So I figured I’d start off by talking about me. This blog is mostly for my personal use and to keep up with things for myself, but anyone can feel free to read it. I’ll say now that this will probably be a pretty long post. So it’s definitely not necessary to read it. It’s just a bit about my & my hair care before I decided to start a healthy hair journey.
I’m currently a college sophomore beginning my healthy hair journey. I got my first relaxer about 7 years ago (after begging and pleading with my mother for a while). I was old enough at the time that I still remember my hair texture. I had very thick hair, which I hated to get combed. It was long, but I dealt with a lot of shrinkage. It was also so soft that heat alone would only keep it straight for a few hours at best. I wanted to be like all my friends who had straight (relaxed) hair. So finally, when my mother could arrange for me to go to the beauty salon every 2 weeks, she let me get a relaxer.
My hair did pretty good, even up to this point, despite all the damage I caused to it. When I got to high school, I had my hair bleached about 3 times, got a permanent color, and then finally stuck to rinses. I still had my bi weekly hair appointments at the salon, so my hair was at least being taken care of to an extent. It grew, but because of the color, I was constantly trimming split ends.
Then college happened. Up until my senior year of high school I had never had to do my own hair. I honestly didn’t even know how to wash my own hair. A few months before I graduated I started doing my own hair so I would have practice before I left. So every two weeks I was washing my hair, blow drying, and flat ironing. This wasn’t the best idea with my relaxed and colored hair, but I didn’t know any better then. Again, despite all the damage, my hair grew longer than it ever had before. BUT, I had the worst split ends and I could see my hair was thinning, especially toward the bottom. I had no idea what to do, so sadly I kept doing what I was doing.
It wasn’t until after my first year of college that I really started researching about hair and reading a lot of hair forums. I learned about moisturizing & sealing, heat protection, and air drying. Things I’ve never heard about or even considered. At that point I had been stretching my relaxers, but that was only because I was obsessed with length. My longest stretch had been 4 months.
Anyway, like I said I had been reading all about healthy hair. At first I was going to try to have a HHJ with relaxed hair. As I thought more about it, I decided to transition to natural hair. Reasons:
1. Even with stretching my relaxers, I would have to go to the salon 3-4 times a year just to pay someone to do it (I would never trust myself to relax at home)
2. The relaxer is damaging to the hair. Every time I was in the salon I would see ladies who had been relaxing their whole lives. Most had short, breaking hair. Even if they had longer hair, it was thin and brittle looking.
3. I realized that I would be getting relaxers for the rest of my life. Seriously, who wants to do that?
4. I want to get back to my original, natural texture. I think natural hair can be beautiful. When I got a relaxer, I just wanted straight, manageable hair. Now that I’ve done research, I see that my hair can be natural and still manageable.
5. No more worrying about “scratching in my head” before a relaxer lol
6. Length retention
I know my hair can grow with a relaxer, but I don’t think it will reach it’s strongest and healthiest potential unless I’m natural. I will be transitioning without the big chop because I prefer long hair. Short hair may work for some people, but it doesn’t compliment my face at all! Lol.
So, this had just been a little bit about me. If anyone wonders why I’m going natural, or anything about my hair before my HHJ this is it 🙂
My Healthy Hair Journey 