Utah mom is slammed for letting her five-year-old daughter bleach her hair

A Utah influencer has come under fire for letting her five-year-old daughter bleach her hair after documenting their heartwarming trip to the salon on TikTok. 

Demi Lucy May Engemann, who calls herself the ‘CEO of cool mom’ in her bio, shared this week that her little girl Maude got to skip school for the day and join her for a mother-daughter hair appointment. 

‘My daughter asked if she could bleach her hair so she could put pink in it,’ the 28-year-old mom explained at the start of the now-viral video, which has been viewed more than 9.7 million times. 

Engemann, who calls herself the ‘CEO of cool mom’ in her bio, documented their heartwarming mother-daughter trip to the salon 

The mom (pictured with Maude before their appointment) explained that her daughter wanted to bleach her hair and then color it pink

The footage shows Maude smiling brightly as the hair stylist separates her strands with pieces of foil and expertly highlights her dark blonde hair. 

‘She was so excited and felt so big,’ Engemann wrote in the on-screen text. 

Maude looked like she was having a blast at the salon, where she got to help mix dye and enjoy some snacks while her color set. At one point, she sweetly gave the camera a thumbs up. 

The little girl couldn’t wait to see her new look, and she started clapping after the foils were taken out of her hair. 

‘She got so excited the minute she saw how blonde it was!’ explained Engemann, who opted for some lowlights that day. 

Engemann let Maude skip school for the hair appointment, and the little girl looked like she was having a blast at the salon

The footage shows Maude smiling brightly and giving a thumbs up as the hair stylist separates her strands with pieces of foil and expertly highlights her dark blonde hair

The influencer’s husband, Bret Engemann, brought them Starbucks while they were getting pampered and ‘walked right passed the room’ because he didn’t recognize his stepdaughter with her new hair.

‘Such a fun day with my girl,’ she added at the end of the clip.

Engemann also shared some before-and-after videos of Maude happily showing off her new blonde hair, though the response has been mixed. 

While some saw it as a sweet mother-daughter moment, others were quick to mom shame her for allowing her young child to have her hair bleached. 

‘My mom did this to me too and it took me 18 years to be comfortable and love my true self as a brunette again,’ one person commented. 

Engemann, who also got her hair colored, shared that Maude was ‘so excited and felt so big’ 

The little girl even got to help the hair stylist mix dye while her color was processing 

Maude couldn’t wait to see her new look, and she started clapping after the foils were taken out of her hair

‘My mom did this and it just started years of dying and damaging my hair,’ someone else shared, while another stranger simply asked, ‘Why????’

‘Absolutely not,’ one critic chimed in. ‘There are safe dyes to make it pink, bleaching it was a hard no.’ 

Despite all of the backlash, there were also plenty of people who came to the mom’s defense and praised her for letting her daughter experiment with her appearance. 

‘This is precious. She’ll remember this forever,’ one fan wrote. 

‘Life is so short and this is so fun,’ someone else agreed. This is for sure a core memory for her.’ 

‘She got so excited the minute she saw how blonde it was!’ Engemann explained 

Engemann also shared some before-and-after videos of Maude happily showing off her new blonde hair, though the response has been mixed

While some saw it as a sweet mother-daughter moment, others were quick to mom shame Engemann for allowing her young child to have her hair bleached

‘People relax. If [you] see the video the roots were not bleached!!!!’ another pointed out. ‘Literally painless and she had a blast and [is] loving it.’ 

Engemann addressed the controversy in her latest video, saying she is ‘exhausted’ by all of the ‘mom shamers and trolls’ who have criticized her for getting Maude’s hair bleached. 

‘You can disagree, that’s fine,’ she noted. ‘But the minute name calling starts or mom shaming starts based off one decision you disagree with, that’s where I’m going to put an end to that.’

Engemann explained that her daughter recently came home from school and told her about a friend who had her hair colored purple.

‘She’s super into unicorns right now and Barbies. She said that she wanted to have a color in her hair, so we went to the store and got a temporary pink shampoo,’ the mom continued. 

Engemann addressed the controversy in her latest video, saying she is ‘exhausted’ by all of the ‘mom shamers and trolls’ who have criticized her for her decision 

The mom explained that Maude wanted to color her hair pink, but the temporary dye didn’t really work in her hair (pictured). She asked to go blonde so the color would show up better 

‘She was super excited, but then after a couple of days, she was like, “I can’t see it. It’s not showing up like my friend’s.”‘

Engemann said she had to explain to her daughter that the reason her friend’s hair color was showing up brighter was that she has blonde hair. 

‘That’s when she expressed to me that she wanted to put blonde in her hair so that the color would show up better,’ she recalled. 

‘I ran it by her dad to make sure he would be okay with that because I know it’s kind of a controversial decision, and he agreed that as long as we did it right, took her into a professional, and just did it properly, that would be fine.’

A number of commenters wanted to know why her daughter’s hair wasn’t pink yet, and she explained that they were waiting until after their family pictures were taken. 

‘I posted this video because it was such a special and fun bonding moment with my daughter, and it’s sad that the internet has to turn that into a negative in any way,’ Engemann said 

Despite all of the backlash, there were also plenty of people who came to the mom’s defense and praised her for letting her daughter experiment with her appearance

‘For those of you jumping to conclusions and saying, “Oh, this was my decision’ and that “I wanted her to be blonde in my family photos.” That simply is just not true,’ she hit back.

‘I would never put that on my daughter and make her feel like she needs to change anything about herself. That’s not the type of person I am. That’s not the type of mom that I am, and I would never impose my will onto my daughter.’

Engemann also opened up about why she decided to share the footage, which ultimately made her a target for criticism.  

‘I posted this video because it was such a special and fun bonding moment with my daughter, and it’s sad that the internet has to turn that into a negative in any way,’ she said.   

‘If you are a mom out here mom shaming, do better,’ she added.