'To all the mums out there that can do their daughter's hair, I admire and envy you.'

There are two types of mums – those who can do their child’s hair and those that can’t. I definitely fall within the latter category much to the dismay of my girls and as much as I have really tried to change this fact.

In our house it has come to the stage where my two daughters don’t even request anything apart from ponytails anymore because they know that it is just not going to happen. In fact, the reality is, even ponytails are a challenge.

Now most of this is just my natural inability to do hair, including my own. My own hair is usually out (on special occasions) or 99 per cent of the time it is just thrown into a pony tail with bumps, strange angles, fluffy bits and ten million flyaways (for the flyaways, I blame the children).

In my defence though, some of the blame does not fall on me, but their father who when creating these children ‘blessed’ them with the curly hair gene *sigh - bloody men*. So, not only can I not do the easiest type of hair but when my two girls, who love dressing up and all things ‘girly’, present me with their curly locks, all I can do is shake my head and say, “I’m sorry.”

My inability to do hair has created a sense of hair guilt of epic proportion. The shame often possesses me, especially when I take my eldest into school or my youngest to Kinder and see the ‘others’. I will often look around me, at them, the ‘others’ - the girls who have adorned upon their heads intricate braids or immaculate hairstyles without a strand out of place - and just feel my stomach drop in hair remorse. Next to them I observe my two girls who look like they have spent the night in the wilderness despite half an hour of my morning spent trying my best to do something with it.

I have done what any good mother would do and researched. I have tried to learn, I really have. I have purchased books, hair tools, hair product, I have YouTubed hair tutorials, I have even spent afternoons practising, trying my absolute hardest to work it out. Between all my physical movements being nothing but uncoordinated, my ridiculously stubborn fingers, my children’s curly hair and their constant wriggling, it just never ends well.

You may think I am being over dramatic, that really this is nothing to be concerned about, but I have the final nail in the hair coffin; something that even those mums who can do hair dread, *cue dramatic music* …the ballet bun.

Yep, my eldest daughter, the one who also happens to have the curliest hair, does ballet, which means every week I have to attempt to put it into a bun; not just any bun, a ballet bun. Each Saturday morning, I usually end up frustrated and yelling at someone because it just doesn’t look like it is meant to but when it is concert time, it almost becomes too much for me.

The pressure of the ballet bun at concert time is ridiculous, actual notes are sent home and tutorial videos are put on the dance school’s Facebook about how to do it correctly and how important it is to get right. The hardest part is the pony tail they say, well BS, the whole thing is the hardest part and it almost always leads me to a mini breakdown.

As a bad hair mum, the effort to, at least, get this one hairstyle done correctly for the year leads me to overcompensate. I pre-prepare the ballet bun styling environment, where I will lay out the multiple types of pins, nets, hair ties, hair sprays, hair brushes and I spend up to an hour trying to get her curly hair into a smooth, flat pony tail, with a fried egg-shaped bun, not a boiled egg shape as per the directions. There are often screams of frustration, tears of heartache and pain, and finally some sort of ‘ballet bun’ that I am not ashamed to let my daughter walk out of the door with.

For all the mums out there that can do hair, I admire you, I envy you, there are times I would do anything to be you. To my girls, mum is so sorry.

Are you a gun at doing your daughter's hair or can you relate to Shona's struggle? Tell us in a comment below.