The Irrational Thoughts A Brunette Has When Her Ex Starts Dating A Blonde
There are two types of girls in the world: blondes and brunettes (and gingers too, but they’re so special and rare; they’re in a glorious category of their own).
I’m a brunette. I’m also American, British, female, Caucasian and Jewish.
But for reasons unbeknownst to me, the label I identify the most closely and fiercely with is BRUNETTE.
It’s almost spiritual. My soul is as dark as my hair.
The color of our hair dictates to the world who we are: Blondes are accessible, whimsical, carefree, fun and wildly flirtatious.
Brunettes are exotic, intimidating, sexy, full of secrets and blazingly dramatic. Blondes are a party. Brunettes are theater.
Some people are born deeply brunette but feel hopelessly blonde on the inside -- and vice versa.
These displaced souls are able to find peace by dying their hair in order to feel more comfortable in their skin, and I’m grateful for the slew of talented hairdressers who can safely bring hair dreams into fruition.
Every woman deserves to have the hair color that feels the most her, you know?
Whether our natural color is platinum blonde or raven black is irrelevant -- we embody our hair color as it appears to the outer world.
Which leads us to the age-old rivalry: blondes vs. brunettes
It's no secret blondes and brunettes have been engaged in a twisted competition since the beginning of time. It's as pathetic as it is true.
As a brunette, there is a sweeping sense of betrayal when we find ourselves rejected for a blonde.
Just watching a mere crush so little as innocently flirt with a blonde babe is enough to make our blood temperatures rise to that of a hot and dangerous boil.
My ex started dating a blonde more recently than I care to admit, and let me tell you, the whole ordeal sent me flying, face first, down an unexpected emotional roller coaster with no seatbelt keeping me safe.
When my romantic partner broke up with me and started to date a blonde (I know -- the f*cking nerve), I was gutted in a way far deeper than I would have been, had the other woman been a familiar brunette.
It's a different sting when your ex starts dating someone opposite to you.
We, as brunettes, become flooded with a slew of irrational, accusatory, undoubtedly insane thoughts when we watch a former lover embark on a romantic excursion with a blonde:
We deem our whole relationship an ugly lie.
When we’re in long-term, committed relationships that span out over the course of at least a year, it’s safe to assume we are our partners' “type,” right?
They’ve put up with our sh*t for a solid 12 months; doesn’t that say something sort of profound?
We are under the assumption that once we leave our shiny brunette hairs in our partners’ beds, we're safe to assume they won’t ever go back to blonde.
I mean, after they’ve had a taste of our sexy, dark, mysterious prowess, how is it possible for them to transport the isle of blonde?
And BAM -- faster than the speed of sound, it happens: The twisted triad of Instagram, Facebook and Snapchat start teeming with pictures of our partners with their new blonde babes hanging all over them.
Stomach flips ensue.
Our inner dialogue is reduced to the following:
"But you LIKED me!?” How could someone like complicated, difficult-yet-fierce brunette me, and then oh so quickly go for something oh so very different? “YOU SAID BRUNETTES WERE YOUR TYPE!"
It’s akin to being a compassionate vegan your whole life and, overnight, turning into a bloodthirsty, raw-beef-consuming carnivore with no grilled chicken transition in between.
Was the whole relationship a farce?! Were they lying about liking/loving us the whole time? Which leads us to irrational fear number two…
We wonder if our exes had been cheating.
No kid wakes up one morning liking the taste of red wine. It takes time for the palette to develop a keen taste for red wine.
The kid who claims to instantly love his first sip of red wine has been secretly drinking underneath his Spider-man sheets since early grade school.
The same goes for the person who embarks on the dramatic switch of blonde to brunette, right?
If someone has the ability to switch so quickly to something so vastly different, surely he or she was dabbling in it behind the scenes right? Right?
We question the societal standards of beauty.
Brunettes have the utmost confidence in their striking, somber features.
We take a lot of pride in attaining a slightly edgier, more dangerous appearance than our blonde counterparts.
That is -- until the foul moment we find ourselves rejected for a flaxen-haired, fair maiden.
And ever so quickly, our self-esteem is brutally ripped from our scalps, and we begin to question the power of our brunette-ness.
The insecurities pour in at once: Does society deem pale-haired, bubbling blondes the only datable women?
Are we brunettes too severe, too harsh, too mysterious, too sad, too sexy, too angry and too troublesome?
The questions invade the surface of our minds like roaches to a leftover can of beer.
We begin to glorify blondes.
This is when we take a dramatic turn in the warped darkness our minds have become. We begin to silently wish we were blondes instead of brunettes.
Life must be so much easier as a blonde! Everyone is kind to blondes; the world is a harsh, cold, cruel place for brunettes!
We are the great misunderstood souls of the modern age -- reminiscent of artists who are only appreciated after death (and who has time for that?).
Our exes are clearly dating blondes because we were too f*cked up and difficult.
We scared them off an entire breed of woman so fiercely that they were inclined to go the opposite direction.
If only we could attain the free-spirited, natural sweetness and effervescence of a blonde. If only. But then again... maybe we could?
We go blonde (if only in our minds).
Now that we’re vehemently convinced everything we could ever want out of life would effortlessly fall into our laps if we were blonde beach babes (have I mentioned we've become delusional?) -- we start to endlessly wonder what life would be like as one. We are stuck in a perpetual platinum daydream.
This epidemic touches even the most die-hard brunettes (if only in secret) after we’ve been ditched for a blonde.
We start to envision what we would look like as a blonde; some will go as far as to get a consultation at a salon while others (me) actually subject their brunette locks to the harsh chemicals of bleach to achieve blonde hair.
We return back to brunette and back to reality.
It's a poignant moment of great clarity when a girl realizes she's lost her sh*t.
It's a sobering moment (hopefully it occurs before we've traumatized our hair with the toxicities of bleach) when we gaze into our reflection in the bathroom mirror and conclude we are brunettes, and we are fabulous. Take it or leave it.
The bare-faced truth is this: Our ex is with someone else. Someone who’s not us.
Let's get real: That's what's really bothering us -- the hair color is irrelevant. We are merely using the blonde girl as a pawn in our twisted jealousy game.
Fueled by our newfound epiphany, the real healing begins.
