A woman insisted that she was only trying to be kind when she told her niece that her hair didn’t suit the new washing routine that she was trying, despite her sister-in-law being fuming
Being told you smell can make you cringe and feel a sense of despair – even if the person who told you is speaking out of love.
A woman was left wondering what the issue was when she spoke candidly to her niece about her greasy hair, urging her to stop trying the “beauty hacks and fads” that didn’t work for her. Of course, for some hair types, not washing often really works, but the woman explained that her niece has “thin, fine, and very straight hair”, so not washing it was causing it to look “wet with grease” and also causing a foul odour.
It can be hard to find a hair routine that suits you, especially when you’re younger, and the auntie claimed that she was trying to do what was best for her niece, 18-year-old Laya. However, the 27-year-old ended up in hot water with her sister-in-law about it.
Taking to Reddit’s ‘Am I The A**hole’ forum, she asked whether she was in the wrong for “telling my niece her hair stinks and looks greasy”. She wrote: “Laya is the type of girl to try out a lot of beauty hacks and fads. She’s done fake freckles, douyin makeup, hair glossing and more. However, recently she’s been on a natural/ holistic kick. Part of it is training her hair to produce less oil, which entails her washing her hair only once a week.
“Let me tell you, her hair is so stinky and greasy. It literally looks wet with grease! I know some hair types don’t need to be washed regularly, but she has the same hair as me. Thin, fine, and very straight.”
She shared that she recently went “on a coffee run” with her niece, but “her hair smelled so bad” that her auntie had to “crack the window”. She continued: “When we were waiting in the drive-thru, I gently asked her if I could tell her something sensitive.
“She said sure, so I told her that her new hair routine wasn’t working out and was making her hair nasty. I reminded her that I think she’s beautiful and I love how adventurous she is with trying trends, but I’d want someone to let me know if my hair was smelly.
“Laya took it well, and she said she’d ask her best friend Ava if she’d smelled any funk coming from her. Ava is a very blunt girl, so I’m sure she’ll tell Laya the same thing. We drank our coffee, I dropped Laya home, and everything was normal.”
However, when her sister-in-law caught wind of what had been said, she was fuming, and sent a “nasty” text to the original poster. “She accused me of ‘tearing down Laya’s confidence’ and ‘shaming her natural body functions’.
“I haven’t replied to the message yet – just got it yesterday – and I will probably talk to my brother before I answer. But I think it’s better to tell someone about an issue so they can address it, and I only talked to Laya because I love her and don’t want her to be embarrassed by someone at school etc.”
In the comments, many reassured her that she’d behaved in the right way, sharing: “Not the a**hole. You didn’t just bluntly tell her she stinks. You asked first, in private, and gently told her what you think. Hopefully, you know your niece well enough to know that she actually took it well and didn’t just pretend. Your sister-in-law may be lashing out because Laya asked her first and she lied instead of telling the truth.”
Another added: “I’m sure she’d rather it come from you than a bully or jerk. You did it in a nice way”, and someone else agreed: “You were kind, you addressed it privately, and you made it clear that you were blaming the hair routine, not calling her dirty.”
One Redditor even said that they wish they’d had someone to guide them in a nice way, saying: “You were respectful, tactful, and kind. I wish someone had told me in high school to brush my hair. (I firmly believed I was acing the whole effortless messy curls look while my head looked like rat king’s nest). Then I wish someone had told me to lay off the dry shampoo in college. But nooooo I decided half a can of dry shampoo and powder white roots was the way to go.”
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