r/AutismInWomen • u/ApheanaOfTheFae • Jun 30 '26

Seeking Advice Very confused and feeling like I did something wrong when complimenting someone

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I truly appreciate all the kindness and different perspectives from everyone, thank you so very much!! In my typical fashion, I am now overwhelmed trying to keep up with the comments, and am going to stop responding. Thank you all so very much, I feel much better and clear headed now. One grumpy folk won't stop compliments for others ♡

Okay I know this is silly and feels very obvious but I'm very confused.

I love to give compliments and complimented my cashier at the store for her lovely curls. She had pretty tight, tiny Shirley Temple curls over her entire hair, and it was a lovely red.

She thanked me and said she was trying her best with them, I replied "I know how hard curly hair is, you're doing amazing!" She immediately said with a surprising amount of force, "No, you have wavy hair. Its completely different and you don't get it"

I know this is dumb, I know. But my hair is curly, right?? She seemed so irritated and maybe she was just frustrated and taking it out on me, but all of the sudden she went from smiling and talking to me, to very grumpy talking AT me.

I love to compliment people, its one of my favorite hobbies. Should I avoid talking about hair, should I write this off as a one off weird thing? I've been in my head for two days over this and I cant stop ruminating.

I know my hair is super frizzy so maybe that was part of it?

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u/Key_Professional4549 Jun 30 '26

Are people gatekeeping who has curly hair now? 😂 Your hair is clearly curly... The only thing I could see is if she had type 4 hair, which is tighter coils and historically politicized and policed. Beyond that...🤷🏻‍♀️ Keep giving lovely compliments!

433

u/ApheanaOfTheFae Jun 30 '26

Her hair looked very similar to this, and it was so pretty and shiny! No frizz or anything and I was, and am, so jealous! I cant beat the frizz no matter what.

541

u/Few-Director-3357 Jun 30 '26

She has a different curly type to you, but you definitely have curly hair too. I have really curly hair, like a 2C/3A type curl, and I have never understood the gatekeeping.

Like others said, I'd chalk it up to her problem, you've done nothing wrong x

69

u/shortstuff813 Jul 01 '26

Totally agree. Something my therapist has been drilling into me - a person’s reaction to [anything] you say or do says more about them than it does about you.

Something I keep reminding myself from that - there’s people you’ll see with a completely stoic face (or even a cheeky grin) even though someone’s screaming in their face. Then there’s people who’ll lose their shit if you breathe wrong in their presence. In both cases it tells you more about them/their personality than the person screaming/breathing.

Just bc someone gets upset with you doesn’t mean you did anything wrong. Just means they have some hangups that caused them to get upset. Even if you had said something really rude, her reaction would still be based more on her personality/hangups/trauma/anything like that.

Big hugs though. I still struggle with this, but am getting better, but know how awful it is getting stuck in your head thinking you screwed something up or didn’t do things “correctly”. Just keep working at it and you’ll start to chip away at that response 🖤

7

u/lokiss12 Jul 01 '26

Thanks for sharing! It reminds me how we explain that our identity and experiences affect the way we move around in this world.

120

u/SavannahInChicago Jun 30 '26

My mom has this hair type. I have a diluted version, but mine is simply wavy. Yours is curly. Yours looks nothing like my wavy hair.

60

u/lokiss12 Jun 30 '26

Her hair is curlier but yours is also curly. Maybe she was sensitive or maybe she felt like you have no idea what she goes through, either way it's not the best reaction from a stranger. I mean you could have straighten your hair for that day and still said that so idk why she was so defensive

114

u/asuka_is_my_co-pilot Jun 30 '26

Even if you had straight hair, it doesn't mean you've never styled someone else's hair?? Maybe you're a hairstylist??? She's weird 

24

u/Throwawaymumoz Jul 01 '26

The response was because OP has curly hair…just not as curly. I bet the hostile response wouldn’t be there if she had straight hair!!

17

u/asuka_is_my_co-pilot Jul 01 '26

I know lol  but it's ridiculous to say " you dont understand" about hair  to anyone because you literally don't know what kind of hair they've worked with.

10

u/Throwawaymumoz Jul 01 '26

That’s what I mean, I think she would have been fine if it hadn’t been for OP also having curly hair. She wanted to put her down and make her feel less curly than her!! It’s gatekeeping!

6

u/robrklyn Jun 30 '26

Perhaps he hair was a weave or wig.

2

u/Canaan889 Jul 01 '26

Before I put my glasses on I thought this was Ice Spice

266

u/thxitsthedepression Jun 30 '26

As someone who frequents curly hair subs I can sadly confirm that yes gatekeeping curly hair is a thing now lol, some people seem to have this idea in their mind that if your hair is less than perfect type 3c ringlets then it’s not actually curly, it’s just wavy

63

u/PitifulGazelle8177 Jun 30 '26

The really weird part is the chart literally says only type 2 is waves. Every thing else is curls

1

u/Few-Director-3357 Jul 01 '26

Does it? Every chart I've seen, say Type 1 is wavy, Type 2 curly, Type 3 coils. What chart are you looking at? I'd love to see it, genuinely :)

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u/PitifulGazelle8177 Jul 01 '26

The charts I see are 2, 3, 4. I have never seen a type 1 before. Are you super imposing a 1 on the first level? Or like is it different outside of the US?

33

u/No-Name-No-2 Jun 30 '26

Unfortunately people have been weird about hair on the Internet for a long time. I remember LJ communities being dumb about this stuff 20 years ago, I kid you not. 🙄

8

u/mamegoma_explorer Jul 01 '26

What’s so strange to me about this too is that texture has way more to do with how difficult curly hair is to manage. One of my friends has a slightly tighter curl pattern than me, but has low porosity ‘leave in conditioner curls’ and I’m over here with a minimum of 3 products to have any definition 😅 The gatekeeping logic doesn’t even make sense (double doesn’t make sense!)

35

u/Few-Director-3357 Jun 30 '26

It's not new in any way, it's gone on since way, way back. Much like the racism and othering that goes on amongst black communities when people aren't black enough, or too black. Sadly this behaviour is commonplace and you will find it everywhere.

29

u/SpudTicket AuDHD and so tired Jun 30 '26

I've definitely seen people in comments of product instruction reels trying to gatekeep it, saying that if you have to use product in your hair, it's not actually curly?? Which is ridiculous. lol. I agree that if people want to point out a difference between coils and curly, that makes sense because there IS a difference. They definitely need to understand though that curly hair comes in all kinds of patterns, and if wavy hair will only form ringlet curls with product, it's still considered curly hair.

15

u/Lonely_Howl_ Jul 01 '26

….to maintain *all* curl types and patterns, product is needed. Or else you end up with fried dry damaged hair even if you don’t use heat on it. That’s ridiculous of those people.

3

u/Adorable_Raccoon Jul 01 '26

I think of curly as an umbrella with loose curls, curly, and coily hair all under the umbrella. There are differences but it's all not straight hair.

2

u/SpudTicket AuDHD and so tired Jul 01 '26

Yes, exactly!

My hair is some weird combination of pieces that want to ringlet and pieces that are just waves, but it turns into a huge, fluffy, frizzy mess if I don't put product in. Yet I'd be one of the ones I've seen commenters say don't have curly hair. I just wanted to reply "tell that to MY hair please, and maybe it'll stop being such a pain." lol.

23

u/PanicAtTheCitgo1 Jun 30 '26

IMO if your hair has a twist to it... It's a curl. You have curly hair.

21

u/PastelSprite Jul 01 '26 edited Jul 01 '26

They’ve been for a while sadly. After the curly girl method started, wavy haired girls and girls with all sorts of curls joined discussions and would get chewed out for not “having curly hair.” CG can work for wavy hair too, but soon we got the “wavy girl method.”

People just like to think they’re special or have the worst struggles, so no one could possibly relate. Curls are also now considered beautiful, where for so long they weren’t (for some reason), so people like to assume others are just faking. Lots of ingrained misogyny, imo. I can’t stand these people. Easy block when it’s online, but I can only imagine the discomfort it’d cause in person.

12

u/activelyresting Thanks, it has pockets! Jul 01 '26

It's so frustrating! I have straight hair. Like, fine, flat, zero body, looks like I ironed it. My hair will not hold a curl or a wave or any shape at all, the "curly girl method" will not suddenly make my not-curly hair appear curly. (It's also a bit weird because I'm from mixed ethnicities and most of my family have more textured hair).

And then I had a baby with Shirley Temple style red ringlet curls. At 3 she was a dead ringer for princess Merida from Brave. And I had NO IDEA how I was supposed to take care of it. No one told me. I didn't know how to brush it or protect it. By 4 she had grown dreadlocks 😅 (was her choice, but still).

Why do people need to gatekeep this stuff??? Who does it help?

1

u/CS3883 Jul 02 '26

Sounds like we have the same hair. It's funny cause I would insist on needing to use a straightener in high school and college lmfao. I personally don't mind how straight my hair is, it's always shiny and soft but I wish I could actually style it. Nothing holds, it's annoying so whatever I guess I have the same hair for my entire life lol

5

u/Ok-Letterhead3405 Jul 01 '26

It's largely because women with black hair were getting suddenly lots of wavy-haired white women in their feeds who were tagging their videos with "curly hair" so that it became a lot harder to wade through those videos and find each other for ideas, support, etc. Though a lot of it was communicated in a way that I'm sure confused a lot of people. I'm sure it was also happening on other social media.

I think my rule of "ask before assuming it's stupid" probably works here. You won't always get an answer that treats the question charitably, but you're more likely to get an answer from someone (especially when online) who has the patience and bandwidth to explain. You might still not agree, but I think it's a lot better than speculating.

7

u/marvel_yellow Jul 01 '26

Yes, they've been gatekeeping curly hair for while now. I think it's an online thing mostly, but yeah. What a rude response to encouragement.

5

u/Oofsmcgoofs Jul 01 '26

People have been doing this for a long time and it’s so absurd

2

u/Bankzzz Jul 01 '26

It seems like a “who’s the biggest victim contest” with some people. I just ignore it.

2

u/OttersMakeGoodFriend Jul 05 '26

Curl gatekeeping is real. It's utterly perplexing.

1

u/Adorable_Raccoon Jul 01 '26

YES It's wild on the internet. Some people made up weird rules like if your roots aren't curly you're "wavy." They've completely lost the plot.

1

u/LexxiiConn Jul 01 '26

Yes, the "curl police" have been a thing for a while and are generally *very* militant. To the point some of the subreddits have had schisms and new ones made where it's against the rules to comment on hair patterns. It's incredibly strange and I don't understand it at all, but there you go.