Struggeling with imposter syndrom
I struggle a lot with imposter syndrome.
Until I was 18 I had curly hair (I’m 25 now). Then I had to start taking the pill because I otherwise wouldn’t get my period and I also had extreme pain. Around the same time I also started dyeing my hair in all kinds of colors, which I stopped doing in 2021. For some reason, my hair became straight during that time and also really thin.
At first I was actually glad that my hair became straight, because I never really took care of my curls before. Curly hair products weren’t really accessible back then unless you spent a lot of money, which has thankfully changed now with the curly hair appreciation trend. I also didn’t really have the energy to take care of myself or my curls back then because of depression.
In 2022 I stopped taking the pill, and I started getting a lot of new baby hairs, which made my hair look quite frizzy in places. A few months ago I also cut myself a wolf cut, and my bangs kept curling, so I kept straightening them while the rest of my hair stayed mostly straight or at most wavy. Even when I let my hair air-dry, the bangs were extremely curly while the rest stayed wavy/straight.
2 weeks ago I got curious and tried a curly hair routine, and surprisingly my hair actually became quite curly, just the back didn’t really curl. Then three days ago I cut my hair even shorter, and it has improved a lot.
The thing is, because the back of my hair doesn’t curl as much as the rest, and I think that if I don’t use hair products even the back wouldn’t curl (at least that’s my assumption, since I haven’t really air-dried my hair without doing anything for a long time, back then I would either blow-dry it straight or nowadays immediately use curly hair products), I’m struggling a lot with imposter syndrome.
I KNOW I had curly hair a few years ago, but over the past years it has become so ingrained in my mind that I have straight hair that it’s hard not to feel like I’m “forcing” curls.
The only thing that helps a bit is that my hair keeps the curls overnight without them falling apart (the two pictures are from this morning without any refresh), but then the voice in my head comes back saying, “Without hair products your hair at the back would barely curl/wave.”
What’s your opinion, and how do you deal with imposter syndrome? I sometimes feel ashamed when I see other curly-haired people in public because I feel like I’m fake af.