Okay, Hello to anyone whose reading this!

Hi so i’ve actually never had a diary, but i feel this is a great way to open my thoughts on my new hair and what it means to me.

So i’ll start at the beginning i’ve always had thick hair which i recall being an absolute nightmare for my mother and me during my childhood, so obviously when the time came towards secondary school i had to have the perm, at first i thought wow this is great so different! my hair was probably half way down my back.
But then I learnt some of the perils of having long straight hair early on, so many of my peers (i went to a girls school) assumed they knew what was best for my hair, not to mention i had the craziest (still do on occasions!) sideburns to date - ashanti had nothing on me, so with this i took their advice - i put gel in my hair from the local shop, i straightened my hair, put the randomest chemically drenched products in my hair.

And for what?

Looking back at photos my hair was in a steady decline, I went to college and did not change anything but yet at the same time i wasn’t as excited of my hair like everyone else. To be honest I felt it was like a burden washing, blow drying, straightening my hair had become a shambles which led to me chopping it to just above my chin.

So then came uni, where i had become a little bit more intuitive with my scalp though the product I was using wasn’t CG friendly then, i was starting to build a pattern with my hair.

So 1 year after graduating i’m here. I big chopped this saturday pass and I look forward to the perils and triumphs of having natural will bring…

I seem to have a lot to say this one night!

So i wanted just to write about my product use and hopefully get some info on what’s best.

Currently I’m using Lush R&B, i first dampen my hair and then add afterwards the smell is hit and miss and using too much can leave you seeing stars!
I use also Coconut Oil to seal (i think that’s what I’m doing - still getting my head round the terminology!) I do this daily as i think my hair needs a lot of this kind of stuff though it maybe that I big chopped recently but my hair is drier than when relaxed/transitioning.

I wash my hair with the Body Shop Rainforest ‘Shine’ shampoo and conditioner though i may change once i’ve finished the bottle as ‘shine’ isn’t my main priority right about now!

I may try the ‘moisture’ range and I’ve heard good things about tea tree so may head down to Planet Organic where they have some great bargains the john masters organic range is calling me like a thief in the night.

Vent:
Okay i need to vent a little, my diary title is all I’ve been hearing for the past few days.
I had a phone call from my sister who basically didn’t understand why I had cut my hair, and you know when it just comes out being a bunch of negativity? well i don’t do negativity (unless necessary)  so I got bored of the conversation, i haven’t seen this woman’s real hair since last year sometime but i don’t question - hell if you have 50 odd quid to spend on weaves and relaxers and don’t mind balding and what not - good for you, but just like the chancellor of the exchequer my budget doesn’t allow that.

Vent over.

Today i’ve learnt that my shampoo and leave-in have turned against me

Last night I washed my hair with the usual Body Shop Rainforest range, my Lush R&B and Jamaican blaack castor oil…this morning I woke up - my hair was very, very, very dry!!!

In panic i rushed to bathroom drenched my hair, and applied R&B and coconut oil. Order has been restored.
Nay, I woke up an hour ago from an unsheduled nap so no head scarf, and my budget doesn’t permit satin/silk bedding so to my horror there was a bunch of hair on my Argos value pillowcases!

Forshame

So now i’m planning on leaving my products behind because clearly i am getting absolute nowt in the moisture department, i’ve redampened my hair and reapplied my leave-in but i am absolutely sure i’m going to have to do this again before i go to sleep tonight…

Tomorrow i’m off to Planet Organic (no lies but i love this shop) in hunt for this
which might help my issue as well as my chock a block cart waiting for me at the curly emporium

thats the one I fancy chan_p

It looks quite good curlyhairmich!
I’m thinking of topping it up with some flaxseed oil which is meant to strengthen dry hair which is what my hair is resembling.
I’m bagging my hair overnight as this helped when I did it earlier this year and i’ll post up a review if i can get the products tomorrow!

Don’t listen to the negativity! I think TWAs are beautiful, and your hair will be much more manageable if you stick at it!

Hello chan_p ,

Hmm..I’m wondering if your hair doesn’t like too much butter (I know that the Lush R&B has avocado butter way up on the ingredient list) so it’s just sitting on your hair? Or maybe this moisturiser isn’t moisturising enough/long lasting and better used as a sealant? However, I’d imagine that applying it on damp hair as you’ve done should be okay if the latter was true, weird . It may be a certain ingredient in the product (I’m assuming that when you say your hair is dry you mean as a result of using this product). Oh and also I seem to remember that coconut oil can make hair crispy/dry when applied to dry hair (I experienced this myself). The Lush R&B already contains coconut oil as well! Not sure if any of that helped I guess I’m just thinking out loud .

I’m sorry to hear about the negativity you’ve experienced from your family. Initially my Mum didn’t really approve of my natural hair, but with time she’s become more comfortable with it. My Dad didn’t mind at all, in fact he said my hair is my business! My sister has been natural all her life (yet I got the relaxer, no fair!) but she’s chosen to straighten it constantly. It’s funny because when we were younger, I’d wish that my hair was curly and she’d loathe me because she wanted straight hair but my mum didn’t want to relax hers and now we’ve switched sides! It just saddens me when she and other people express embarrassment over natural hair, as though it’s a disgrace .

chan_p - re the silk satin pillow case - pop into a fabric shop and see if you can get an off-cut and you could spread it over your pillow at night and safety pin on at the underside.  (You could take off in the am so it doesn’t spoil the look of the bed) - that way if your not too picky about the colour you may get a bit of fabric quite cheaply.

curlyhairmich - 29 June 2011 05:11 AM

chan_p - re the silk satin pillow case - pop into a fabric shop and see if you can get an off-cut and you could spread it over your pillow at night and safety pin on at the underside.  (You could take off in the am so it doesn’t spoil the look of the bed) - that way if your not too picky about the colour you may get a bit of fabric quite cheaply.

thanks curlyhairmich i may have to do this as my scarf just keeps slipping off when i sleep - i’m a bit of a toss and turner!

Went to Planet Organic today but opted out of buying the protein conditioner as i think part of my hair is dry because i may be applying a bit too much protein - thanks NaturalMane! i had another look at the ingredients of R&B and avocado has the highest protein in any fruit and I remember back when I tried doing egg/mayo treatments my hair dried to the max and was knotted, so I may be saying goodbye to the daily applying of R&B.
Though to day i just wet my hair with water and it’s maintained it’s softness it’s a little dry around my edge but i think less maybe more!

I bought some Flaxseed Oil 5.99 for a really good size, and will be using it along with black castor oil for my hot oil treatments (i may add coconut, but i’m a little hesitant about it)
Also went Body Shop and they were having a little 3 for 2 sale so i picked up the Rainforest Moisture shampoo and conditioner - the little bottles which are only £2, just to hold out til payday when i’ll be getting my product overhaul in to gear!

I’ll try these out tomorrow and hopefully my hair will take better to them and i’ll give the lowdown here!

Good luck with the TWA. Natural hair is a matter of trial and error until you get what works for you.

Okay so I did a massive shop last friday (twas payday) I bought some shea butter, vegetable glycerine, curl junkie hibiscus and banana deep fix and the science of black hair…roughly 55 squid well spent?!

Today the Deep Fix has arrived so I did a quick shampoo, which I haven’t done in 10 days and think my hair was starting to feel it just been really busy and ill but anyhoo.

First of the smell the deep fix has a whiff of fresh bubblegum, it did hit me a bit when i went to take a scoop but it pretty much phased out after a while, my hair was a lot less tangled and combing was a breeze, some of my curls became really defined there is a massive bit of 3c hair in the middle of my head, which i was confusing for left over relaxed bits and kept chopping them off - but they’re actually supposed to be there!

Which leads me on to my hair type, now i’m not that good with the number game but i’m thinking 4b/c front back and sides and 3c in the middle but that seems a bit weird but in comparing to other photos my hair does seem to resemble that so maybe when it get’s a bit longer it maybe something completely different.

My hair has grown though and it seems thicker i’m rolling on to three inches and hopefully will reach my goal of 6 by xmas!
i can comfortably get a twist going so may try doing a whole head of short twists and do a twist out for the week.

oh dear.

So yesterday i wrote about my Curl Junkie conditioner and how it felt great, and was a big help in detangling my hair.

oh dear.

My hair looked so bad yesterday, I mean I know I was at work for a bunch of hours but it looked awful, very picky like I had a hard time trying to keep it down a lot of stray bits were out and about. It looked nothing like it had previously done, in fact it resembled my hair straight after I big chopped and hadn’t evened it out. It is also very knotty especially in the middle and am having a hard time detangling today

Now I don’t want to blame Curl Junkie (no i do) but I read the back and it does say it would possibly define curls, maybe that’s what it was trying to do either way I’m off to deep condition with my Body Shop regulars and JBCO and Flaxseed mix.
If my hair reverts to before I’ll know lil miss curl junkie was the cause, which seems a shame because it has made my hair a lot softer than previous, so I am tempted to keep but then I will be getting my shea butter and glycerine tomorrow so possibly there is no need if I can get a similar softness with the shea butter, and moisture from the glycerin.

I’ve added some b4 and after but they don’t really do it justice as i’ve been trying to sort out my hair today like crazy, though some of you might look and think it’s not that bad!

Congrats on your BC. People will always be negative about anything different.

Sorry to hear about the Curly Junkie mishap . Did you use it alone? Also, could you have applied it too generously? Maybe it is better used as a deep conditioner (shorter duration in the hair) as opposed to a leave-in (longer duration) for your hair (I’m assuming that your results came from using it as a leave-in conditioner).

Thanks MuMu, shame others can’t enjoy what i am experiencing now! 

NaturalMane - 13 July 2011 01:11 AM

Sorry to hear about the Curly Junkie mishap . Did you use it alone? Also, could you have applied it too generously? Maybe it is better used as a deep conditioner (shorter duration in the hair) as opposed to a leave-in (longer duration) for your hair (I’m assuming that your results came from using it as a leave-in conditioner).

The weird thing is i only left it on for ten minutes as a deep conditioner, because it felt a little bit too gunky for use as a leave in, i’m going to leave it for the time being, and may try again when i have some more length!

I co-washed yesterday with BS Rainforest Moisture Conditioner and it actually had the same easy detangling effect as Curl Junkie, yet no stringy hair aftermath - so i may just stick with this for the meantime, though I have been reading up on the CG way, and apparently the CJ deep fix is good as a rinse out so later on in the year I may combine the two as right now i like the way my conditioner is working out for me!

Last night I did my twist and I’ve just taken them out, really happy with the results as this is my first proper twist out that will take to the public! my relaxed hair attempts were abysmal to say the least again the photos don’t give it huge justice but the curls really came out quite defined esp. in the middle and back the front however was a little meh, but it is a little shorter and a lot more fluffy in this region possibly with some more hair growth they can a bit more defined!

The rest of my big shop has arrived veg. glycerin and shea butter - I actually got a lot more shea butter than i bargined for 250g for £6.50 is pretty decent (like a small tub of flora) considering you get a lot from a little - it comes in different sized chunks so you don’t need to carve away to use some.

Currently locked into the science of black hair, this book is an essential and i am only a quarter of the way in and i’ve already just bought some litmus paper off ebay from for £1.50!! the bit about oils (i skipped a bit!) is very informative, though i have been using flaxseed it is unsaturated and more likely to sit on my hair which is why coconut oil is a huge favourite for hair because it is saturated, I may revert now that I have some glycerin and shea butter my hair will hopefully not be as dry as when i first started!

Also i’m worried about combing and shedding, i currently spritz with water and comb day and night, i get probably the equal amount of hair coming out daily roughly 20 coils/kinks of hair would be interested to hear other peoples regimes and tips

The results of your twist out is lovely. I have never succeded to get such cute twist outs.