Running and Work and I are Ruining My Hair

As a runner, you frequently have to relinquish your vanity to the sport. You sweat all over, you drool, you might pee your pants even. You will attempt to wear flattering running clothes; but let's be honest, they're still pretty unflattering. You post those race photos where you look like death, and the full force of gravity is pulling on every ounce of muscle and fat on your body. You might feel like a lithe tinkerbell running fairy but the pictures say otherwise.

One other way running sucks? It breaks your hair. Well, it breaks mine.

You cant really see it, but I have 1 gazillion broken hairs from tying up my hair too tight. I have very fine straight hair (but a lot of it) so if its not clenched between several thick bands of rubber-laced hair-ties, it will fall out approximately 5 seconds into each and every run.

But! I have to be honest. I've never been very good to my hair. Did you know I used to have dreadlocks?

Wifely dreadlocks!

Aunty Dreadlocks!

Bridesmaid dreadlocks!

Best friends with too much wine... Dreadlocks!

Another thing you might not know about me? I used to be in a band.

Ok, so that is irrelevant to this post. But it happens to be where my days of dreadlocking began.

In addition to dreadlocking, and possibly concomitant with it, I am almost incapable of actually running a brush through my hair. My husband gets so sick of finding my hair throughout the house that he has taken to brushing it for me. No joke.

Anyway, apart from running, apart from dreadlocking and apart from my apparent inability to groom myself, I have also been mean to my hair because of my work. I don't much like wearing it down when Im working long days at the computer. So more tight hair bands and more frizzies.

Moreover, with all the running and all the working taking up my time, I am averaging approximately 0.6 haircuts per year of my adult life. Not good for someone whose hair grows approximately 1 gazillion miles a minute.

Oh, and then theres the basic concern that working 15-20 hour days might actually cause my hair to turn grey and fall out altogether. Genuine concern, at this point, on my sixth day of such hours.

So the conclusion Im drawing here is about as sensical as my writing this blog post at 1am in California, when its 4am on east coast time, after a full day of work. 

That conclusion is: running and working are both bad for my hair. By all accounts, I should do neither.

But.... Even if I was capable of a heightened level of personal attention to my hair (which Im not) for the most part, I really couldnt actually care what the hell my hair looks like or does. Or the rest of me for that matter. So suck on that, hair.

The end.

~ Penny