Red/ginger hair-what’s the big deal

[Flowersintheattica]

Toddler Dd has red/ginger/whatever colour you want to call it, and blue eyes. It’s the topic of conversation almost constantly among people-friends and strangers. It’s curly also, which adds to the hysteria more 😅
Dp and I both dark haired and people can’t seem to understand how this happened

Why is it such a big deal? In a good and/or bad way?

@CorrBlimeyGG

because it's in minority, differences are always picked out

This.

Some of the comments on here are no better than the people you've met. They fetishise it. It's creepy.

I agree strongly with this too.

Our 3 year old is a red head, non of the rest of us are, we've no idea where he gets it from, if I had a £1 for evey time someone mentioned his hair I'd be a millionaire by now!

I used to get stopped when we were out with ds when he was in a pushchair all the time! Ginger curls and a huge smile on his face all the time! M&S returns queue between Christmas & New Year was his favourite place he got so many compliments!

It's gorgeous and unusual. Unless you go to whinfell Center parcs then it's pretty normal!

Its funny how it goes.
I too was bullied relentlessly my whole childhood for my curly red hair.
People told me I would love it one day but I couldnt believe then. Got to 15 and dyed it almost black and straightened it every day.

Im back to my original colour now,stopped straightening it and now people literally call out compliments to me in the street!
Only took about 30 years for the world to get used to my hair. But all those old ladies from my childhood were right..eventually I fell in love with it.

@Gingernaut So interesting, Dp and I are both dark brown haired, so it was quite rare we had a redhead 👩‍🦰 All blue eyes though.

She has light eyebrows & eyelashes too, do children generally keep this hair colour or may it change? Her hair colour is light-medium, I can’t ever see her being dark haired like us.
Also do kids generally keep curls? No idea where she gets that from either 😅 mine has a slight wave, but easily blow dries straight, does go wavier, almost curls when wet. Hers is so curly though!

I really hope she doesn’t get bullied, any tips for how to approach this? 🤷🏻‍♀️
I still can’t get how people could bully for it, it’s literally just another hair colour.

Sorry @Flowersintheattica I don't think you as a parent can approach it!

What I mean is if she gets bullied cross that bridge when you come to it if the issue arises. But it might not and I wouldn't have a conversation pre-empting it or anything as I could imagine this being very stressful for her.

I was bullied once, fleetingly, and no comments were made again. I never told my parents but if it had continued I would have.

@Maria53 Sorry, no I meant to increase her self esteem and have her see how beautiful her hair is etc

@Flowersintheattica If she’s bullied, and I sincerely hope she’s not, take her concerns seriously, don’t tell her to just ignore the bullies or say but your hair is beautiful, that’s not helpful. I think part of the reason my bullying went on so long is that my parents and the school just didn’t believe me, they just thought I was being too sensitive and it was my fault for getting upset.

@TheRebelle Oh for sure, I’d take it very seriously! So sorry you had to go through that, people can be such arseholes.
She’s a strong character, so I’m hoping that will help, she’d likely punch them if they started 🙈

[quote Flowersintheattica]@Maria53 Sorry, no I meant to increase her self esteem and have her see how beautiful her hair is etc[/quote]
Ok well OP, please don't take offence at this but...I feel you're maybe being a bit intense about it all and just need to let her move through the world without worrying so much about controlling how people react to her. And also know that girls don't usually get such a hard time.

My mother did occasionally tell me my hair was beautiful, alongside other family members. This didn't mean an awful lot to me, I cared more when strangers commented! Actually I had my last compliment from a colleague last week and felt a million dollars after .

Oh by the way...saw your comment above, my parents are both brunette but my grandfather's were both redheads! Is that the case for either of her grandparents?

@Maria53 🤣Yes, am probably being too intense! I do worry about bullying though, but will keep that worry to myself and not project it into her if you see what I mean.
No redheads as we know, but my grandma was sort of dark with some auburn, mine used to have auburn bits in as a teen, but no full redheads that we know of. Lots of Irish and Scottish in our family though, especially Irish on my side.

Growing up in the 60s and 70s I did get quite a lot of comments (complimentary ones) on my strawberry blonde hair, it really was red-gold and looking back at photos of me then I am amazed at the colour. It never bothered me though, and I was certainly never bullied over it.

I have 3 red haired / blue eyed DC and even in Ireland this is unusual. Red heads more commonly have brown eyes.
I get stopped everywhere I go! 👩‍🦰

Because it’s not as common as brown I guess. Or mousy or dark.

One of my children has very blonde curly hair and that gets mentioned quite a bit because it’s very light - not white blonde but light golden blonde. It’s lovely.
The other is auburn. Their hair also gets commented on quite a lot.

I have Amber blonde hair. It’s long and I have a shit ton of it. 90% of the time it looks like dog shit bc I’m too lazy to do anything but on the days it’s styled I get a lot of comments. It’s not unusual as such but it’s not common that every 3rd woman in Tesco has my colour / length.

I don’t know how I feel about people commenting - in an ideal world the physical wouldn’t really matter would it. But we live in a very visual world, it’s literally our first impression of someone, so if they have a unique feature it will stand out to us. Hair is something that feels safe to comment on - same as eye colour. You don’t comment on someone’s extraordinarily massive norks or bulbous nose. There must be features that society sees as fair game for commentary.

If your mum has red hair, you and any siblings you have, all carry 1 copy for red hair and can pass that over to any children you have. 😁

I was born with bright orange hair, which darkened to the shade you saw in my picture a couple of pages back.

Babies tend to have baby curls which grow out after a while, so don't count on the curls growing up.

My facial hair is white - I have to dye my eyebrows and eyelashes for people to see them.

Although my menopausal beard is roughly the colour of my head hair

My dd has red hair, green eyes, pale skin, but long dark lashes and dark eyebrows so quite unusual combo. People always go on about her hair too. My other dd has more brown/auburn hair she's gotten darker as yrs go on but kind of unusual too ppl comment on her too.
Ppl are obsessed with needing to comment to red/ginger hair ! But always say nice things

but my grandma was sort of dark with some auburn, mine used to have auburn bits in as a teen That'll be where you got the gene from and your husband obviously got it from someone too. Like you ,my grandmother was dark auburn but both my parents have brown eyes and dark hair.
Straight hair too.
My curls as so coily and I'm very ginger with green eyes look nothing like them

The only advice I have is to not make a deal of her hair and keep telling her how nice it is, just let it be her hair.
Others will compliment her a lot.

Dont overly speak about it to her - it may just make her aware everyone is speaking about her 'different hair'' .
It did for me, it was bad enough having kids at school,on the street and strangers always talking about it but to then have my mum and aunts/family members always talking about ''where does she get it from?'' ''its getting brighter!'' comments etc... it just irritated me and made me feel like everyone was looking at my 'different hair'' even if they were complimentary.

As soon as I could change it,I did. Just so people would stop talking about it

I've fallin in love with it again as I'm no longer an awkward teenager or insecure 20 something.

I had hoped the world had moved on and red hair wasn't such a huge deal or talking point anymore there you go,it seems it is.

Wasn't the plot line in the da vinci code that the red heads are direct descendants of Jesus Christ? I quite like that.

My dd has red hair, green eyes, pale skin, but long dark lashes and dark eyebrows so quite unusual combo.
ah!! This is me ! I've never met another one
The most common question I'm asked is ''How come you have red hair and dark eyebrows/lashes''??! ....I.. dont know ???
Good to know there are more pale skined, red headed, green eyed people with very dark eyebrows

Notimeforaname

You are not alone! My DD has beautiful red hair, pale skin but very dark brows and lashes.

Her eyes are brown though.

@Whatagreytdoggo My mum has blonde hair

My son has deep red hair and the most striking bright blue eyes its a beautiful combination even dh sister who is ginger and has blue eyes couldn't believe how blue his eyes were. Dh is ginger with Hazel eyes. DS gets his eyes from me.

I don't get why people always act surprised about it to be completely honest!

Her hair sounds gorgeous!

My cousin is black. His parents are white. They did actually have a DNA test done and he is 1000% theirs. Just a throwback gene.