The Things You Learn

I have no idea how to properly care for a little girl's hair.

I'm damn sure better at it now. When I first started spending time with my daughter as a 'single father' over a year ago, I was completely unprepared. My ex-wife had always done the 'mom' stuff, and I did the dad stuff. When there was suddenly no longer a mom around during the time that I had her, things got a spot more complicated.

The hardest part of the transition was learning how to spend time with her effectively. I spent so much time missing her, that it eventually turned into a kind of anxiousness. I would get increasingly antsy as Brenley Time^tm approached. I often felt a bit ashamed of this, because sometimes I wanted to hide in a hole and skip my weekend. I never did that of course, but it was a symptom of the issues I was dealing with as part of my new role in her life. Having overcome that and being able to truly savor my time with her has been a tremendous journey.

Anyway, one of the most visible aspects of this, to me, is her hair. BB (Baby Brenley, an old nickname) has beautiful blonde-turning-brown hair that is parted on the left. I am completely inept when it comes to putting it up into a pony tail or anything, but I have learned to care for it.

Initially, I would take her out of the bath, towel dry, and comb. I tried to let it dry before putting her to bed, but it always ended up crazy in the morning. I eventually bought a brush and wielded it against the Hair Demon. Things got better. One night, when Renee was in town, I borrowed her hair dryer. Brenley was afraid of it when it ran on high, but could tolerate it somewhat on low. This made things a bit better.

Let's just skip to the end-game: I now have learned how to properly dry and brush my daughter's hair. At three, she's not very good at telling me how to do something, but she's an expert at telling me when I do something wrong. I've even managed to master the art of using the brush while blow drying, and getting knots out painlessly.

So, for any of you newly christened single dads out there, stick to the grind. They'll help you.