5 things about longer natural hair

Hi Guys!

Merry Christmas to all who are celebrating! :). I have loved Christmas for as long as I can remember; the food, family and presents. So although I can not give a tangible present to everyone reading this I figured now would be a good time to share a few more things I have learned about my hair.

In February, it would be four years since I last relaxed my hair.  A while ago I shared some things I had learned since being natural and now that I am almost four years in, here’s my updated list.

1. Long hair=More time
   As my hair has grown, the “hair goals” comments have increased.   I’m not going to front and act like I don’t like those comments but sister, it is not easy to have a “hair goals fro”. Detangling takes longer because all of your shed hair just clings to other strands. Drying takes longer because well there’s more hair to dry. As a result of these two things, overall styling takes longer so you cannot afford to be re-doing your hair every other day. As such, I have found a few key styles that I rotate and anything I do to my hair starts from there.
   
2.  What is the actual length of my hair anyway???
   This question is deeply rooted in the magic of shrinkage. I did a very basic length check on snapchat just to get a sense of where I’m at. [I tried uploading said video but it didn’t work :(. I will do another length check at some other point if it’s requested.] The thing about this is that when my hair is wet it is more elastic so it stretches longer than the length in the video [My hair in the video is just about bra strap length]. So if you’re looking for a little encouragement on your journey just check the length of your hair while it’s still wet :P.
3. What worked in the past may not work anymore
   I don’t know if this is just me but I may have a conditioner that works wonders on my hair and then after 6 uses I no longer feel the silky softness I once did. I don’t know if that is just me getting used to the effect of the conditioner or if my hair truly gains immunity after a couple washes but I definitely feel the need to switch things up fairly regularly. I however have not allowed this to turn me into a product junkie. I just flip flop between my regular conditioner and my deep conditioner.

   

4. Naps or nah?
   As my hair started getting longer I started to feel that my roots were a little dense and incredibly difficult to comb through. At first I thought this was new growth cause you know how when your hair is relaxed it gets harder to comb your roots as it grows out. But something about this theory just didn’t make sense to me. Remember those shed hairs I mentioned? Yea those little bad boys think they can just chill wherever they like and make your hair harder to manage. I realized this when I took the time to properly detangle only to be sliding out shed hairs that had been making my life difficult for goodness knows how long.
   
5. Combs? LOL!
   I never thought it would come to this friends, but I almost exclusively finger detangle my hair now! With shorter hair, combs work and you can be gentle and keep the breakage to a minimum. However, when combing my hair brought on flashbacks to my childhood I knew it was time to stop. I remember cringing every time my mum said it was time to do my hair–I know most black girls can relate to this–you’re sitting there begging for mercy while your mother keeps trying to convince you that it doesn’t hurt -_-. 

Despite the struggles, I still love my kinky-frizzy-sometimes curly-has a mind of its own-sassy-fro. ❤