HOLY COW! Erin has red hair!

I had to say holy cow for Kyle. Mike said it this weekend and Kyle thought it highly amusing. He has continued to say it in a very boisterous way. So, HOLY COW! Erin has red hair!

I will preface this blog post by saying that I love Erin’s beautiful red hair and I hope it stays red. Although she’s a beautiful girl no matter what color hair she has. :-) I will also preface it by saying I don’t mind talking about her hair, so please don’t be offended or worried if you think I’m talking about you, LOL!

Mike and I were surprised to have a child with red hair. We each have a cousin with red hair, but that’s it. And they are cousins who live far away, so we don’t even see them often to be “reminded” of the red hair. So Erin’s hair was a surprise.

What is more surprising to me, however, is what a huge topic of conversation her hair is. There is not a day that goes by, and I am in no way exaggerating here, that I don’t hear multiple times, “Wow! She has red hair!” or “Where did that red hair come from?” and often, “What beautiful red hair!” This is from people we know, but also from strangers who stop me in the grocery store. People who stand in line by me at the post office. People at the next table in a restaurant. You name it… wherever I go, I get comments about her hair. It seems that anyone who sees a baby with red hair has to make sure I have noticed that yes, my baby’s hair is red. And it’s ongoing conversations with the same people… yes, her hair is still red six months later.

Two people have mentioned to me that they read articles that red hair is headed (ha, a pun) toward extinction. I found this very interesting, so I did a little bit or research on red hair, extinction, genes, etc.

Extinction – nope. This story has gone around several times, and resurfaces occasionally. The bottom line is that while red hair may continue to become increasingly rare, unless every single person on the planet with the red hair gene dies without reproducing it cannot go extinct. Makes sense.

Why red hair? Red hair is a mutation of the MC1R gene. Because it’s a recessive gene, both Mike and I had to have the mutated gene in order to create beautiful red-headed Erin. And because it’s recessive it can easily skip around in the family tree. That said, because Mike and I both have the mutated MC1R gene, our kids had a 1 in 4 chance of having red hair. Those odds are not too bad, but the odds that Mike and I both had it were higher since only about 4% of the population has a mutated MC1R gene. And while I always thought of a "mutated" gene in a negative way, resulting in disease or defects, I now see that "mutated" can lead to something wonderful and beautiful!

Forgot about the theories of genetics? (Junior high science was a long time ago for many of us!) There are dominant and recessive genes. You get your genes from each of your parents, and if you are given a dominant gene and a recessive gene for a particular trait, the dominant one will override it. Hair color is less understood than other genes, and you actually get eight genes for it, four from each parent. Most determine where you fall on a scale of black hair to blond, and others throw in the red hair gene. (Thus you could have red hair, but be on the blond end, and be a strawberry blond.)

So the bottom line is Erin has red hair, Mike and I both have recessive mutated MC1R genes, and we will continue to smile and talk about her hair every day because we love to talk about Erin!