AITA: Internet backs 'emotionally traumatized' woman who snaps at friend for ruining her curly hair

There’s always that one friend in a group who loves to tease and annoy others. Sometimes, their playful behavior crosses a line. A recent post on Reddit’s popular 'Am I the A*****e' forum highlights this. 

A Reddit user with super curly hair shared their frustration about a friend who, in a now-deleted post, constantly scrunches their hair "just for fun," leaving her feeling upset and ruined.

Woman snaps at her friend for scrunching her hair

In the post, the original poster (OP), a 23-year-old explained: "I’m 23f, my friend is the same age as me. For my entire life I have had very very curly hair. I’m white, but I have 3C curls. Anyways, super curly." She mentioned that her curls are classified as 3C, which refers to very tight, corkscrew-like spirals.

She went on to describe, “My friend has kind of wavy hair, but not super wavy and definitely nowhere near my curls," as per Somecards.

Further, the 23-year-old gave a glimpse of their bond, "She has this habit of being super touchy with me in general, but especially with my hair. It drives me insane."

She added, "Anyone with curly hair knows how delicate they are and how temperamental they can be. ALSO, how difficult it is to fix your hair once it has been ruined." 

The 23-year-old also shared some insight into the nature of their relationship, "I think I’m a bit emotionally traumatized from growing up with curly hair because I was constantly laughed at, judged, and touched because of my hair and it really is a sensitive subject for me." 

She emphasized how traumatized she felt about her curly hair, "I love my hair now and I take good care of it and it looks great, but I just can’t handle it when people touch it without asking. They don’t understand that they just ruined my hard work and I’ll have to wet my hair again to fix the damage they have caused." 

The original poster gave an instance, "Anyways, this weekend I was getting ready and my friend was over at my place. I had showered and was letting my hair air dry. It was in that “in between” stage of wet and dry where it looks really weird and flat (curly haired people know), but I wait until it’s fully dry to fluff it out and make it look good." 

She described the incident, "My friend came up behind me and scrunched my hair while running her fingers through it. I almost cried. I legit snapped at her and was like “what the f**k?! you just totally ruined my hair!” I was definitely rude. I don’t care though. She has no idea what it’s like to have someone just completely ruin your hair that now can’t really be fixed. I was honestly furious and not to be dramatic, but she really did ruin it. I had to fix the pieces that she had turned frizzy and stringy and my hair just looked bad that day as a result."

The curly-haired woman then detailed what her friend said after she snapped at her, "She told me I was crazy and need to chill out about my hair. I told her that it’s really frustrating to do a whole wash day hair routine just for someone to rake their fingers through it, ultimately messing it up. She said she was sorry, but she’s still frustrated that it made me so upset. I feel like it’s just insane to touch people for no reason, and I’m so tired of people grabbing my hair too."  

She concluded by saying, "I know I might sound obsessed about having “perfect” hair, but it’s really not even that. My hair is just so curly and also so fine that it doesn’t really take much at all to mess it up so it’s super upsetting to me when someone is rough with it on purpose and knows how I am about my hair. So, AITA?"

Internet backs curly-haired woman

The OP's post, which received over 3K votes within two days of being shared online, has garnered widespread support from the internet for the woman's experience.

One Reddit user shared, "NTA If she messes with the curls before it hardens into the cast, it will completely mess it up!!" 

A person wrote, "NTAWhy would anyone just go and run their hands through someone's hair? Even with waves, touching it can f**k them up." 

A user claimed, “NTA. Fellow curly girl here. I don’t even want people to look at my hair funny in that state, just in case. Let alone touch it!! Why in the world do people think it’s okay to just touch people’s hair??”

One remarked, “NTA she should know better.”

A user wrote, "NTA I don't care what the situation is, NOBODY has the right to touch any part of you without your consent. Your friend is a major a*****e."

Another user stated, “NTA at all. I hate it when other people touch me without my permission. I'm still amazed at the number of people out there who never learned to keep their fucking hands to themselves.”

This article contains remarks made on the internet by individual people and organizations. MEAWW cannot confirm them independently and does not support claims or opinions being made online.