How do you deal with natural taper?

[Entangled]

For the first time in my life, my hair is long enough and in good enough condition that I can notice a natural taper not based on damage beginning. It's actually a bit unnerving, because very tapered hair in my head is always linked to the bleached blondes with very damaged hair in my area, so taper has come to equal damage and thus is not desirable--and even"you should cut." Most of the world around me has no clue about natural taper, as they've only seen false terminal induced taper, so once again, taper equals a haircut needed. For someone who wants extra long hair, that's a little ominous. Extra long hair (like knee length) is usually seen as crazy, and the taper usually visible leads people to say "she NEEDS to cut it. Look how dead it is" type comments. So that's the cultural barrier. Even if I know it's false, I know long hair with minimal taper will be more acceptable than hair without it, and my hair's never yet been long enough to attract negative attention. On the other hand, taper for a longhair is a reminder that hair has a terminal length. Most hair won't get to classic without some noticeable taper, to my understanding. Even here, untapered hair is seen, for better or worse, the way thick hair is. It wows people a lot more, even if tapered hair is in perfect condition. People notice a braid thick all the way down a lot more favorably than a tapered one, though both are admired (here) and get compliments.

i guess my point here is that I'm noticing for the first time what it means to have long hair, and accepting taper is freaking me out in a small way. It's not like my hair is crazy thin or anything, but I'm beginning to notice that my braid thins towards the bottom, and I want to get to healthy, not fairy-tailed classic in the least and knee as a dream goal. I would love in my life to have floor length hair, but if I'm noticing a taper now, I don't think genetics are in my favor.

How do you come to terms with taper? How do you deal with cultural attitudes around you? Because let's face it, I'm getting nervous about the rude hair comments that come with "abnormally" long hair, which for me is anything past tailbone length. Long enough to sit on really seems to stir up people. I think I can handle it, but I've not yet been on the receiving end. What have been your experiences? And have you been concered about reaching a goal length due to genetics? Does taper concern you, and how do you manage it mentally?

[cathair]

Think about your motivation for growing it. Focus on it. You're growing it for yourself, not other people, right? You know it's healthy, so why should you care what other people think? You probably know more about hair than they do.

If I ever get a comment about my hair is usually about how I need to cut at least a foot off. I have quite extreme taper and FTE. I've become very thick skinned about it, it doesn't bother me I just say no bluntly. Wouldn't make me happy, doesn't make any difference to anyone else's life, so why should I? I am very stubborn about it.

You might get negative comments, extremely long hair will freak some people out. Some people just don't like it, they're allowed to not like it. You do though, so it shouldn't matter to you.

[Linguaphilia]

This is a very interesting thread. I have been thinking about taper a lot, what it means for my terminal length. Itt seems that taper gets less and less the longer you let your hair grow, eventually--look at Gossamer's hair, for example. I hope she's going to chime in, because I wonder whether she had tapered classic length before, even with natural undamaged hair. I also wonder whether the thickness traveling down is mainly because you become more skilled at handling your hair with every year that goes by on the way to extreme lengths.

I want to get to knee length eventually, but only if the end of my braid will be as thick as it is now at classic. I can't stand it any thinner. So taper is a big concern for me.

[Amapola]

I agree with cathair, I'm growing my hair for myself, not anyone else. Anyone at all. I don't ask other people to approve of my favorite thing for breakfast or my favorite color, why would I care what they think about the way I like my hair?

And to tell the truth, taper makes your life a little bit easier with long hair because it's easier to put up and tuck in your ends nice and secure, compared to very thick blunt ends. That's more of a challenge, at least for me, so I am fine with the taper.

For me, no one is going to see my taper anyway, because my hair would tangle unmercifully if I left it down when I'm out and about. That started, for me, about mid-back or waist. I only wear my hair down when I'm going to be in the house for an extended time. I do sometimes wear braids down, but no one has ever said anything to me at all about the taper; all I've gotten is, "Wow! Your hair is so LONG!". :shrug:

Basically, don't worry about what other people think. I have no idea of your age. So I'll just make something up: let's pretend you are 25. What I say to myself is, "I have lived for 25 years without their approval, and done just fine. I don't need their approval to live a good life." and completely forget about any negative comments. I'm happy for them to think whatever they like, but there is no need for them to share it with me.

[lapushka]

Most hair won't get to classic without some noticeable taper, to my understanding. Even here, untapered hair is seen, for better or worse, the way thick hair is. It wows people a lot more, even if tapered hair is in perfect condition. People notice a braid thick all the way down a lot more favorably than a tapered one, though both are admired (here) and get compliments.

I've managed classic without natural taper. It's fake taper as I have layered hair. It is going to take a long time before I naturally taper, I think. It all depends on the hair. No two people are the same in this!

How I deal with it? I just wear it up when I'm up. And down when I go to sleep. That's the way I deal with nasty comments. People just don't see my hair. :shrug:

[EdG]

Don't worry about it.

Hair naturally tapers. For non-trimmers, the hair naturally tapers down to nothing. This is like reaching the end of the rainbow. :)
Ed

[spidermom]

I go back and forth over this, too. I'm noticing more taper right now because I'm at the tail-end (I hope) of a stress shed. Right after I comb my hair, it looks really nice. Within a few minutes, it starts looking very stringy. I haven't had stringy-looking hair since childhood! One minute I want to ignore it and keep growing with only minimal trims. The next minute I want to trim back to thicker ends. I wear it braided most of the time, then pinned up, and the taper isn't that noticeable once I pin it up because the ends of the braid are tucked under thicker areas. That's how I'm dealing with it. I remind myself that I won't be able to tuck the ends under thicker hair if I cut it shorter.

[Mimha]

Hi Entangled.

From the way you expose the matter, I notice some doubts about how you like your taper or not. I mean, do you consider it as "an unavoidable inconvenient" that goes together with very long length ? or do you consider it as part of the natural magical charm of it ? This can make a difference. If you find it somehow unpleasant to your own eyes, your doubts will be echoed by the people's remarks. On the contrary, if you like and cherish your fairytailed ends, you will be far more hermetic to the negative remarks about them. And usually, you will also have much less of them because people usually preferably criticize when they feel a weakness somewhere in your self-confidence.

[Entangled]

Hi Entangled.

From the way you expose the matter, I notice some doubts about how you like your taper or not. I mean, do you consider it as "an unavoidable inconvenient" that goes together with very long length ? or do you consider it as part of the natural magical charm of it ? This can make a difference. If you find it somehow unpleasant to your own eyes, your doubts will be echoed by the people's remarks. On the contrary, if you like and cherish your fairytailed ends, you will be far more hermetic to the negative remarks about them. And usually, you will also have much less of them because people usually preferably criticize when they feel a weakness somewhere in your self-confidence.

Yes, at this point my taper is an "unavoidable inconvenience" for me. I'm trimming regularly, and so at this point I've got two different negative feelings toward taper. One concerns the fact that having taper when I'm not even at tailbone--I would love knee length hair with a blunt hemline, eventually, and this concerns me, as I want to have a long enough terminal length to have a blunt hemline at such lengths. The second negative feeling is my overall dislike of very tapered hair (influenced by the culture around me), at least on mine, which is not wavy enough or curly to make the taper visually attractive to me on my hair. That's why I'm concerned about my current taper beginning, as it means my terminal length might not be long enough to get my hair to my desired length and condition.

I'm fine with my current amount of taper. It's small enough. However, it's making me a little nervous for down the road. (Plus I've also been reading Igor's blog, and she thinks she's almost at terminal at knee, and so the subject's been on my mind.)

[Silverbrumby]

Yes, at this point my taper is an "unavoidable inconvenience" for me. I'm trimming regularly, and so at this point I've got two different negative feelings toward taper. One concerns the fact that having taper when I'm not even at tailbone--I would love knee length hair with a blunt hemline, eventually, and this concerns me, as I want to have a long enough terminal length to have a blunt hemline at such lengths. The second negative feeling is my overall dislike of very tapered hair (influenced by the culture around me), at least on mine, which is not wavy enough or curly to make the taper visually attractive to me on my hair. That's why I'm concerned about my current taper beginning, as it means my terminal length might not be long enough to get my hair to my desired length and condition.

I'm fine with my current amount of taper. It's small enough. However, it's making me a little nervous for down the road. (Plus I've also been reading Igor's blog, and she thinks she's almost at terminal at knee, and so the subject's been on my mind.)

I've seen here over the years that taper can just mean some parts of your hair are growing faster than others. Also when you trim hair you have a much longer time to see what true terminal length is.

Look at your family. Both sides to see if there are any super long genes. Long hair is not just a matter of growing but what you got in the gene lottery. I have been growing my hair for 3 1/2 years. Started at BSL. I'm at BSL still with a TON of taper lol. I could never be part of this tread. I mean the classic or waist to hip threads.

[Dessi]

I don't think you should worry that much about taper (especially natural taper). And there's this thing that taper actually makes it easier for you in some ways - for example, some hairstyles are way easier to be done if you have some taper. My hair has top layer, which means that half of my hair is shorter (about BCL) than the other part of my hair (Near Classic length), so I have no idea how my hair would look without this fake taper, but it doesn't bother me that much. Where I live, a tapered braid is the way a braid should look, because hair with no taper is something really rare. So people in my country don't expect you to have hair that is as thick at the ends as it is at the nape. And I don't think this goes only for people in my country lol, I think most people think this way.
You should love your hair the way it is, and if it's healthy, I don't think there's anything to worry about. :flower:

[dogzdinner]

I think at some point you just have to accept what you are given though! Some people have thick hair down to their knees and others dont. My hair starts to taper at about BSL and Im doubtful wether I'll even be able to get to classic, plus my braids are pencil thin at the bottom, but its the hair Ive been given and I like it long so I persevere!

[Mimha]

I've seen here over the years that taper can just mean some parts of your hair are growing faster than others. Also when you trim hair you have a much longer time to see what true terminal length is.

Look at your family. Both sides to see if there are any super long genes. Long hair is not just a matter of growing but what you got in the gene lottery. I have been growing my hair for 3 1/2 years. Started at BSL. I'm at BSL still with a TON of taper lol. I could never be part of this tread. I mean the classic or waist to hip threads.

I think that Silverbrumy has a very good point here. The only part of taper that you can really improve is the part concerned by damaged hair (broken hair). But the essential part of taper is actually indeed due to the fact that the whole mass of hair is made of single hairs at all possible stages of growth, and you cannot do anything against this but let them grow. Depending of your hair "life expectancy", you have a more or less long turnover of hairs on your whole scalp. If your hair life expectancy is, let's say, 5 years, every single hair has only 5 years to grow before it sheds. So you'll have much more taper on a shorter length than someone whose hair has 10 to 12 years of possible growth, and whose taper will be much more extended along the length, if what I explain makes sense^^. The life expectancy of every people's hair, as well as their growth speed, is genetically programmed and there is not much we can do, except our best to make it fully profitable, if I may say. In my own case, I know that I have hugely improved my hair quality by having an adequate diet with no crucial deficiencies. The second step I would like to take is to reduce my stress level. I am a hyper duper sensitive, nervous and emotional person, and I need a lot of rest (which I don't really get). This has a direct impact on the growth rate. Stressed hair grows slower, and sometimes even stops growing (and sometimes also sheds out of exhaustion).

Well, step by step, we can get closer and closer to the ideal frame of conditions to maximize our personal potential. :)

[StellaKatherine]

I have issues with natural taper as well... My braid look nice until about the last 20 cm + or so. This is where it dramatically turns in to a mouse tail. My goal was always to put a braid around my head just like my granny did. I actually can do this now, but the super mouse tail doesn't make my coronet braid look pretty... I hope that maybe with time the thickness will travel down to the ends, but I am worried as well that it will never happen. Yesterday I saw a woman with thick waist length braid and it had 0 taper!!! With my naked eye it looked like a iii+ thickness. And I started to wonder if it is even possible for "normal" ii to ever even grow to classic and more without getting a mouse tail taper. Maybe this is it... If it so, do I really want my hair this long ? :shrug:

[Obsessed1]

I've never seen anyone with hair of any length whose hair didn't taper in a braid. I have layers now but even without them Ive have taper even when I had shoulder length hair. The only time I didn't was if I grew my hair long and then did a big blunt chop to above shoulders

[Zesty]

I have issues with natural taper as well... My braid look nice until about the last 20 cm + or so. This is where it dramatically turns in to a mouse tail. My goal was always to put a braid around my head just like my granny did. I actually can do this now, but the super mouse tail doesn't make my coronet braid look pretty... I hope that maybe with time the thickness will travel down to the ends, but I am worried as well that it will never happen. Yesterday I saw a woman with thick waist length braid and it had 0 taper!!! With my naked eye it looked like a iii+ thickness. And I started to wonder if it is even possible for "normal" ii to ever even grow to classic and more without getting a mouse tail taper. Maybe this is it... If it so, do I really want my hair this long ? :shrug:
I sometimes worry about this, but certain LHCers give me hope. Obviously it depends on your genes, but dellad, for example, has blunt knee-length hair and lists herself as a ii. Plus there are so many stories about people who get to a long length and then microtrim to maintain there, and after some time find that the thickness travels down as the hairs with slower growth rates catch up. So I can't say about any particular person's potential, but it's not impossible. And if it's not possible for *your* hair, then know that not everyone thinks a lot of taper looks bad.

This thread makes me wish that we had more braid taper pictures at super long lengths. I'm just interested to see what a super long head of ii hair looks like, on average.

[lapushka]

I've never seen anyone with hair of any length whose hair didn't taper in a braid. I have layers now but even without them Ive have taper even when I had shoulder length hair. The only time I didn't was if I grew my hair long and then did a big blunt chop to above shoulders

True, everybody has that to some degree. Well, most people. There are exceptions!

[hennalonghair]

I deal with natural taper by trimming. I'll always have some natural taper but there's no drastic difference.

[Silverbrumby]

My BSL hair is the size of 1/2 a pencil then a mouse tail when I braid it all. Everyone varies but I have noticed on this board iii hair makes up the majority of the knee thread.

[Beborani]

Long past classic braid with gentle taper used to be my ideal when I was young--instead I had thick low-taper braid thanks to my mother who kept my hair blunt. Not everyone longs for taperless hair. Now I have severe taper due to hair loss but I like my hair now more than I did when I was younger.

[JadedByEntropy]

braid will always taper beause not every hair is at its fullest length. I think this is why people trim the racers to get the bulk of the hair to be one length. If i worried about taper i'd be stuck at BCL where my iii drops out. That line is moving downward, like everyone is saying, over time. I guess its protected better in longer hair than always being the actual hem. I know i couldn't have made it to classic without this sharp taper so i'm pretty happy with it. The weight of a no-taper braid is not fun. at all.
I found after i passed waist that the extra length was no longer exacerbating the headaches of updos and helped with bun stability as it continues to wrap around and tuck under nicely.
There are a lot of benefits to taper, but yeah. It sometimes hurts to look at a nice long braid, even if you're proud of it, and not see the Wow.

I also just discovered paranda, and that only looks 'nice' with a taper so that its not a blunt poof then yarn. Maybe that would help your comfort with the transition to longer lengths? makes it look thicker and longer while helping to ignore the effects of taper. :)

[lazuliblue]

Don't worry about it.

Hair naturally tapers. For non-trimmers, the hair naturally tapers down to nothing. This is like reaching the end of the rainbow. :)
Ed

I love this!

I do trim, but I also have a taper. I think some of it is from when I had a lot of hair loss and a poor diet, but I have been worrying recently that it is never going to thicken up. However, I enjoy looking at other people who have 'thinner' or tapering braids/ponytails because they always look lovely to me, and I tell myself that my braid can look just as nice. So for me I look to others with a natural taper for inspiration and to help me to feel more confident.

[AspenSong]

I just live with it. I don't have thick hair so I can't expect not to have crazy taper....my hair tapers to being about the thickness of a yarn needle of a couple spaghetti noodles at my ends. I don't love it, but it does make it easy to tuck ends into buns!! :)

[StellaKatherine]

It is true indeed that the most people will have some more or less visible taper the longer their hair is growing out. If this is good or bad would seem to be more of a taste. I just seem to be almost " ashamed" to braid the last 20 cm of my hair and show it off. The weirdest thing is, that I like all types of braids I see both tapered and not tapered, but I am more critical when it comes to my own.

[Seeshami]

...... I know these things are hard for me to understand because the naughty mess is obeese but why worry/care? Taper happens. Its a fact of hair. You can't really do anything about it besides trim so why?

[StellaKatherine]

Seeshami, I know this can be hard to understand. But when you had an idea/ a dream of how you would like to wear your hair when it is specific type of length... And when you are finally there and what you expected and wanted isn't there at all. I know this is silly, it is just a hair and I should be over the moon happy it has grown, but I feel little disappointing as well. It is so easy to say " just trim it"... I would say this isn't only the hair itself issue but mental part of expectations and reality not going hand to hand.

[Sarahlabyrinth]

....I want obese hair now :p....

I know just what you mean StellaKatherine.

[Seeshami]

I never expect anything from my hair either........ i mean I really don't picture it longer in my head than he is and I don't have an expectation for him. Possibly because my mental image and understanding of my hair is still tail bone and I don't really know for sure how long it is till i take a picture. Maybe because since my original goal everything has been icing on the cake and at a moments whim I could find what make me comfortable chopping off to tail bone or hip.

[EbonyCurls]

I love tapers. It makes the hair shape more interesting. How I deal with it is I pull down select curls to make the taper more obvious :) In fact some people tease their hair at the top in order to create that taper look. It's especially popular in braids.

[trolleypup]

I think I can handle it, but I've not yet been on the receiving end. What have been your experiences? And have you been concerned about reaching a goal length due to genetics? Does taper concern you, and how do you manage it mentally?
Where I live the culture is accepting of diversity and there are many cultural groups locally that encourage long hair. I have received very few negative comments, and none specifically about taper/fairytale ends. If I did get a comment on my taper, I'm sure I would be as polite (or not) as circumstances called for in saying "Not you problem or business!"

I am near terminal, so I have a pretty good idea what my genetics say I can grow...and being near terminal, I taper to 0 at calf. If I had a longer terminal...well, I would just taper to 0 further down! My goal was always "longer" rather than a specific length.

I try not to worry about stuff I can't change/fix...and surely, terminal length is out of my control...so I don't have any suggestions other than to enjoy the journey and not worry about it.

ETA: depending on how it is groomed, I have visible taper from mid-back down...but, of course, the taper starts at the scalp.

[Entangled]

I love tapers. It makes the hair shape more interesting. How I deal with it is I pull down select curls to make the taper more obvious :) In fact some people tease their hair at the top in order to create that taper look. It's especially popular in braids.

I've not before heard of teasing to get a tapered look. The people I know tease hair to get volume on top. Artificial taper via layers seems common enough. I think curly hair types tend to be more accepting of taper, to avoid triangle head. Personally, I like the look of curly tapered hair: it really does look like a fairytale illustration. In long straight hair where I am, long straight hair with very noticeable hair is called ratty.

[Theobroma]

How do you come to terms with taper? How do you deal with cultural attitudes around you? Because let's face it, I'm getting nervous about the rude hair comments that come with "abnormally" long hair, which for me is anything past tailbone length. Long enough to sit on really seems to stir up people. I think I can handle it, but I've not yet been on the receiving end. What have been your experiences? And have you been concered about reaching a goal length due to genetics? Does taper concern you, and how do you manage it mentally?

My take, for whatever it's worth:

It's my hair, so my opinion is the only one that matters. I can't stop anyone else from having their own opinion about it, but they don't count. That said, it helps that I live in a culture where making unsolicited comments about other people's appearance is socially unacceptable to the point where I've never actually experienced it. I routinely boggle at what American listmembers post on this board in the way of rude remarks about hair from perfect strangers... that sort of thing just doesn't happen here in Central Europe!

As for taper... I want my hair to be a certain length. I don't yet know whether I have the genes to achieve a blunt hemline at that length. I do know that I'll take tapered hair at classic over blunt hair at waist any day of the week. As long as the individual strands are healthy down to the ends, that's all that counts in the final analysis. :shrug:

[Silverbrumby]

Where I live the culture is accepting of diversity and there are many cultural groups locally that encourage long hair. I have received very few negative comments, and none specifically about taper/fairytale ends. If I did get a comment on my taper, I'm sure I would be as polite (or not) as circumstances called for in saying "Not you problem or business!"

I am near terminal, so I have a pretty good idea what my genetics say I can grow...and being near terminal, I taper to 0 at calf. If I had a longer terminal...well, I would just taper to 0 further down! My goal was always "longer" rather than a specific length.

I try not to worry about stuff I can't change/fix...and surely, terminal length is out of my control...so I don't have any suggestions other than to enjoy the journey and not worry about it.

ETA: depending on how it is groomed, I have visible taper from mid-back down...but, of course, the taper starts at the scalp.

Best quote ever trolleypup. I should tape that onto the bathroom mirror.

"...I try not to worry about stuff I can't change/fix...and surely, terminal length is out of my control...so I don't have any suggestions other than to enjoy the journey and not worry about it."

[spidermom]

I used to only like blunt ends, but after seeing all kinds of ends on LHC, I have come to appreciate most of them. Now blunt looks too abrupt to me; I prefer some taper.

[gossamer]

This is a very interesting thread. I have been thinking about taper a lot, what it means for my terminal length. Itt seems that taper gets less and less the longer you let your hair grow, eventually--look at Gossamer's hair, for example. I hope she's going to chime in, because I wonder whether she had tapered classic length before, even with natural undamaged hair. I also wonder whether the thickness traveling down is mainly because you become more skilled at handling your hair with every year that goes by on the way to extreme lengths.

I want to get to knee length eventually, but only if the end of my braid will be as thick as it is now at classic. I can't stand it any thinner. So taper is a big concern for me.

I only just saw this thread (and this post) yesterday. One can't just speak my name and hope I appear (http://www.mdbg.net/chindict/chindict.php?wdrst=1&popup=1&wdqchid=%E8%AA%AA%E6%9B%B9%E6%93%8D%E6%9B%B9%E6%93 %8D%E5%B0%B1%E5%88%B0). :p

This sent me on a bit of a nostalgic journey through photos from college (9-13 years ago) that would give me a real sense of what my hair was back then.

It wasn't as thick and had next to no waves. (Click link for huge photo showing a last-minute Halloween "costume" and my hair down, 10 years ago. (http://forums.longhaircommunity.com/attachment.php?attachmentid=20290&d=1449667630)) I didn't know what "frizz" was or grabby hair. I wonder how much of that is the result of beginning hormonal birth control 9 years ago and how much of it is just naturally aging hair and hormones stabilizing through my 20s and now into my 30s.

At the time, I was getting very regular major trims from a firm but kind hairdresser who believed in blunt ends. From the age of 14 to the age of 20, for 6 years, I went from BSL to TBL very, very slowly. Yet this shot (Also huge, click link (http://forums.longhaircommunity.com/attachment.php?attachmentid=20288&d=1449666187).) that inadvertently has my braid in it still shows taper, albeit not as much taper as I have now coming up on 3 years without trims.

Brainstorming a reply to this thread, I had a lot of thoughts about how I really didn't care well for my hair back then (washing every night, plastic brush, sleeping with it down) and or care for myself very well either (little sleep, little food poorly balanced, etc). [Aside: Given that my ends are from that era of my "health," I'm amazed they're still here. By no definition was my hair undamaged when it reached classic, although it hadn't seen heat in years and had never been dyed.]

This presents a few possibilities, three of which I'll list here:
1) Due to inattentiveness to health, my terminal length then was shorter back then, maybe mid thigh, hence the taper on the hip length braid even with aggressive trimming over 6 years.
2) My bad hair habits were damaging my ends so much that hair was breaking off prematurely.
3) Thickness actually does travel down the longer that you let it grow (this doesn't make sense to me logically, but I can't think of solid evidence to the contrary either, especially given the photographic evidence that my hair tapered then at TBL where now it's full and thick at the same length.)

[melindalucy]

Don't worry about it.

Hair naturally tapers. For non-trimmers, the hair naturally tapers down to nothing. This is like reaching the end of the rainbow. :)
Ed

Fade haircuts, (https://hairstyle-en.com/taper-haircut-men-ideas-for-with-long-hair-2021-trendy-hairstyles/) usually are longer at the top and gradually become shorter on the sides and back.
The taper fade is a popular choice because it is understated and subtle where the hair gently tapers down to the neck and can be kept longer on top.

[Entangled]

Wow, here I was thinking about this post and it suddenly reappears! Thanks to everyone who chimed in.