“You look old,” said my friend’s husband. “You need to colour your hair.”
I have a headful of salt and pepper locs (also known as dreadlocks), heavier on the pepper. My hair stands out and normally gets complimented.
Clearly, not that day.
I started to grey in my early 30s and that was too early for me, so I started colouring my hair.
When I began colouring it, I didn’t want to look older than I was, but after almost two decades of inhaling peroxide and rushing to the salon or the pharmacy to get that box colour, enough was enough. I was fighting a losing battle — nature was going to do its thing. So, I stopped and let my hair naturally go grey.
A few years ago, I stopped by my older sister’s house and a contractor was working in her backyard. When he saw me he said, “Your daughter is upstairs.”
I was taken aback — I looked old enough to be my older sister’s mother? Of course, my sister got a good chuckle about this. She says she will go to her grave, an old woman, with a head full of black hair.
That night, feeling very self-conscious and about to buy a box of hair colour, I asked my husband if I looked old. He sighed and trod very carefully. “You look fine. I love your hair.”
As I took more turns around the sun, the question evolved from "do I look old?" to "what’s wrong with looking my age?" And more importantly, why does it matter if I look like the 40-something woman that I am?
It’s not simply about greying hair or seeing some new wrinkles popping up here and there — it’s about what we believe aging means. For women, each year can be seen as a loss of youth and beauty. In the workplace, it can mean going from being infantilized as a young woman to being straight up ignored as you age. We can’t win for losing.
Society tells us, specifically women, that we aren’t useful when we get older. It says we’re past our prime. We’re invisible. We are no longer desirable.
We’re not valuable anymore.
And I reject that with my chest and every one of my grey locs.
To visibly age and to revel in it is a form of resistance against the distinct aging-based sexism that women endure and internalize.
Simply turn on your television or walk through the aisles of your local pharmacy. There are shelves and shelves of anti-aging skin care products of all prices and brands. I’m guilty of perusing them and thinking, maybe I need to fight these fine lines. Maybe I need to plump my skin. I went from grabbing the cheapest moisturizer to searching the benefits of retinol and hyaluronic acid.
It’s a mini midlife crisis each time I visit the skin care aisle. According to Statista, in 2023, the skin care market is projected to generate a revenue of $181.20 billion (US) worldwide. We are spending billions of dollars worldwide to fight the inevitable.
Every selfie is a condemnation and confirmation that something needs to be done. I need to ignore the ads and accept that you can only fight aging for so long. Maybe it’s time to reject the idea that women shouldn’t age and that we should hold onto every scrap of youth to be seen in this society that isn’t safe for women.
I will never slander a woman who wants to colour her hair, use all the serums, get all the injections, or do whatever she deems necessary to feel comfortable in a world that is actively and openly built to advantage youth and disadvantage women as we age. We need to critically investigate why women are never seen as enough just how we are.
A male friend of mine said, “men become distinguished. Women get old.”
Let’s remix that: “men become distinguished. Women get better.”
