British Curlies

Curl Drama

Dear Anita I have Heat Damaged Curls!

by Anita Grant

Dear Desperately Unhappy,

All hair is made up of alpha-keratin which is a protein.

Our hair is curly because of the amino acids contained within the keratin proteins called cysteines.

Cysteines link to each other by disulfide bonds (the connection of two sulfur atoms).

The more disulfide bonds the curlier the hair.

Disulfide bonds are not affected by water in any way.

Note:

There are other factors that will determine how curly one's hair is like pore size, etc.. but I don't want to digress.

When these disulfide bonds are broken, damaged or denatured it is difficult to reverse the process to have your hair return to its former curly glory.

When you disrupt the protein structure of your hair with the application of heat, inadequate pH levels, chemical relaxers, etc. this is known as "denaturing" the protein.

In some cases the process of denaturing is reversible.

However, in most cases it is not.

For example:

Egg whites, which are entirely made of protein (ovalbumin) are sort of a slimy liquid before heat is applied.

Once heat is applied it is transformed into a solid and cannot go back to its original slimy liquid state.

The denatured protein bonds at the end of your hair will not reform.

However, your original hair will simply grow back (re-growth) from the roots, replacing your straightened hair with what you had originally.

So, in your case, the application of heat is in effect denaturing the protein bonds, thus causing your naturally curly hair to split all the way up the hair shaft. Unless you trim your hair above the line of demarcation (where re-growth meets straight hair) or more your hair will continue to remain pin straight at the ends.