Breaking the Comb Ceiling

There were four hard knocks on the door; the kind only the police made. We froze, every muscle still, breath slowing down. My eyes focused firmly on the hardwood floor, tears slow-danced down my cheeks, snot bubbles in my eight-year-old nose, little fists clenched. The loud squeaking of the front door, in desperate need of WD-40, signaled Mom had opened it.

“Ma’am, we received a report of continued screaming and possible child abuse. We need to ensure everyone in the household is ok. Do you have a child?”

Mom audibly sighed, “Coño,” which means Fuck, and I looked toward the door. She opened it wider so the officers could see me and step into the apartment.

“Tell them,” she said, “Tell them now!”

I was sitting on a pillow on the floor and looked up at the officers, my face starting to flush with embarrassment. “She’s just trying to comb my hair.”

That was the day Mom decided I was getting a “relaxer,” a chemical straightener that permanently strips the hair of its disulfide bonds (strength, structure, and stability) so it’s “easier to manage.” You see, everyone on Mom’s side of the familia had either type 1 (straight) or type 2 (wavy) hair. My curly (type 3c) / kinky (type 4a) hair was frowned upon in our culture, not considered beautiful, and no one knew how to handle it. In fact, it wasn’t really considered acceptable anywhere in those days; it was absent on TV and especially in the workplace, but I didn’t have to worry about that just yet.

Back in the 70s and 80s, we didn’t even know about the hair types chart that walks through each category of hair. Type 1 is straight, meaning hair that is flat from the roots to the ends and can often be oily. Type 2 hair has a gentle bounce to its undefined waves. Type 3 has three sub-categories of curly depending on the tightness of the curl, barely generates oil, and brushing is a no-no. Finally, Type 4 has three sub-categories of kinky hair, the tightest coils, is the driest and most delicate of all hair, prone to breakage if it’s not kept well-oiled and moisturized. Major retailers didn’t carry differentiated hair products, catering solely to straight and wavy hair, and many of us didn’t have the language or training to help ourselves back then. At best, education and homemade products were passed down through word of mouth and elders who knew how to make them. If you didn’t have that, then there was simply good hair and bad hair. Mine was bad. It didn’t stay straight, frizzing at even the idea of humidity, and it knotted and misbehaved as soon as you looked away, like a naughty child.

It was impossible to comb, and I was tender-headed, leading to immense pain over the course of the four to five hours it took my mom to wash, comb, and braid my hair every Sunday afternoon. We could fill a Ford F-550 truck with the amount of combs my curls had snapped in two. I’d snatch them, and other hair tools like the dreaded hot comb, and throw them out the window during those early years of torture. Mom always made me fetch them from the private alleyway in the back of the building, but I’d bought myself a few minutes of relief.

My heritage is Puerto Rican: We are a mix of Native Americans (predominantly Taíno—indigenous to the island), Sub-Saharan Africans (via the slave trade), and Spaniards who colonized the island in 1508. We’re proud of that mash-up because it makes us uniquely who we are as a culture.

My heritage is Puerto Rican: We are a mix of Native Americans (predominantly Taíno—indigenous to the island), Sub-Saharan Africans (via the slave trade), and Spaniards who colonized the island in 1508. We’re proud of that mash-up because it makes us uniquely who we are as a culture. My familia looks like a United Colors of Benetton ad—from the alabaster skin and stunning blue/green eyes of my maternal grandfather, Julio, to the sun-kissed caramel skin and thick wavy hair of my paternal grandfather, Papa, to the beautiful pools of deep ebony eyes and skin of my maternal grandmother, Nana.

If all twenty of us first cousins lined up as a spectrum, there’d be the fairest skinned and youngest, Steven, on one end, and the oldest, Cindy, “black like the bottom of a pot” on the other end. I’d be in the middle, this blend of freckles with deep raw sienna skin that burns faster than my Irish husband’s (SPF 70 for life!), light brown eyes, and hair that refuses to choose a side. Two of my aunts on Dad’s side of the familia had “nappy” hair—hair you could “fro,” hair that showcased the Africano in our lineage. They relaxed their curls until they were in their fifties, then cut their hair just shy of bald. “We don’t care anymore,” they quipped, “It’s easier to manage.” That phrase again.

By the time I was in my mid-twenties, I revolted against the relaxers too. I didn’t care that I might get eyed at work, where discrimination based on hair was allowed (and still is in many states). Relaxers burned my scalp, smelled bad, and left me constantly worried about sweating, rain, or swimming. I loved dancing but barely did it, lived with an umbrella in every purse, said no to invitations for pool parties and beach days, and generally avoided anything else that had to do with water lest I mess up the very expensive handiwork of my hairstylist. I no longer wanted to spend an entire day—literally six to ten hours every other weekend—in the Dominican hair salon to tame my tresses.

What was wrong with them anyway? Why were people, especially at work, so afraid of what naturally grew out of my head? I hadn’t seen my real texture since I was eight. I only saw it when I was going to grad school at NYU full-time while also working full-time on Wall Street at Lehman Brothers. I was so swamped and exhausted, I didn’t go to the salon for about six months. Oh, the blasphemy!

The hair was plentiful and fine, dare I say silky, but in this interesting corkscrew pattern. This new growth felt like it wanted to bounce, stand up even, only it was weighed down by the limp, relaxed ends of my hair. Two different beings fighting for the same strand. It wasn’t coarse or like a brillo pad as I was led to believe. It intertwined—each hair not wanting to be without the other—like a promise to never part, a pinky swear. Once I saw it, touched it, and felt the freedom in it, I realized it was…shockingly beautiful! I cried out, “Oh my God!” It was the first time I truly questioned why I had been made to believe this mane was unacceptable, outside of breaking combs.

In the very early 2000s, “going natural” was considered brave. You might tank your career or get passed over for that management promotion.

“You will be less attractive,” the Titis on Mom’s side said.

Cousins chimed in, “Men like long, silky, straight hair.”

“Your hair is unprofessional. You have to dress for the job that you want,” said a female vice president in HR; AKA, look as close to Eurocentric beauty standards as you can in order to fit into this white, male dominated corporate environment.

I didn’t care.

If I was going to be successful, to be a leader, I was going to do it as authentically as I could.

I snipped off the frail, lame, lifeless strands of relaxed hair and let it grow naturally. I watched over the next few years, how it shape-shifted in new and inspiring ways. There was the untameable curly bob—reminding me of those awkward preteen years where shit just happened to your body and you had no clue what to do with it.  I often looked like Rick (from Rick and Morty) had a jerry curl. But I was free. When she (my hair now had her own pronouns) hit my shoulders and her thickness expanded, I felt like Cleopatra. People couldn’t help but look. Some were fascinated. Others were curious. Some gave looks of disdain (mostly at work). By the time she’d grown into her glory—long, tight curls that hit mid back, like a black stallion’s mane—she defined me. She was me, and I was her.

People commented on my hair multiple times a day, unasked and unfiltered. They wondered how one day it could be “hippie straight” (hello flat iron), the next ridiculously curly (spritz in two cups of water), and then in a huge ‘fro (use a hair pick). Some would reach out to touch, like people often do when they see a pregnant belly, but then their manners willed their hands backward. Others would stick their mittens in, grabbing a handful of coils, not even asking permission. It pissed me off—the audacity of white people who were captivated by my hair, seemingly forgetting my humanity or personal space, petting me like a dog. Just fucking don’t. Usually a friend or simply a nearby sister would step in to de-escalate, but I still almost threw down a few times.

Navigating my locks seemed to require a degree in cosmetology, and so it was trial and error. Getting a consistent look was a futile effort, and there was no YouTube yet. But there was still word of mouth and some Black-owned hair products you could buy in the local beauty supply shops that would help.

As I fought to be in rooms that weren’t meant for me, and over the years became a senior HR executive, I made it a point to wear different ethnic hairstyles to work. I ran global meetings with my hair in twists, fluffed my curly poof atop my head while speaking to 2,000 employees, and wore a headwrap to meet with politicians and the governor visiting our offices.

I learned that everything done to care for straight or wavy hair was damaging for my hair type. Combs simply weren’t meant for me—there were specially designed detangler brushes! I learned that trying to manipulate my curls while dry would break them. Moisture and water were actually my friend and critical to maintaining healthy curly / kinky hair. I could go to pool parties and dance in the warm NYC rainstorms in the summers. I found out that my scalp didn’t naturally create oil so I had to put it, and conditioner, in regularly and not shampoo my hair as often. There were so many other surprising things. I educated my familia and friends—they didn’t know! I forgave my mother—she did the best she could. And I modeled the shit out of my new hair!

As I fought to be in rooms that weren’t meant for me, and over the years became a senior HR executive, I made it a point to wear different ethnic hairstyles to work. I ran global meetings with my hair in twists, fluffed my curly poof atop my head while speaking to 2,000 employees, and wore a headwrap to meet with politicians and the governor visiting our offices. I became proud of my hair’s versatility. I was humbled by folks saying, “You don’t know what it means for me to see a leader who looks like me.” “I love that you wear your hair like that. It makes me feel more comfortable.” By being unapologetic, I was able to push the boundaries of what is viewed as professional in the workplace and create a safe space for others to come to work as their authentic selves. It was also the least I could do for my younger self, striving to be the boss I wished I had twenty years earlier. You see, I am not exceptional in any way; I was just one of the few that got to make way.

I was delighted in 2019, when California became the first state to pass the CROWN Act (Creating a Respectful and Open World for Natural Hair Act) prohibiting discrimination based on hairstyle or texture. My friends in the service, who had been forced to cut their hair, were overjoyed when the branches of the US military finally established grooming guidelines that acknowledged, and made acceptable, natural hairstyles. I can now find Black hair products in all major retail spaces and online, but I still try to shop at the local beauty supply stores. And I sometimes find myself happy-crying watching so many beautifully diverse leading ladies and all kinds of representation on TV, not as tokens, but as a spectrum of fully realized characters, celebrating their differences. I didn’t know I needed that until the screen started to reflect what I see in my familia and outside every day.

Twenty-seven states have now adopted the CROWN Act, and Black lawmakers have recently reintroduced it for a federal vote. I’m proud of the progress and sad that we’re still debating this “issue” in 2024. As the battle to eliminate bias and discrimination continues on multiple fronts, I’ll still have to compromise on a lot of things, but my hair will never again be one of them. In learning to understand and take care of her, to keep her healthy and growing, I was able to love and accept every aspect of myself fully. My hope is that this next generation will never know what it is to doubt the skin they are in or the crown they were born with.