Should i let 13 year old dd wear false lashes to school?

[EyelashConundrum]

Dd is 13, and has started wearing stick on lashes to school. They are not super heavy spidery ones, but they do change the way her eyes look. She bought them with her own money in town with friends.

Im really torn between letting her wear them (school allows it, all her friends wear them and she obviously wants to fit in, she's 13 and is trying to find her own style, etc).

But then false eyelashes just seem so unnecessary for 13 year olds who are going to spend the day sitting in maths and geography. And my heart breaks that modern beauty standards make her feel the need to conform and wear this level of adornment.

Its a choice between being the authoritarian mother who forbids it because its just excessive in my opinion. But equally i remember being 13 and arguing with my parents that my thick orange foundation was an absolute necessity and they couldn't possibly understand what its like to be a teenager.

Ive allowed voting

YABU - Let her wear them. Its not doing any harm, doesn't disrupt her learning and helps her to feel confident.

YANBU - Absolutely no way should i let my 13 year old leave the house wearing these ridiculous things.

Let her wear them. I don't understand what the problem is.

I'm surprised school allow it. As a they do I would her wear them, Save your energy for bigger battles!

Nope

I voted YANBU as I don’t think you are being, but if school allows it, you’re fighting a losing battle.

I think many pp saying ‘pick your battles’ and ‘the novelty will soon wear off’ are right.

Crazy that the school allows it. In my school they have to take them off or sit in isolation until they do, same for fake nails.

This is exactly what DS says to me . As much as I hate to admit it most of the time he’s right it’s ‘not that deep’.

Teenagers have always pushed the envelope and horrified their parents with their beauty/fashion sense. I was a foundation lipped pencil thin eyebrowed teen of the noughties and my mother was aghast.

Teenagers are trying to discover their own identity and this is part of it.

My DD (13) wears them. I think they look daft. She doesn't, and her friends don't.

I can't bring myself to get worked up. Much much much much bigger things to worry about in life.

It's a fashion. It'll fade. Let it play out.

Not donated. Girls pinned down in the street and shorn

Ah, I'd let her. I remember the orange foundation stage well 😂

I think it's too young.

But the school allows it, and I made a couple of parenting decisions that I think are handy here

a) never get in to a major fight about something that comes off easily
b) I'll send them out of the house dressed to conform to school standards, but if they then get in to trouble (because they modify - like rolling up skirts - or because there's been some new edict) the it's Their Own Silly Fault and they take the consequences.

So I'd tell her that I didn't really approve, but I wouldn't stop her.

I think that sort of enforcing bollocks is ridiculous, and makes me glad I don't live in England, which at times seem to be obsessed with how pupils look as much as their actual education.

I literally said "fuck no" out loud reading this...

However if she's been wearing them, you can hardly take a strong stance on it now can you.

No
She's 13
She's at school

When I was at secondary school in the 1970s the fashion was for 'flicks' at the front of your hair. A sort of long fringe you turned back on itself and welded with gallons of Elnet hairspray. Green eye shadow and blue eyeshadow were the colours of choice. Everyone did it. I wasn't allowed to. I was bullied throughout senior school because I didn't look like everyone else. Teens want/ need to fit in. It makes life so much easier given all the other shite they have to deal with. If they don't look like giant draft excluders on her eyes and everyone else is doing I then I would let her. Fight about smoking and drinking. Eyelashes are not a hill to die on.

Well, she's worn them for a week. Dh drives her to school in the morning and didn't notice them 🙄. So she thought it was a-okay with us.

I only noticed towards the end of last week - before that i naively thought it was a new super lash lengthening mascara or something. But then I'm mostly clueless when it comes to makeup.

I agree with pp who said if the school allow it then you’re fighting a losing battle.

I was at secondary in the late 90s/early noughties and was also a fully paid up member of the orange dream matte mousse brigade. We were supposed to wear these godawful nylon gym skirts for PE, I didn’t even own one and used to wear my Kappa trackies with the poppers down the legs. Nail polish was banned in my school, we used to sit on the back row in maths painting French tips onto our nails with tippex 😂

She’s taking the p**s, not being serious! 🤣

It's really nothing to get worked up about, it's part of growing up. I was dying my hair all different colours, getting piercings, wearing make up etc
Some false eyelashes can look nice. Not the big fluttery ones that make you look like you're about to take off though, but you've said they're not those type. Just let her get on with it op

It's called a joke. 🙄

Yep - and what's wrong with that?! Nothing at all

Shwoooooosh! <<<<< the noise made if she gets to close to a Bunsen burner wearing false lashes!

I'm surprised none of us went up from the amount of hairspray we had on

Not the hill to die on. Just say you'd rather she didn't as she looks stunning without them on. But she is obviously wanting some independence and if school allow it - let her exert a little control over her own body. She's not asking for a tattoo or a belly piercing (which would be a hard no from me!)

Expanding on my pound shop bratz dolls theme…
Apart from it being low hanging fruit I decided that I’d much rather my dds experimented and made mistakes in broad daylight in the company of their peers than at a club aged 18. And school can and do enforce rules about short skirts, heavy make up etc. Again in the context of so many battles over screen time, curfews, drinking and worse I felt appearance wasn’t a hill I’d die on.

Definitely not that deep.

My 15yo wears individual false eyelashes under her lashes rather than over and sleeps in them. Idk how she does it as she leaves them on for a few days. 😱 Dd isn’t supposed to wear falsies to school but these aren’t actually much more dramatic than a few coats of mascara.

I’m a pick your battles parent. The (recent) battles I want to win are 1) no, you cannot stay over at a boy’s house even if you have no intention d having sex because you’re 15 and 2) you’re coming to bed, not staying up with drunk people at the wedding we went to yesterday evening (dh and all our side of the family were already in bed and I was desperate for my bed).