[Case Study] My Mother’s Face Was Looking Back At Me

I got a new haircut in September 2026, and my mother’s face was looking back at me in the mirror. Here’s what I did.

Read time: 6 min.

My hairdresser spun the chair around so I could see my new haircut.

I had gone from shoulder length to a pixie cut. The last time I had one, I was 45. I’m 51 now.

The first thing that came through my mind was: “oh my God, you look like your mother. And you have your father’s neck.”

My mom is 82. And there she was, in my face, in the mirror.

For the next three weeks, I stopped posting on social media. No longer showing on IG stories. s. I stopped getting on camera. 

Being on camera is my job. Normally I do it freely, without a second thought about my body.

NB: This case study is my story. Not one from a client. This is the story of me doing what I tell my client to do. I reach for my own body acceptance challenge and let it carry me through showing up on camera again.

Why I cut my hair in the first place

Simplifying my life was the whole intention when I booked the appointment. I’m not someone who stands in the mirror for hours. I don’t even wear makeup. With longer hair, it was a ten-minute blowout, flat iron and styling every day, and I didn’t want that anymore.

What I didn’t account for was the six years since my last pixie cut. My body changed in those six years. My face got droopier. My neck got droopier. I knew that. I see myself every day. But I hadn’t seen it like that, with nothing framing it, with my mother looking back at me.

And first the spiral

That first thought sent me into a spiral. I was dissatisfied with my face and my neck. I questioned my choice of haircut. If I’m honest, there was a little bit of disgust in there too.

So I went quiet.

It took me about three days to clock what was really going on. It wasn’t the haircut. My hairdresser did an amazing job.

Seeing my mother’s face in the mirror was confirmation that I was getting old. And that everybody would see me as getting old now.

Thirty-two thoughts about getting old

I grabbed my journal and wrote down every thought in ink so I could actually see them. I had over 32 thoughts about that one moment in the mirror.

“I’ll be no longer relevant. I’m heading towards the end. I’m no longer attractive. I’m not going to be able to keep up.”

Then I read them back, and something stopped me.

None of those 32 thoughts were about the size of my body.

I spent 25 years inside diet culture and another decade taking it apart. My beliefs about size, health and weight have changed. They don’t run me anymore. So my brain went to the belief system that was still sitting in me, untouched. Ageism.

Somewhere along the way, I learned that old means not relevant. And my biggest fear is not being relevant.

Women have been handed two instructions our whole adult lives. Be thin. Be young. I had spent years dismantling the first one. I had never once looked at the second.

I gave myself space, not hiding

I didn’t force myself back on camera. I gave myself about two and a half weeks of deliberate space.

That wasn’t hiding, and it wasn’t performing. I let myself feel the shock and the disgust without pretending they weren’t there. It makes total sense that I would think those thoughts. I’ve been exposed to that message for 40 years of adult life. Of course they came in.

Then I decided ahead of time what I would think the next time my mom’s face and my dad’s neck looked back at me:

My body is wise. It is a living map of everything I have survived, loved, and accomplished. I'm entering a new era of my life where I am and no longer seeking.

I practiced that until it felt safe. Then I came back.

A new layer of body acceptance

You can make peace with your size and still get blindsided by your mother’s face in a salon mirror at 51.

That doesn’t mean the work you did failed. It means there’s a layer you haven’t reached yet. For a lot of us, around this age, that layer is about getting older. The face changes. The neck changes. Our mothers start arriving in our reflection, and with them comes everything we were taught about what an older woman is worth.

You don’t have to love every reflection. You learn what to do when one hits you.

This is where I’m now 3 weeks later

I love my haircut. It’s the best fucking thing I’ve ever done. It takes me two and a half minutes to dry my hair. A little hair wax, a shake of my head, and I’m done.

It’s the same haircut that sent me spiraling three weeks ago. What changed is what I think when I look at it.

The mirror didn’t show me a problem with my face. It showed me a belief I had never examined, because I was busy with the other one. Being at peace with my body size didn’t protect me from it. It just cleared the way so I could see it.

So here is the question I want to leave you with: when you see your mother’s face in yours, what do you believe it means about you?

You don't have to love every reflection. You learn what to do when a reflection hits you.

This Is The Work I Do With Women

We’re all the same in this way. You can make peace with your size and still get blindsided by your mother’s face in a salon mirror at 51. That doesn’t mean the process failed. It means there’s a new layer, and you have a tool for it.

You don’t have to love every reflection. You learn what to do when a reflection hits you.

That’s what we practice inside the Body Acceptance Challenge.

If my story hits home, I’d love for you to join me in the next cohort.

Join me in the Body Acceptance Challenge.

With love,

Stephanie