Everyone craves a change from time to time.

It's natural and since it grows back, our hair is often the thing we turn to fulfill that desire. Anything can spark a sudden urge to switch things up, a messy breakup, a promotion at work or maybe sometimes we just want to try something new.

For me, the need for a new look was sparked by one simple sentence: "Mom, I'm gay."

After letting my mom in on my best kept and biggest secret, I knew something had to shift. I needed to physically embody my sexuality finally, after keeping it a secret for so long. So naturally, I headed down to the salon, sat down and got the most tragic half-shave haircut I've ever had.

Now, don't get me wrong, at the moment that half shaved asymmetrical bob was everything to me. It felt so right, to me. However, looking back now almost four years later I can't help but wonder how I wasn't teased mercilessly.

The real change, the one that stuck, came around about a year after. I finally said goodbye to the one piece of long hair I had been holding on to. Sitting in the same salon, I traded in the asymmetrical half-shave for the real deal! A full shave, both sides and the back with just a little bit left up top.

When my hairdresser spun me around to take a look after it was all said and done, immediately had tears in my eyes and couldn't do much more than alternate between "thank you" and "oh my god I loved it."

As a masculine-presenting queer woman, there was this kind of catharsis that happened when I finally got the "big chop." I was finally seeing myself as I wanted to be seen. I got the typical lesbian haircut, which for me meant that I finally fully embraced my sexuality and was putting out there for the world to see too. My hair now serves as a kind of unsaid "Yes, what you're thinking is right. I am gay and I'm proud of it!"

With all of the good, naturally, there comes some bad too. Well, not even bad just....interesting. My new haircut coupled with my love of menswear really threw some people for a loop. My mom was asked questions like "does your son want another cup of coffee?" Or "Oh make him carry the groceries to the car."

When we would both look at these people in deep confusion, they would move back at me as if it were the most obvious thing in the world. I would correct them as politely as I could and go about my day but I'd be lying if I said it didn't bother me at times.

Now though, it doesn't even phase me. Call me sir, bro, ma'am miss, it doesn't really matter because at the end of the day I know who I am. And I couldn't be happier with or more thankful for my hair. It's helped really feel like myself and become a powerful queer woman that owns her identity and her journey.

I can say with nothing but confidence that cutting off all of my hair was by far the best decision I've ever made!