who would win:

the transfemme urge to have long flowy beautiful hair

vs.

the autistic urge to not have a long flowy sensory nightmare attached to my head at all times

@kasdeya interesting, the long hair for me is nice to stim with and brush and stuff

@kasdeya tying it back helps for me but i have to tie it so i don't feel it pulling

@kasdeya loose braids and buns are a great way to deal with the sensory nightmare until it grows long enough to no longer be tickling the neck, and by that point, the weight of it is kind of soothing I think. my vote’s on long hair (I’m not biased at all, I promise)

@theking it drives me absolutely crazy anytime it gets in my face and especially my mouth T_T and the absolute worst is when it sticks to my body in the shower

@kit I wish I could! T_T even if I tie it up, I have to undo that in the shower and it sticks to my body, and individual hairs end up sticking to my skin everywhere and it drives me crazy. also back when I had long hair, every single time I leaned forward the hair would be all over my face and I hated it lol

@kasdeya ah, yeah, leaning forward is a nightmare if you’re not a permanent hat wearer like me, there is that

I actually considered dreads once because I just hate haircuts that much and committed to never have one again, thinking that dreads would be lower maintenance and easier to control, but that was a horrible idea for a lot of reasons. I’ve been living with long hair and wearing a hat for long enough now that I guess the smaller sensory issues have faded into the background with everything else, the hair sticking to me in the shower definitely used to bother me a lot more than it does now

living with cats for my whole life has also admittedly done a lot to desensitize me to my own loose hairs floating around

@kit oh - I didn’t even consider how a hat would effect things! yeah I bet that makes having long hair a lot better

what was so bad about having dreads though?

@kasdeya from what I heard at the time at least, they’re pretty low maintenance once they’re fully grown in, but they’re very high maintenance to get to that point, and I just plain didn’t have the energy for that level of self care even back then, before The Fatigue™ set in

I also lack melanin and as I grew up, I got a lot less comfortable with the idea just for that reason

bonus: I think I’d look pretty terrible with them to boot, actually. but I can rock braids, and I’ve figured out how to tie them easy enough that it doesn’t feel like too much of a chore

@kasdeya long flowy hair ... That you can turn into a pony tail

There is def some friction with going between short hairstyle and long hairstyle. I feel anything with a hairband at-most is acceptable.

@ilobmirt hehe, even with a ponytail I still get loose hairs all over me in the bath when I have long hair and it drives me crazy. but I did try that in the past!

unfortunately every time I tied a ponytail it always ended up as a low ponytail and I could never figure out how people get a nice medium-height ponytail lol

@kasdeya hehe this is a struggle in our headmates. I prefer shorter hair or a braid, Anya wants long and loose, Purpose wants ponytail. Carbon likes braids too

@kasdeya @ilobmirt after having my mom tie my hair up once, the secret seems to be: tie it tighter than you think is the limit lol.

i'll stick with low ponytails i guess, i really don't like how tight a high ponytail has to be to stay secure 💀