My Journey Back to Natural Hair

@CurlyNikki Chunky Twist N Curl Method

My journey back to my natural (non-chemically processed) hair began in May 2006 after I was forced to give up perms for 3 months. Up until then, I would have a chemical relaxer done every 6-8 weeks either, by my mother, aunt or beautician since I was 5 years old. Yes, I agree, five is indeed extremely young for any child to have their hair chemically processed. Unfortunately, for me I had curious George for an aunt who decided, she wanted to see what would happen to my hair if she used her left over relaxer on me. My natural virgin curls were murdered. I still loathe Aunt Curios George from time to time; can you sense it? LOL

To my lament, my mother had no idea that she could of just stopped the pain staking and costly cycle that was about to begin; by simply letting the perm grow out. To add insult to injury, because I am Dominican it is common for girls to have their hair perm-ed.  In addition, it isn’t rare for Dominican beauticians to categorize hair as either “good” or “bad”, My hair now fell under “bad”. With that being said, I will take a moment to educate all of you a bit. There is no such thing as “good” or “bad” hair. Here we go… these are a few of the appropriate and inoffensive descriptions for hair types and/ or textures

Curly, Wavy, Kinky, Brittle, Coarse, Flat, Fine, Dry, Thin, Thick, Frizzy and Straight

Now that we have that out of the way, I digress, since everyone around my mother and I were accustomed to perms my mother felt she was doing the right thing by continuing and maintaining the chemical process. I admit although always had a fresh blow out; there were numerous occasions where I badly yearned to have easy carefree curly hair like my cousins.

My poor mother isn’t the only one to blame for my delay in quitting perms. After becoming a young adult, I never tried to educate myself on how you can get your hair back to its natural state. I pretty much assumed as well, that this was what I would have to do with my hair for the rest of my life.

I highly doubt that if it wasn’t for the incident that gave me no other choice but to give relaxers a break I would have probably continued to perm my hair for a few more years.

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Transitioning, Wash and set with the roots blown.

Transitioning - Wet look with mousse and lots of scrunching.

Transitioning - Blow out

After going cold turkey and quitting perms in ‘06, I discovered that my new growth was pliable, soft and manageable CURLS ! You can’t even begin to imagine my excitement. Me? With curly hair? After crying, begging and even wishing on the stars up above , Me! I had curly hair!

I would run the tips of my fingers through my hair all day just to feel and “check” that I really did have curls growing. In delight, that I may soon have curly hair I would even ask my friends and mother to check my new growth too. After almost a year of slow grow out process I decided to chop it all off to speed things up.

I still hadn’t discovered or created a natural hair process. I would simply blow my hair dry with the comb attachment and then flat iron. As my hair began to grow longer, I would then do a wash and set only blowing the roots.

It took what seemed like forever for all of the processed hair to completely grow out but once it did, I was in heaven. I no longer had two different textures of hair to work with and wash & go became my staple for occasions in which I wasn’t able to get to the salon.

After Chopping it all off!

Growing out- Blown out

Growing out - Curly

A few weeks ago while on twitter – my hub for informative sources; I discovered @CurlyNikki a natural hair guru and I could not be happier. After reading her blog http://www.curlynikki.com/ and viewing her pictures I now have learned new ways to manage and maintain my curly locks. I recently tried her Chunky Twist-n-Curl method and loved the results (see photo at the start of post). I had tried a similar twist method when my hair was shorter but it was a longer process.

 What I am looking forward to most is long, big beautiful healthy hair and teaching my daughter to love and embrace hers.

Fully transitioned to natural hair - blown out

Fully transitioned to Natural hair - curly