For a while now I've had a love/hate relationship with my mane. I believe part of it was attributed to not knowing how to properly maintain it. After 31 years of harsh water, breakage and the devil himself, heat, my hair is now on its way to a healthier life.
It took a bit of research to figure out what would be the best regimen for me. I learned how to pre-poo, co-wash and the various techniques for these methods in a matter of 2 hours of watching YouTube videos (look them up to learn more). There are numerous ingredients that can be used with these methods. It is advised to read the labels of whichever product you choose. Sulfates and alcohol aide in damaging ends. Many of the women going the natural route have seen tremendous results just from cutting out heat and conditioning instead of shampooing regularly.
Although I have had medium to long hair all of my life, that doesn't mean it is healthy. I had my first perm around the age of 13 and didn't feel it was any different from the hot comb (remember those?)I used. Not to mention all the horror stories I heard from my friends. I decided to use the lesser of 2 evils, heat. Recently I have noticed my ends becoming more dry and they no longer curl when I wear it natural due to heat damage. That made me want to do a little research to see how I can get it to be truly healthy, not just long and brittle =/I've come across blogs and various how-to videos. I even joined Hairlista. This site is a plethora of information on how to maintain beautiful and healthy hair usually by natural methods (i.e. herbs, olive oil, shea butter, etc). Only if I knew then what I know now. My hair would have been like freaking RAPUNZEL's by now!!! That may be a bit much now that I think about it LOL!
In the previous post, I talked about co-washing. I have to say, I LOVE IT!!!!! My hair felt VERY healthy and silky smooth. LIKE BUTTA! After rinsing out the conditioner, I applied Philip B.'s Love-In Leave-In conditioner along with a drop of EVOO. I then dried it with a blow dryer on cool not hot since I was going to bed after wards and did not want to fall asleep with a damp scalp. Normally air drying would be best to cut out one heat source. Once it was dry (and bushy holy cow), I applied Philip B.'s Drop Dead Straight. I then used a double sided Conair Brush (it has boar's head like bristles and clamps down on the hair for blow drying) near the roots followed by a flat iron. Using the brush left my hair shiny. This method is also on Youtube. I then sectioned it into 14 parts (6 in the back, 3 on each side and 2 in the front for my bangs and set pin curls and went to sleep.
In the morning, I took out each curl and used my rat tail comb to separate it. Since I had to see what all the hype was about, I sprayed my hair with Elnet. So far, it is all it's cracked up to be. It's not sticky, doesn't make my hair stiff and I was able to brush and finger comb my hair without any problems. No wonder the French kept it a secret ;) I'm glad it's sold in the US now. So far, Target is the only place in the neighborhood where I can find it. It is sold online as well.So far so good with the co-wash method. I hope it helps to reach my goal towards healthier hair. I'm considering letting it grow to WL (waste length). It was there once and it was a little hectic maintaining it. Maybe now that I know better and organic ways to take care of it, it should be easier.
Wish me luck!
nice post =]
ReplyDeleteThanks dear :) More to come!
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