it was cut under 1.5" at the crown.  He had decided that he wanted to grow out his summer buzz cut so we'd been dealing with the sticky out hair for a while but had finally got it to a good place but he needed a trim.  I took him to the stylist I'd been using for DD and gave her explicit instructions about a scissor cut only and to in no circumstances cut his hair short at the crown.  She did it anyway because she didn't believe me and that she had these 'mad' hairstyling skills that would elimante the problem.  According to her, she thought he'd just had 'bad' haircuts in the past.  DS was not a crier, but I honestly thought he was going to start when he saw himself in the mirror. Even though it only took 4 weeks to grow his hair back out, I still can't pass that salon without getting mildly irritated and it's been 10 years.

[dawbs]

Interesting. I guess I just don't get the big deal. It's just hair, it will grow back. Sure it can be frustrating but life can be lol.

I read these comments and they almost make me sad, like we're setting an example for little girl's that her hair determines her success in life (And yes, NO ONE SAID THAT, this is just how I as an outsider see's this, its my opinion only and I do not want to see this thread locked).

I see it as "other people don't haev control over your body [including hair]".

I don't force my child to hae her hair certain ways.  I don't alter her body/hair/etc w/o her input.  No one gets to make decisions about her body without her input--and, for the moment, her parents' input (when she's a bit older, her input alone)

And "it grows back" doesn't really adress the amount of time.  For me, the difference between a 'bad' haircut and a 'good' haircut can be, quite literally, YEARS.

If someone were to try to cut bangs into my kid's hair, I'd say it would be easily 6-8 months to get it back to the starting point.
That's 6 months, so 180 days.  Over 180 separate times I would have to struggle to do her hair differently (possibly being painful because making hair 'work' isn't comfortable) because of someone else trying to make that decision for us.
assume 1/2 an hour for each of those (which, is about average), you'er talking 90 hours of trying to get ponytails in.

[wolfie]

There is a rule, and grandparents should know it: No Grandparent May Get a Grandchild's Hair Cut Without the Express, Direct, and Wholehearted Approval of the Mother. (No, Not Even Dads Are Allowed to Permit This--Only Moms.)

Seriously? Dad's doesn't get a say? What's the rational behind that? 

Normally I would disagree very strongly with the idea that a dad doesn't have equal say and in all things concerning his children, but I agree with Toots on this one.  My husband never had to brush the tangles out of my daughter's hair, or put it into a pony tail, or try to get her gossamer strands into a french braid. Her hair was my job alone, so I got to decide what it looked like.

I can understand that but I would have been a lot happier if Toots had said that only the person in charge of the hair gets the say - and not say that only moms get any say - dads don't at all.

[Thipu1]

Actually my GF did this to me.  I was going on three and had next to no hair at all.  What I had was a pale, red fuzz.  It was driving the family crazy. 

There was a family conference to decide if I should start wearing a wig.  While this was going on, Grandpa took me for a 'walk'.  He took me to his barber and had my fuzz trimmed.  My parents weren't thrilled but nobody dared say anything to Grandpa.

Oddly enough, after that, my hair started coming in and I had a full mop in about six months.

Okay, that was an odd case.  The one in the OP is very different.  The child wasn't bothered by her hair, her parents weren't bothered by her hair, only the GM was bothered it. 

Cutting the child's hair was bad enough but as others have pointed out, the real problem was the lie.
Hair grows back pretty quickly.  Trust takes a lot longer to develop.   

[Sharnita]

While some people have personal anecdotes about their own families where dad wasn't good with hair I think it is completely unreasonable to make a bla.ket statement that dads should have no say, or even that they should have less than the mom.

[TootsNYC]

There is a rule, and grandparents should know it: No Grandparent May Get a Grandchild's Hair Cut Without the Express, Direct, and Wholehearted Approval of the Mother. (No, Not Even Dads Are Allowed to Permit This--Only Moms.)

Seriously? Dad's doesn't get a say? What's the rational behind that? 

Because.

That's why.

And, because I don't think most men care about it in the same way moms do. And in almost every situation I've known, the mom is the one who does the bulk of the logistical work w/ haircare, etc. And even if the dad DOES handle this, the mom knows everything *as well* (but moms don't always tell dads about their plans).

And yes, it's sexist, and I don't particularly care.

In my case, I *had* told my MIL several times that we were growing it out and that she should stop fussing about DD's hair in her fact, because soon it was going to be long enough to put in the ponytail.

[Shoo]

There is a rule, and grandparents should know it: No Grandparent May Get a Grandchild's Hair Cut Without the Express, Direct, and Wholehearted Approval of the Mother. (No, Not Even Dads Are Allowed to Permit This--Only Moms.)

Seriously? Dad's doesn't get a say? What's the rational behind that? 

Because.

That's why.

And, because I don't think most men care about it in the same way moms do. And in almost every situation I've known, the mom is the one who does the bulk of the logistical work w/ haircare, etc. And even if the dad DOES handle this, the mom knows everything *as well* (but moms don't always tell dads about their plans).

And yes, it's sexist, and I don't particularly care.

In my case, I *had* told my MIL several times that we were growing it out and that she should stop fussing about DD's hair in her fact, because soon it was going to be long enough to put in the ponytail.

Yes, sometimes that's just the way things are.  Not everyone has to think it's "right" but that doesn't mean that's not the way it is.

Most dads that I have ever known have left their daughters' hair up to the moms.  Most moms care way more about their daughters' hair than most dads, IMO.

[CakeBeret]

Reading these replies, i realise I have an opposite view, but here it goes.......

Firstly, regarding the haircut - it doesn't seem too strange to me that a grandparent, who does a lot of childcare and helps the parents a lot, would take it upon themselves to 'help out' or 'surprise' the parents by getting a grandchild's hair cut - my mum looks after my nephew and it would not seem strange for her to take tim to get his hair cut, to help out my sister. I don't have kids but if i did, it would not really bother me at all unless i had SPECIFICALLY said 'please don't get their hair cut, we are trying to grow it/ we like it like that, etc'

When i was little, my nan looked after me. one day, when i was four, she took me to have my ears pierced. i suppose my today's standards, that seems crazy, but it was all fine. in fact, considering my nan was horrible and really nasty to me, i think it was probably teh only nice thing she ever did for me, and i still remember the experience fondly.

if you trust your parents to look after your children regularly, for long periods of time, then don't you also trust them to make a few decisions ? Or even do something as a favour or a surprise for you?
xx

While I see your point, I disagree with you. My mom watches my DS 3 days a week. I expect her--or anyone else watching him--to not make any permanent or semi-permanent decisions without talking to me. And haircuts have come up before. Mom will say "DS's hair is getting really long, would you like me to get it cut?" or "I'm going to the hairdresser on Tuesday, would you like me to get DS's hair cut as well?" It doesn't take more than 30 seconds to ask the parent beforehand. IMO there's no excuse for not asking.

I trust my mom to look after my child--just like I trust my mother in law, my siblings, etc. And I trust them to make decisions that are relevant to their care of my child, up to and including appropriate punishment. It's not that I don't trust someone to make a decision regarding a child's hair--it is simply that I expect to be communicated with regarding something like that.

Personally? I would be mildly irked, at the worst, about the haircut. I would be furious at the lying, though, enough to consider never letting grandma watch my child alone. If I can't trust her to be honest about a simple haircut, what can I trust her to be honest about?

[postalslave]

Because.

That's why.

And, because I don't think most men care about it in the same way moms do. And in almost every situation I've known, the mom is the one who does the bulk of the logistical work w/ haircare, etc. And even if the dad DOES handle this, the mom knows everything *as well* (but moms don't always tell dads about their plans).

And yes, it's sexist, and I don't particularly care.

No, it's just offensive and a pretty interesting assumption.