Since 2000 I grow my hair with a purpose: Locks of Love.
Since my hair grows very slow it takes 3-4 years to have a 13" length gift and be left with something myself :-)
I love my hair, it is a nice hair. I really take care of it, and I use good shampoo and conditioner (Biosilk, Abba, Biogenol). The good news is that here my hair is much healthier than down in AZ, since it is not as dry, and is much curlier, it does not grow faster though :-)
I expect that by Christmas or my birthday next year my hair will be long enough to be a gift of love.
My Mom had very long hair, till her ankle. I cut it off for her till her shoulders; I think it was ten years ago, and now is back as long as her extended hand. My Mom's hair grows like grass in my yard :-) Her hair is much nicer, much stronger, now is grey, but once was dark brown, almost black.
I had my first ever hair cut when I graduated middle school and went off to commute for high school. I remember when I cut my hair my Mom was very upset. It was Dad who came with me to the hair salon to have it cut. I left having my hair longer than my hand and I came home with shoulder-long hair and the rest of it in a plastic bag ... I cried morning and evening for two weeks, and Mom cried with me. Then when I graduated from high school I had another major hair cut. That was by a mistake, the hair dresser choped up my hair and the only way to have a decent shape for graduation was to cut it all. I had the shortest hair among all guys (boys also!). My hair was less than 1"! I had little round eye glasses (the John Lennon style). On the class pictures everyone thought I was a boy :-) Then I went to college and I kept my hair short till after graduation when I started my engineering career. Then I started to grow my hair again.
But now I don't just throw my hair in the trash. I make a gift to Locks of Love and I feel very good about that. I don 't mind having for Christmas short hair again. Actually I am looking forward, knowing that someone will be happy to have it and perhaps the person will think about how much I loved my hair to make it a Christmas gift.