Natural Coverage on NPR

Along this journey there have been moments where I've questioned my decision to go natural. It seems the universe keeps sending me messages when I start to doubt.

My husband has been very supportive during my transition.  He loves the texture and pattern of my new coils and tells me if I decide to just chop my relaxed ends, it would look really cool (I'm still not there emotionally, I just like to have the length). His excitement, even though he jokingly pokes fun at me when he catches me looking at my new growth before going to bed, has really provided me with a lot of motivation.

The other day, I met up with a good friend that I hadn't seen in quite some time. I was sporting a braid out and when she saw me the first thing she said was, your hair looks amazing, I love what you've done with it. I explained that I was transitioning and growing out my relaxed hair. She began to excitedly ask if I'd have big curly hair and whether I could style it in a fro sometimes, because she (fine, wavy haired, Irish girl) has always been envious of people with hair that can be styled like that. I've never received such compliments when I relaxed my hair, so am definitely enjoying all of the positivity!

My mother in-law, can't stop touching my hair each time I see her, she always manages to find a way to greet me and touch my hair at the same time.

Healthy hair is also a question of life style, so I'm nourishing it by drinking lots of water, eating really healthy and exercising. In conclusion my hair is feeling the love! Some days are more difficult than others and my braid out or low manipulation styling attempts don't always turn out as I please, but bad hair days are part of life, that's true for every woman.

Speaking of signs from the universe, today I stumbled across this interview while reading the news on NPR. Robin Young discusses Chris Rock's documentary Good Hair, the increasing communities of natural hair bloggers/vloggers and interviews blogger Maeling Tapp of naturalchica.com. Maeling has been natural 2 years and her hair is so full and GORGEOUS (check out the pic). It's so wonderful to see natural hair being embraced and talked about positively in the media. I've included the link to the interview below:

Natural Hair on NPR

Peace & Love

P.S. - The shampoo I purchased last week is very mild, which works wonders for retaining moisture. The conditioner on the other hand, I'm not too crazy about. It's quite drying, probably due to the fact that one of the main ingredients is alcohol. I promise to take my time and carefully read through the ingredients on my next purchase. In the meantime, I recently pre-pooed with a mixture of argan, almond, caster, coconut oils, this did help counteract the drying of the new conditioner. The conditioner apparently contains shea butter and honey, both of which I have.... perhaps it's time for me to make my own conditioner with those ingredients. Why can't hair companies practice what they preach/promise!

Salon Hubby

I once had a chat with a friend, who is Latina and hair is probably type 4a (very coarse, densely-packed, tight curls), but she relaxes. She mentioned that her husband, also European, is very against relaxers and slightly protests each time she applies one to her hair. Talking with her, I realized my husband has no idea about my hair routine. I guess I just left him in the dark since we started dating. I'm not sure why, but I guess I just felt I didn't need to inform my husband about my hair and up keep, he's married to me not my hair. Of course he knows the troubles I went through finding a suitable salon in Europe, as my hair is not the same texture as European hair and he knows that when my hair is flat-ironed (as opposed to scrunch and go) that means I sleep with my "night hat". The first time I wore my durag to bed, my husband, at the time my boyfriend, asked why I was wearing a "night hat", I found his accent and this choice of wording so cute that I continued using it with him ever since. So, that's the extent to what he knew about my hair.

Recently, I realize my not telling him about my hair issues was more of a defense mechanism to protect myself. I was really lying to myself, as I was hiding everything I went through to achieve "perfection". I'd style my hair, when he wasn't home, time our shared activities (going to the lake, spa or running) around the state of my hair, never really explained the process behind the relaxer, but instead just said "my hair is really thick and difficult to manage, so I just get a process that loosens it and makes it easier to style. Instead of telling him, I'm putting an alkaline based chemical in my hair to alter the structure of my curl pattern, which makes my natural hair irreversibly straighter. I think I was mostly afraid, that he would find the process dangerous and unhealthy and protest my doing so and at the same time dislike my natural curl pattern. This all sounds very irrational as I write this down, but this is what I felt. I've heard stories on blogs where women's boyfriends, often black, have left them after they decided to go natural, why wouldn't the same apply to a white male?

As I decided 3 months ago to go natural, I sat my husband down and started to tell him about my decision and what I had been doing to my hair. I try to make this an ongoing conversation , so that he can understand that this is a theme, that goes skin deep and is not just about the hair. He thinks my decision is wonderful and always tells me nonchalantly "I'm in love with you and not your hair, you'd look hot bald, so I could care less." (I'm lucky, I know). I think next, we are going to watch Chris Rock's Good Hair together. Maybe I'll interview him on my blog to get his perspective on the movie and topic. I'm really happy that I opened up to him and think it's crucial he understand black hair. We're not quite ready for kids yet, but are definitely at the stage where we talk about raising a family. Seeing that we both have super curly hair, I can only imagine our children will have the same, so it's good that he'll know how to care for and understand their hair when the time comes.

....

Last night, I bumped my hair quickly with the flat-iron after wet wrapping and sitting under the dryer for about 1 hour (this made my hair so much softer than direct heat from the blow-dryer). It came out okay, but like I said, I'm looking forward to learning more methods that don't involve the heat. Perhaps soon I'll try the flat twist out, I've seen a couple of videos on YouTube and it looks manageable. My husband trimmed some of my dead ends for me yesterday. Yes, that's right, my husband trims my hair. I don't trust anyone here to do it but him and he does a pretty darn good job. In the US, each time my stylist would ask if I wanted a trim, I'd leave with a haircut, so I'm happy he just gives me a trim. Like I said before I'm not ready to part with the length yet, so don't want to cut off all the relaxed ends yet. I'll probably wait a year or 2 to do so, depending on my new growth.