Women Always Change Their Minds...

For one of my uni assignments, I had to do a 1000 word feature article on a topic of my choice.

I love doing features, just chatting about something which you're interested in, it's pretty much just a longer version of my blog posts to be honest. I'd love to one day be writing feature articles for a glossy fashion mag, I can dream aye.

But anyway I did this particular feature on how women seem to have the inability to make a decision and keep to it, something which I am particularly not good at. So here it is, hope you all like it...

No matter what the subject is, or possibly who the subject is, fact is women always change their minds. Whether it your hair colour, nail polish, which shoes go better with which dress on a girls night out, what to order in from the local Chinese or even which male takes your fancy this week it seems as though we as women find it physically impossible to make a decision, and men will never understand this.

 For me it is my hair. I am never ever satisfied, no matter what. It all started when I was sixteen and my Mum let me have my first round of highlights, a breakthrough in what I was aiming to be my new identity within the fashion clones that were my peers at school. I was so excited at the prospect of getting a few blonde highlights to brighten up my pretty dull, mousy brown existence that I couldn’t just stop at one set.      

Months and months of bleaching and highlighting I was finally blonde. Just in time for my year eleven prom. I loved it. I had my long blonde curly hair, a huge poofy lilac prom dress, magnificently high/almost impossible to walk in heels, and the most beautiful crystal adorned tiara. I felt like Barbie princess. However, all that bleaching took its toll.

Shoulder length. The long locks were gone and I was devastated. However, the next trip to the hairdressers I went along with it and had it cut into a bob. In six months I’d deviated from the Barbie look to one which looked more representative of Ken. I was not impressed. “Ah I love it”, “It’s lovely”, “It really suits you” my friends would all say. Lies. That’s another thing that women grow to be very good at. Lying to make their friends feel better about themselves. Nice in retrospect, until you run in to someone who speaks the ultimate truth – “What the hell have you done!?!” Plus the roots were an absolute bitch!

So after this mishap, I decided the only way was to go back to brunette, and because I think that I am amazing at everything I decided to ditch the hairdresser and do it myself. Mistake.  At first glance it was a beautiful chocolate brown colour, I was delighted I’d done such a ‘professional’ job all for a fiver. “Score” I thought. However, after a couple of washes there were bits of blonde, a little bit of gingering going on on the ends. It was far from the Cadbury brown dream I was hoping for.                                                

After three consecutive trips to boots for different shades of brown hair dye, I had now become best friends with the lady at the counter. “That’s the good thing about hair” she said, “You can always try again”. She said this in such a manner as though she was trying to console a three year old who had dropped their ice cream. I gave her a rather unimpressed smirk and sauntered out ready to get back home and try again.

Third time lucky is definitely a saying that I live by. It was finally a normal chocolate brown colour. No blonde, no ginger, one colour. Sorted. However, being a true woman, after three weeks being a “normal” colour was boring so red it was. Even after the massacre that was the last attempt of home dying, I decided one again to ignore the hairdresser and do it from a box; however this time I enlisted the help of a friend therefore if it was a total cock up it was her fault!

I went for a nice deep shade of red. Brown at first glance but in the right lighting a beautiful shade of plum. It’s funny how a hair colour can affect your whole character. It’s like I felt instantly feisty and fiery. I was in love. So now, after six different colours in two years, I settled with this shade for seven months and I thought that was it. I’d found the one. No. Me being me got bored and decided I wanted to go back to brown. Good idea Lou.

One of the most difficult colours to cover is red. I discovered this after four boxes of chocolate brown and I ended up with black hair. Less than fabulous I can tell you. With my naturally almost translucent complexion I looked like I was attempting to be the most eccentric Goth in existence. Black hair, pale skin and the brightest clothes the eye could handle. It was not one of my most attractive moments in time.

It was at this point that I admitted defeat. I went crawling back to my hairdresser with my puppy dog eyes and eyelashes fluttering at her to “please sort out the mess in which I had created”, only to be told it was not that simple. If I didn’t want to ruin the condition of my hair I just had to sit back, take it and wait for the colour to grow out. I was in for the long haul.

A year down the line and I was finally back to my natural colour. It was an achievement I can tell you. The once addicted girl had got through hair dye rehab and was free. So after all that time spent looking an utter mess, half black, half brown you’d think I’d learn to appreciate the natural beauty wouldn’t you. But no. I am now officially back to being a red head, complete with extensions.

Women do have the inability to make a decision and keep to it. It’s a fundamental part of our being. Yes we may take what seems like forever to decide on an outfit for a night out, but let’s face it would a man really want us on his arm after throwing any crap together and claiming it to be an outfit? No, every man likes their Mrs to look good and be the envy of all others, whether they will admit it or not. And despite all the moaning and arguments it may cause, they wouldn’t have it any other way. Well at least that’s what we tell ourselves...