A Curly Journey

Yesterday was a scary day for me. Having curly hair, I always get nervous when I go to a new stylist because many of them are truly clueless about thebest way to cut and style curls.  That's the reason I had put off getting anything  more than a trim while I was at Berea. Last week when I got a pedicure (an anniversary gift from Lucas), the subject of my hair came up with the lady who did it. I told her the frustrations I had experienced in the past and she told me she'd give me a wash, cut and style if I'd let her. I have been needing a cut for awhile now and thought Why not. I'll never get a good stylist if I don't give anyone a chance.

So, at 4:45pm yesterday, I made my way to the hot seat and I was more prepared than ever. Prepare for a caveat. There were many, many years I truly despised my hair. I've cried over it multiple times because I could not prevent it from getting frizzy or get it to curl the right wait or stay straightened. I spent so much time wearing it in a bun or a ponytail because I was embarrassed and didn't know how to appropriately care for it. Over the past month or so, I have been doing research on the best ways to care for curly hair and the different types of curly hair out there. This is what I've learned about my doo!

1.) I have low porosity hair, meaning my hair takes longer to let moisture in and to release it. This hair type often doesn't allow conditioners in either and is why it can often look dry.

2.) All hair types, but particularly curly doos, should never be dried with a terry cloth towel because their rough on it. Instead, simply using a cotton tee shirt works much better.

3.) I should avoid combing my hair unless I'm in the shower and have conditioner in it if possible because of the breakage and prevention of natural clumping of the curls that occurs.

4.) I may want to wash my hair even less. Lots of people I've watched videos on or read about only wash their hair once or twice a week. Honestly, this is really difficult for me because my hair becomes more difficult to style and I don't like the texture as much after a few days.

5.) Co-washing is fairly common. Instead of using shampoo which is meant to strip your hair of all its natural oils and other grim, co-washing simply means using a lighter (usually much cheaper) conditioner to wash the grim out and following it with a higher end conditioner that will hopefully really work its way into the hair.

6.) LOTS of pharmacy/supermarket hair products are actually harsh on the hair. Do your research before you shop!

I learned a lot of this information from watching Waterlily716's YouTube channel. I also had several Pinterest photos from my Doos Board that I wanted to show her to kind of give her an idea of what I wanted.

I told her that I wanted to keep the length I had but I wanted more layers to give it volume. I also wanted the cut to frame my face (like what you see in the photos above) rather than be one solid length.

Here are the before and after results! However, I will say that the before pic is a little dramatization because it was second day hair that I didn't attempt to style at all. I wanted the stylist to see my hair as it it without much product in it.

Overall, I am satisfied with the results so far. She went through and individually curled each clump of hair using a defining creme so I haven't seen how it looks with my normal styling routine. I plan to take a few photos in the next couple of weeks and share the new cut in different styles!

Let me know what you think!

All the best,