A trip to the public hairdressers!

As I promised, I would write this post about my trip to the hairdressers.

Pretty much all my life we've had family appointments to the hairdressers and driven out to this lady's house to cut our hair (she has a cabin in her garden). Before her, we had a mobile hairdresser come to our house. It wasn't until recently that I struggled to get an appointment (me being a girl I really needed my roots touching up! - Yep, I'm not a natural blonde I'm afraid!) So yeah, I'm quite impatient and couldn't wait 4 weeks, so I booked an appointment at the local hairdressers.

I'm not too keen on public hairdressers. I don't hate them, I'm just not used to the environment and find it hard to hear sometimes. It is completely different from my own house or the cabin in our hairdresser's garden! This time I went by myself as my Mum was working. I know that sounds really bad as I'm 20 years old and rely on Mum. I have to be honest, my confidence going to new environments is quite low. I often rely on my Mum, my boyfriend or my friends to come with me and help me out with something. This time I had to go by myself.

Luckily for me, the guy who cut and coloured my hair happened to have a brother who was deaf! Brilliant! It was difficult at some points to have a conversation, because obviously he was behind me and I had to look in the mirror to lip read him. It is actually quite difficult from a distance.  Especially as he often walked out of view of the mirror. Also, I was sat right by the door and because it was a hot day, they propped the door open. The hairdressers was also situated by a busy road. As you can imagine, every time a car drove past...ahhhh!  Haha!

Apart from all of that, it was generally ok and not so daunting as what I thought it would be. I would definitely go back in future and book the guy who did my hair that day! I'm very happy with it too :-)

I just wanted to write this post to raise awareness of how difficult and daunting it can be for a severely deaf individual to do simple things, such as going to the hairdressers. I rely a lot on other people most occasions, I know as a 20 year old people would judge me for that, but I am improving in confidence. Two great examples, are going to the hairdressers by myself and having the confidence to explain my hearing to them and travelling on public transport by myself now which is difficult at points (train announcements, buses etc.) It will take time for my confidence to develop, but I will get there one day!

Has anyone had any similar experiences? :-)