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Monday, March 11, 2013

Hair talk!!! (Part 1)

Hi guys,

How are y'all? I hope you guys had an amazing weekend. I had a lovely weekend. House hunt was an epic FAIL and we are back to square 1. Its so frustrating looking for a house in Lagos. We've been searching since last year and we haven't found anything yet. Its so hard finding a cute little pad I can swaddle in cute pink stuff :( I'm really hoping for a miracle and keeping my fingers crossed.
Sunday was so much fun, I spent it with the boo and he slept the entire time we were in the cinema, only to wake up when they were showing a love scene. LMAO!!!!!



Ok enough weekend ramble. Let's get down to the ish. Hair is such a sensitive topic for women, especially African women. Its enough having to deal with the constant ambush on TV by long flowing locks of Caucasian women (both real and fake), and looking at yours and wondering why its so kinky and dry. Its been a tough journey for me because I've never been able to get my hair past my shoulders. Its like there's a secret formula which keeps eluding me. I've always seen my hair as a pain I always have to deal with. Because of this negative attitude, the hair retaliated. I could never get anything right with it. It was constantly breaking and it was so dry. I had absolutely no clue on what to do with it, save for constant weave fixing, which further damaged my hair.

One day I was at home, bored to tears and with no book to read, I grabbed my blackberry. I kept fiddling with the phone, and for some reason, I googled 'how to care for African hair'. This single google search introduced me to a world I never knew existed. I was like a child reborn. I kept soaking up all the information I was getting from these wonderful sites that were giving tips on how to take care of NATURAL hair. It seemed the only way one could have healthy black hair was to grow it natural. That meant cutting off my terribly damaged hair. At that point, my mind was so made up, and I was going to get my mom to slowly accept the fact that I was going to cut my hair. Being the drama queen she is, she freaked out * 100. My mom has very beautiful flowing hair (I constantly asked God why I was stuck with hair from my dad's side of the family), so I knew she would never understand what I was going through.

After about 10000045673 pleadings later, she grudgingly allowed me to chop off the damaged parts. This was 4 months after I had stopped getting my hair relaxed. So on June 26th, I grabbed a pair of scissors, and chopped my hair myself. I was crying and telling my hair how sorry I was for all the years of damage. I promised I was going to be a better owner from then on. It was such an emotional experience for me, but when I was done I felt extremely liberated. I knew how vain I was, so I never believed I could achieve such a huge feat. Hehehehehe!
a month after the chop :)

From that day, I've never looked back. I've grown to love my extremely thick kinky hair, and the best part of the whole thing is, its been loving me back. Every day I touch my hair, I'm constantly amazed but the amount of curls and kinks I never knew I had. I had been getting relaxers since I was about 5 years so I could barely remember what my natural hair looked like. Its been a year since I got my last relaxer, and about 8 months since I chopped my hair, and even though its really tough sometimes, its been nothing but an amazing learning process.
getting ready to flat iron at 7 months


Each day is a brand new lesson and a labor of love. The only regret I have is that I wish I cut my hair a long time ago. With the rate its growing now, I would have been at bra strap length now. Its so funny how my hair got to where it was when it was relaxed only in 7 months.
flat iron!!!!!!!!
My hair has taught me to have a whole lot of patience, to love myself and to love my hair the way God Almighty made it. And I swear, nothing has been more rewarding in my life.
Our hair grows too, if only we can let go of all the crazy chemicals and love it.

P.S I'm dedicating this post to my friend Adaeze Opara, who is going through what I went through about a year ago. Lots of love dear, and you are strong enough!

Have yourselves a wonderful week,
Yolanda

2 comments:

A said...

Hehehehehe @ the first picture with the really short hair. Your natchi hair look wonderful by the way, healthy and shiny.
PS Your mum :) :) :)
I fell of the natchi hair wagon I had been on since Dec 2012, when I retouched in Feb 2013.... :) lol. You know is not an easy something.... So more kudos to you.

Yolanda said...

Thanks dear. Lol you dont wanna know about my mom.
I know how tough it is o. Not knowing how to deal with all that texture and constant breakage is a huge challenge. But I'm taking it one day at a time :)

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