A charming, shaggy-haired girl called Phoebe Braswell doesn’t know what a hairbrush is. Due to a rare genetic disorder, she belongs to a small category of people whose hair is so different from normal that it is easier to leave it alone than to try to fix it somehow.
The girl, and she is still 21 months old, is not yet aware of her uniqueness, but her mother has a hard time – there will always be someone who will reproach her for not looking after her daughter, completely unaware of what is going on.
Phoebe’s mother says she has tried dozens of different products in an attempt to gently and painlessly get her daughter’s hair into some semblance of order. To no avail. The girl wakes up and her hair stands up on end, which, while looking adorable, is still somewhat disconcerting.
She’s young now and doesn’t give it a second thought, but what happens when the age-old girlish craving for beauty overtakes her? It’s one thing to look like a cartoon character as a child, and quite another to live with it all your life.
For the first time, mom realized that something was wrong with her daughter’s hair when she was three months old. Then it turned out that Phoebe had the same, strange and unpleasant, “uncombable hair syndrome.” Instead of a round shape, her hairs are triangular, they have a jagged surface and are strongly twisted – combing this is like wading through a dense forest thicket.
Power methods just lead to terrible pain, so it’s easiest to do what Phoebe’s mom figured out. She clings to her daughter a bow or a hairpin and everyone thinks that this is the author’s hairstyle.
It is unrealistic to cure or eliminate this syndrome; moreover, doctors are not at all sure that it is worth doing. It is likely that with age, Phoebe’s hair will change and become more “compliant.” Well, if not, no big deal. The great scientist is an example of this.
