Yeah, My Kid Has Blue Hair

I may have mentioned this once or twice, but I have identical triplets. Ever since they were babies, I have resisted dressing them exactly the same (the image of three children that look the same and are dressed the same makes me hear horror movie music in my head) and have tried to foster independence as much as possible.

When they were babies, when I truly struggled to determine their individual personalities, I took each on a trip with me. It was a chance to flood them with one-on-one attention and to truly be able to focus on one child. Really get to know him, as strange as that sounds. People would ask, “do they have different personalities?” and I would indigently retort, “of course they do!” but heck if I could tell you how they were different.

My resolve not to dress them the same kind of went out the window when they started preschool because they wear a uniform. Their teachers and the school administrators got used to learning which color shoe each boy wore. In PreK-4, we put them in separate classes.

IMG_1654But there’s only so much you can do to make three children with the same DNA distinguishable.

So when Oliver asked me if he could dye his hair blue, I immediately said yes. (Though I did draw the line at bleaching it first so it could be the bright turquoise of a YouTube star he first saw it on. And it ended up more aqua than blue.)

The stranger that sees my little blue-haired boy walking next to me at the store might make assumptions about him and me. That he is some kind of troublemaker and that I’m a pushover. But what they don’t know is that Oliver is a total rule-follower and made me check with the school before we did it. And my parenting style is, if no one’s getting hurt, why not? (Also I have a blue chunk of hair. But that’s my midlife crisis hair, totally unrelated.)

When I see Oliver with his blue hair, I see a brave boy who wants to stand out from the sea of triplets he looks like. Who doesn’t mind that he might get stares, even though he’s a pretty shy kid. Who doesn’t mind being different. Who wants to be different. And that makes me a very happy mama. I worried so much when the boys were infants that they would suffer from identity crises as they got older, and people struggled to know who is who. But I no longer worry.

Pam Kocke
My name is Pam, and I live in Algiers Point with my husband George and my identical triplets Linus, Oliver, and Miles. I work from home as a Happiness Engineer for Automattic. I enjoy reading and photography and sewing (and blogging!)

6 COMMENTS

  1. Love it! This aptly describes my home situation and my twins! One has blonde curls while the other has magenta fading into turquoise hair. They don’t want to look the same or be confused one for the other. Now that I understand, I’m very okay with it. ?

  2. I, the mother of fraternal twins (I also refuse to dress my boys alike), with blue streaks in my hair (and plenty of stares myself), applaud you and Oliver! Sounds like you’re doing a great job, mama.

  3. As a teacher at your kids’ school, all I can say is thank you! With their hair all different these days, it’s so much easier to remember who is who. Of course, I had to ask my kid which boy has the blue hair. Haha! She, in preteen fashion, thinks I am completely clueless since I still can’t magically tell them apart. Cool shade of bluet, by the way.

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