I’ve done what women fear most. I’ve broken up with my hair stylist.

As my friend Doug often writes, <clutch pearls.>

Guys may not understand, but a girl’s hair stylist is sacred. It’s easily right next to mother, sister, best friend, and cat on the list of those we tell our secrets (and everyone else’s) to.

The one I left had been doing my hair for almost 20 years. We’ll call him Mark. He had all the aspects of a great stylist – he was gay, handsome and vacationed at the best destinations. Mark was introduced to me by my mother, who has gone to him forever. He owns a posh shop in a ritzy location and caters to beautiful people. Models stomp through the salon all day showing off their shoes and a variety of outfits I can’t afford. There’s little that reduces your self-esteem like wearing a frumpy black smock and sporting little hair sandwiches wrapped in aluminum foil on your head as some 6’1″ goddess with flawless skin and hair twirls in front of you.

And the cost! The expense of the haircut/color/highlights versus the result was just not balancing out. Frankly, for the $225 before tip that I forked over, I should have been swooning every time I saw myself in the mirror. I definitely shouldn’t be going home and staring in the mirror making angry face.

The realization that I needed to change finally sank in when I attended my mother’s 70+ birthday party. I looked around the dining room at all the dozen or so women in attendance and realized they very nearly had the same haircut as my mother – each and every one. I sassily pointed it out to my husband who responded, “Ann, you are dangerously close to having your mother’s haircut too.”

<GASP. Clutch pearls.>

He was right. Time for a new gay.

I mean guy.

A STRAIGHT guy at a convenient location that is not nearly so hoity-toity.

D. has attitude, a wife and kids, and tattoos.

He even tells me I came in sporting “Soccer mom hair.”

That’s the kind of opinion I NEED from a straight guy. Believe me, soccer mom hair was not viewed as a compliment by me, nor was it meant as one by him. I was actually wandering around with soccer mom hair. Kill me.

At the end of an hour that little situation was corrected. Soccer mom is dead. Long live the cross between Jenna Elfman and Robin Wright (in House of Cards.)

Let’s just pray D. does some good color, because I’m going to be very sad if I have to crawl back, ask for forgiveness, and explain to Mark why my hair has been razored.

“I was attacked by a hair dressing gang of ruffians…”