Growing out hair?

[AmberLou23]

Ok so I wasn't sure where to put this thread. The 'transitioning' section seemed the best place but correct me if not. I'm new to the forums

So I'm 15, MTF transgender. I have had a lot of time to come to terms with who I am and I think I'm at an ideal point to start thinking about transitioning. Obviously, I'm limited until I turn 18 but living as a male is horrible for me. I feel uncomfortable all the time. I'm sure y'all can understand!

I'm thinking about starting to grow my hair out. I used to have nice, long hair but I cut it all off not that long ago in some attempt to 'fit in'. Mind you, it didn't look great before anyway. Now, I have a undercut, quiff style thing. Where it's longer on top, y'know? Don't get me wrong, nice haircut! But, for me... nope. My hair has a wave to it, I wouldn't go as far as wavy but its not straight, that's for sure. Ultimately, I want to grow my hair down to neck length into a sort of wavy bob and grow it longer when I feel like it.

My question is, what would you advise I do? Grow out the undercut and trim when I need to OR just cut my hair really short so I can grow it out better. I would feel uncomfortable for a while doing that but my hair grows SO FAST anyway. I want to part my hair towards either side eventually and that's difficult in the style it is now.

Talk to my hairdresser? Hmm, maybe. Not completely comfortable with doing so. What do you think? Any kind of advice about hair would be appreciated.

[ikanote]

you have 3 years til then.. I tried to imagine what kind of hair you have but if you said you used to have nice long hair.. and between wavy and straight.. I say I might have similar hair :O
I feel happier with long hair.. If it would make you happier and yes let your hair grow out.

As for maintenance for hair and styling.. I don't know much about, see how it grows out first then decide what you want to do.. you have a lot of time to learn about your hair.. It starts  out a bit ugly but it starts to change.. Well mines was really ugly but once it got longer it got a bit wavy at the ends.. My mom said it looked like a girl cut and I said purfeeeeect )

[awilliams1701]

When I was your age, I was ashamed at any thought I had about being transgender. Yet I grew my hair out because sometimes guys have long hair. I got a lot less problems with the hair than I would have if I had accepted my trans status back then. So grow it out. Believe it or not long hair alone helped me a great deal. The longer it got, the better I felt about the mirror. I didn't understand why until well over 15-18 years later. (Holy crap I'm old (33))

[AmberLou23]

When I was your age, I was ashamed at any thought I had about being transgender. Yet I grew my hair out because sometimes guys have long hair. I got a lot less problems with the hair than I would have if I had accepted my trans status back then. So grow it out. Believe it or not long hair alone helped me a great deal. The longer it got, the better I felt about the mirror. I didn't understand why until well over 15-18 years later. (Holy crap I'm old (33))

I feel so much better with longer hair. I am really starting to regret cutting it off. I'm glad you came to terms with being transgender There is no doubt that I would never have realised I was trans without the resources there are today. I'm very lucky, that's for sure!

[awilliams1701]

Its the oddest thing. I felt like all the right doors opened for me in a relatively short period of time. A year ago I was in denial (I was even dreaming about being a girl almost every day, but waking up and saying NOPE I'm not trans) and even transphobic. It was around the end of May that I started questioning and concluded in the first week or two of June. Part of accepting myself as trans was first learning to accept myself as a nerd. I've struggled with being a nerd far more than being trans. I had been in the process of getting over it since I moved here back in 2010. The end of that road was when I accidentally started watching a show called "King of the Nerds". It helped me get over the last hurtle of being a nerd. That was the first door. It wasn't that much after that the doors started opening to me and it hit me that it was an issue I had been dealing with since childhood.

Summery: King of the Nerds helped me accept myself as transgender (as strange as that sounds).

[Lyric]

I don't know your exact situation, but if your feel you are a MTF transgender there is a lot you can do over the next three years. The most important thing would be to see a good therapist about this feeling ASAP. You can do that one way or the other.

To me, at least, having long hair helps a lot in feeling feminine. With a life situation as restrictive as yours every little thing helps. It sounds like you had some hair care issues before, but you were less mature then. I always found that people are much, much more accepting of a male with long hair if it is well cut, styled and cared for-- even if it's in a more traditionally feminine style. Taking good care of their hair is just one thing most women do, so you might as well get used to it now.

I'd be careful about getting advice from a hair stylist, though. They understandably make their living cutting hair so advising clients into high maintenance styles is in their best interest. If you've got a good one, discuss the TG thing and that you want to look more feminine. Talk to female friends who have nice looking hair and get tips about how they take of theirs.

Growing your hair out from the undercut will probably not look very good for awhile because short hair doesn't hang downward until it's grown enough weight to point it downward. Just put up with this as best as you can until it gets longer. Hair that's at least chin length can be quite manageable and look good on most anybody.