My Healthy Hair Journey

The day is sometime in June of 2016, the mood is somewhat depressed. I had seen at least 4 guys with longer, healthier, & prettier hair than my own. I missed the look and feel of long, soft, manageable hair I could achieve with sew-ins, but I missed the hundreds of dollars I spent on them even more! Something had to give. I began debating a fresh start with my hair.

A close friend of mine at the time mentioned to me her sister shaved her head and the new hair that grew back was healthy and unlike anything they could remember before. We found ourselves conversing over this same topic many times over the next few weeks. I would joke, “I’m just gonna shave my head & wear wigs for a while.” Growing up my family would always joke my hair would eventually fall out from dying it so much & I would say the same thing, “then I’ll just wear wigs when it happens.” Wigs are very much a part of my life to this day, but we will get to that part later.

See growing up, I always had a taste for flair, standing out, starting trends, and being unique. At 13, my mother finally let me color my hair! Well, she probably should have kept telling me no because I was hooked! I loved changing up my look in more dramatic ways using my hair and makeup. The average lifespan of a hairstyle for me was (and still is) 3 months; except, nowadays a new style doesn’t involve any chemicals on my natural hair like it did from age 13 to 25.

Can you imagine, coloring ur hair every 3 months for 12 years!? Not just root touchups or fixing greys, but going from bleach blonde to jet black and back in less than a year. (If you’re a cosmetologist reading this, I apologize sincerely for your queezy stomach & any sudden desires to punch me). Add in a perm gone terribly wrong in 2011 & my head was a dying, disastrous hot mess.

Enuff of that, let’s get back to summer of 2016. So I try to color my hair back to natural (guessing it’s close to medium brown), to let it grow. My hair is so damaged and gross that it won’t hold the hair dye. Fast forward to the end of August and I’m really debating hard about cutting my hair all off. On September 7th, 2016, I headed to the salon & said goodbye to almost all of my hair!

I loved it for weeks longer than I expected I would, but then I started to really hate the monotony of it & miss my length. About October, I decided to start making & buying some wigs to mix things up whenever I felt those urges! I was always big on clip-ins, sew-ins, & other hair pieces but wigs really became a new obsession for me. They also added a protective factor to keep elements off my hair & allow it to get healthier.

Time has really flown by this past year! I’m just living and loving life! I couldn’t be happier that I decided to take this step & stick to my commitment to getting healthy hair back! Speaking of healthy hair, my new hair growth is just that! My natural/new hair growth is also very strange. It’s lighter brown than I remember (last really seeing it about 12+ years ago), but it’s also scattered with some reddish highlights. I also have a patch up front in my bangs that is a very light, almost strawberry blonde in good lighting. My hair texture is pretty wavy and even curls loosely when allowed to air dry. I am very excited to see what it’s like with twice the inches! Long as I can remember, my hair would always dry stick straight. I use to brag I didn’t even need a straightener or serum, except for the fly-aways and broken ends. Guess that was from all the damage not my natural hair.

(Air drying hair – Aug 2017)

I must say the awkward stage from about month 5 to month 8 is the roughest. I like to use braids and braided protective styles to help through this transition, PLUS they are excellent for achieving healthy hair.

Keep scrolling for statistics and timeline photos of the journey this year. Here is to another year of progress! Can’t wait to update you again, Sept 7, 2018. I’ll be posting some product recommendations and reviews later this weekend! Stay tuned!

Statistics: 9.7.16 – 9.7.17

-4 hair cuts (1/2 in to 1 in)💇🏻

-5 trims (not including cuts)

-4 protective styles involving braids (2x box braids & 2x Ghana/feed in braids)

-4 different wigs at random times

-Twisted hair before bed from month 3-5 at least 5x a wk & then once in a while after that➰

-No hair dye, perms, or other chemical treatments or changes to hair

-wrapped in scarf most nights to sleep in

-blow dryer used approx. 10x only

-rotated type/brand of biotin intake month to month with a 1-2wk break in between ea💊

-limited use of hairspray, moose, & heated styling tools.

-washed: every 2-3 days (longer when in protected style)

-1-6x a week used hydrating lotion or hair grease (posting products & reviews later)

-never use steaming hot water when washing my hair

-no brush used, only a pick or a wide tooth comb. (I do use a smooth bristle brush from time to time too and depending on my style of the day)

-stress levels kept low 🤷🏻‍♀️

VISUAL: PHOTOS OF JOURNEY DONT FORGET TO FOLLOW ME ON ALL SOCIAL MEDIA PLATFORMS : @combatbarbie365 And stay tuned lovelies, things are just starting to get interesting!