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What's the worst hairstyle/cut you've ever had?


What’s the worst hairstyle/cut you’ve ever had? Share!

I got a perm once, when I was really young. I washed my hair as soon as I got home!

Thanks to reader Jennifer for today’s question idea Do you have a question idea? Submit yours here.

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Phyrra Avatar

I had long hair about to my shoulder blades and my mom took me to get a poodle perm. It looked awful and my hair felt so stiff. That was the worst! I was only about 11 or 12. I had a bad color experience once. Instead of getting a blood red or burgundy red or wine red, my stylist wanted to try copper red on my hair. She talked me into it and the moment I saw the finished color on me I burst into tears, hating it (because I looked like my mom), and she fixed it 3 days later.

Audrey Avatar

This past May I asked for my hair to be cut to collarbone length, but it definitely was hovering a good inch or two above my shoulders (when my hair was wet!). My hair gets VERY curly when it’s short, so it seemed so much shorter. Also, I was unable to put my hair into a ponytail or braid for a good two months, which drove me crazy. Just in this past month or so, I’ve finally been able to put all of my hair up, where bits and pieces won’t fall out from being too short.

Dusty Avatar

Blasphemy! I love my perm! LOL 🙂 Once when I was a kid I told the hairdresser to not cut too much cause I didn’t want it all spikey. She made me look like a child version of Billy Idol and said “You asked for it to be spikey right?” I looked like a Fraggle.

Rima Kaur Avatar

When I was really young, an Aunt visited me in New Delhi. The flamboyant woman that she was, she took me to a high-end salon at a five star hotel. Needless to say, it was a disaster. My shoulder length hair had been chopped to what we in India call a “boy cut” (self explanatory!). I was chubby and the style did not suit me one bit, though it was a good haircut in general. I could never muster the courage to say anything to my Aunt, but I never went out with her again!

ilovemakeup Avatar

That made me think of the part in “Legally Blonde” where Elle was grilling Chutney about how she got a perm and then got in the shower and went on that whole explanation of the chemicals used in a perm!

I think we got the obligatory perm in our early teens. Mine actually didn’t turn out badly, but I would never do it again! It was more of a “body wave” or whatever. When it started to grow out it looked pretty bad,

fabiola Avatar

Good lord, a mullet. Hahah, this past March, I tried to cut my own hair, and did a horrible job. Went to the salon to fix it, and they gave me a haircut that looked like a mullet. Now is a lot longer, I did the invention method, miconazole challenge, and they worked, plus my hair grows very fast. Now I have a lot of layers and the longest layer is almost to the middle of my back. My hair was always super long down the to my waist. I learned my lesson. Leave your hair alone. Hahaha.

Verily Avatar

I had something like a bowl cut once. As I have curly hair, it was a sad sight. I had to deal with it until I was 19 because then and only then did I have “permission” from my mother to cut my hair however I wanted to.

Veronica Avatar

A mullet… But in my defense, it was 1981 and I was 12.

I have had my hair in almost every single style, from the shortest pixies to waist lenght. But that mullet was definetly the worst!

Andrea Avatar

My mom took me to a barber to have my hair cut really short when i was 15. The worst possible hair cut, done with a razon, which makes your hair frizzy, specially if you have as much hair as I do. Since that point in my life I’ve always invested in my hair cuts or else done them myself. I am beyond picky about who touches it at all.

fiaspice Avatar

I got a short haircut (think top of my ear). It looked great in the magazine, but the model didn’t had thick hair. I was also trying a new hairdresser cause mine was sick. It was a disaster.

Jenny Avatar

One time my mom got my sister and I identical hair cuts… bowl cuts. Think, Jim Carrey in Dumb & Dumber. THEN, to make it worse, she got us perms. I had a bowl cut fro.

I remember going to the grocery after with my mom and an elderly lady looking at my sister and I, and then to mom and exclaimed, “Don’t you have the cutest little boys!” And my sister and I burst into tears. It was scarring, haha.

Erin Avatar

Never wash a perm the first day!

I’ve had plenty of bad cuts, perms, and color jobs. The worst was when someone burned my hair off. I’d been to this salon several times before and it was a good experience and cost effective. They changed ownership and products but I didn’t realize that until I smelled the dye getting applied to my head. Needless to say I had a very hard and expensive time getting it corrected. They refused to give me my money back too!

Lee Avatar

I’ve had lots of horrible haircuts – I was in high school in the 80s and did all sorts of crazy things to my hair: faux hawks, crew cuts, asymmetrical bob-type things, huge teased wanna be dreads. But it was all fun at the time even if I look back now and realize I looked kinda goofy.

But, yeah, my worst hair cut was probably a perm. It really damaged my hair and split it to the roots so it was this hideous ball of frizz for a while.

Kimmy Avatar

Many years ago I cut my hair pageboy style – but that wasn’t what was bad. I decided I wanted to go from black to bright orange (think Milia Jovovich in the Fifth Element). But that wasn’t that bad part either because it looked kinda cool. Now that bad part. I was told by my school that I had to dye it back to a “normal” colour. I didn’t feel like going to the salon again, so I bought some canned aerosol semi-permanent black colour and sprayed it in, hoping I could wash it out later. Needless to say, my hair turned vomit green. Not a good look! And it lasted for weeks. Lol.

AudreyNZ Avatar

Don’t think anyone could beat what happened to me. One day, when I was thirteen, my brother (who’s 19 then) suggested we gave each other haircuts. Being extremely bored and thinking it would be fun, I said, “Yes”. Said he was going to give me a new fashion haircut. He gave me bangs which went all the way to the back of my ears and my sideburns shaved off!!…trust me, he said. “Trust me.”

Susan Dowman Nevling Avatar

Anyone old enough to remember curly perms? I had that with a bad perm and a burn from the solution. Awful!!. My real hair is perfectly straight and just below shoulder length. Without something drastic like a perm, it will not curl. I don’t do perms ever now. .

Jennifer Avatar

Growing up I had the worst hair. It was just the perfect storm of aweful.

1. I have very thick, moderately coarse, very dry hair, that will grow to about mid-hip length if left to grow.
2. My hair tangles. It knots. It dreads.
3. My mother did not let me cut my hair. Not even to trim. No, I still don’t know why.
4. When I wasn’t playing in the woods, I was playing with art supplies. Messy art supplies.
5. My mother’s hair is very fine, very thin, and very oily and rarely tangles. Her idea of “minimum hair care” was MILES AND MILES away from what my hair should have been getting. She still thinks “conditioner doesn’t matter.”
6. I have a very sensitive scalp. Since brushing was exceedingly painful, I would simply avoid brushing my hair.

I was fourteen when I cut my hair to shoulder length, and I was 16 when a curly haired friend sat me down and taught me how to take care of my hair.

Meghan Avatar

Worst hairstyle: I basically had a mushroom cut in grade 6 or 7. Me & my friend were set on getting pixie cuts, and we were given mushroom cuts. It was awful, and we looked like boys!

Worst haircut experience: I have really long hair, and in December I went to someone who doesn’t usually cut my hair… And she chopped off a good 6-8 inches. I was devastated! And it’s going to be ages before it’s that long again!

KaseyCannuck Avatar

This happened to me just last week!!! I asked for a 6-inch “trim” and about a foot was cut off! I’m going to start taking a ruler with me!!

Helene Avatar

That sort of happened to me. I asked for a trim of at the most 2 inches, I was reading a magazine, but felt something was wrong, so I asked the stylist how much she was taking off. She answered 2-3 inches, so I kept reading, When I looked up she had taken almost a foot off. I didn’t pay and cried for hours. I know, just hair, and it will grow back, but still!

Aeri Avatar

It’s a tossup:

1. Bowl cut in 1980 – my dad had this brilliant idea that “it was too hot for long hair” in Florida, so right before we moved BAM! FUG BOWLCUT FOR ME. Horrible. So, so bad.

2. In like …idk 84ish the stylist gave me a spiky mullet in an effort to make me look “cool”. LMAO I SOBBED AND WAS TERRIFIED.

MizLottie Avatar

I permed superfine, superthin already naturally curly hair. I had to cut it all off to only 1 inch long right before graduation, could barely pin the cap to my head. How stupid was that?

Rachel R. Avatar

When I was 9, my mother let the neighbor cut my hair. She ran a salon out of her home and offered mom a cheap deal to do mine & my brother’s hair. I had really long hair, one-length, down to my butt. This licensed hairdresser had no clue whatsoever to do with it, but I didn’t know that. She chopped it all to he–, and she gave it “uneven” layers. My mom chewed me out big time for not telling her to stop & for paying her. I got grounded. (I had no idea what I was supposed to do, this was an adult, and I’d always been taught adults were always in the right). My mom evened it up the best she could. Worst haircut and worst haircut experience of my life.

Karen Avatar

That’s easy the 70’s “wings” my bangs were cut into for my 8th grade graduation picture because my dad wouldn’t allow me to cut my hair, the choppy bob my aunt gave me all through high school (copy bobs were not in) and finally the poodle perm just before the “bob” that was too tight because I wanted wavy hair and it was too long to keep repeating the process. Lol those were the days tie between the “wings” and the perm for most tears because I could wear makeup for the “bob”

Deborah Avatar

This is so easy! When I was 26 years old I had my hair cut short – I looked 56 instead of 26! Never again! I have kept it long, wearing it up mostly in the summer.

KaseyCannuck Avatar

Not sure if I can narrow down the actual “worst.” The choices are:
A home perm when I was around 11 that left my hair looking and feeling like straw.
A salon perm with no relaxer when I was in high school. My hair was a complete half-sphere! I wore it in French braids for 4 days until I could get it fixed by having another perm solution combed through it to straighten it.
Later in high school, layers cut so short I looked like a boy except the bottom of my hair above my neck. It looked like I was supposed to have short hair and some strands were forgotten.
It’s no wonder that now my hair is long and one length!!

Oh, and I can’t not mention every bang trim of my childhood. By the time they were even, they were about an inch long. I never once trimmed my daughters hair for this very reason!

Alecia Avatar

When I was young my mom cut my super long hair off into an ugly boy looking style. It was so bad that, that year when I went trick or treating on Halloween, an old man mistaken me for a little boy. Other than that I would have to say when I was about 12 or 13 I used to curl my bangs and rat them up into a big poof, and spray the heck out of them with Aqua Net! LOL! What was I thinking!?!

Johnna Quick Owens Avatar

When I was about 20, I colored my hair black using some product that claimed to be washed out in 2-3 washes. I started bleached blonde, so the color grabbed and I had extremely black dry hair. I conditioned it, washed it, conditioned, and yet the black wasn’t going anywhere. I finally went to a friend who is a great professional stylist and assured me that he could get me back to blonde. I spent 10 hours in his chair, and he used bleach after bleach. Finally, my scalp was bleeding, I ended up with chemical burns, and my hair was this weird peach color. I had to leave it that way for two weeks until he thought it was calm enough to put another color on it. I stayed blonde for a few more years, then went red and never looked back! I keep it a dark burgundy/red now, sometimes even using a Soft Violet Black shade. We live and we learn, and thank God it grows back!

Kat Avatar

I asked my boyfriend to help me cut my hair once. Bad idea. Then I let his mother try to fix it. Worse idea. My hair was sooo short in the end, and I look awful with short hair, plus it was this weird bowlish cut — just no. I was so upset I cried every time I saw myself for the next three days.

doroffee Avatar

Beatles type mushroom hair as a 6-7-8 year-old girl… my parents would not let me change, but I finally rebelled :D.
Also, once, before a school yearbook photo, I wanted some loose curls in my hair… the hairdresser messed up, and made me really heavy curls that made my hair shrink, and I looked like a really unfashionable Maths teacher in her ’40s. I spent all night combing the curls out of my hair.

Sylirael Avatar

Urgh. I had this intensely ugly bob cut when I was about 11. I think I wanted it at the time, and I don’t recall being too upset about it, more kind of ‘deflated’, but hindsight has opened my eyes to how truly offensive it was. 😀

At the time of writing, I haven’t had a haircut (not even a trim) in 6 years. At the same time, my secret dream is the exact opposite: to be able to rock a pixie cut, LOL!

Helene Avatar

So many fun stories!
I do think the perm(s) in my 20s must be the worst I’ve done to my hair. Took years before I had the last part of frizzy curls cut off.

Maricel Avatar

my worst cut I ever had was during my senior year in high school. At the time I wasn’t familiar with monthly trims. I always thought a trim means they end up cutting it really short. So I let my mom trim my hair. I told her just a little bit. But Instead she ended up cutting 4-5 inches I was so upset. I learned my lesson and I rather spend money on a trim. It took a long time to grow back.

Diane Avatar

I was a child of the 80’s I had all kinds of bad hair. LOL I had the permed 80’s rocker hair, oh yeah, me and Jon Bon Jovi had the same hair at that time. I had a bob with huge bangs at another point. in the early90’s I had the lovely orange sun-in hair that never really got blonde despite the fact that I used a whole bottle (or 2) of sun-in almost every saturday morning. My mom let me start coloring my hair when I was about 15 because it was cheaper to color it than it was to use a bottle or 2 of sun-in once a week

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