I haven’t combed my hair in 81 days.
In a way it’s the most freeing thing I guess you can save I’ve “never” done? You see this past summer I decided I had enough with my hair. I had enough with the washes and deep conditions. I had enough with the detangling, twisting and styling, and I had enough of trying to find the perfect products, and when I did, it was hoping the company wouldn’t change the formula.
I decided to reclaim my time.
I finally pulled the trigger on locing my hair.
I’ve wanted to loc my hair for a while. Actually for a few years, but I never went forward with it because I fell in love with sister locs and we all know sister locs can be very costly. Even with shorter hair, I was quoted almost $1000 for a sister loc install. Not to mention I struggled to try to find a sister loctician that not only was certified but also had proof of their work. I am VERY picky about who touches my hair and if your parts weren’t straight or someone’s install didn’t look as neat as I liked so I’d keep searching.
With sister locs out of the picture due to the price I did more research to find the best size locs for me. I finally decided upon micro locs after watching several youtube videos and reading many a blog. I chose to have my locs done by Syreeta, master loctician and owner Duafe, a natural hair salon here in the Philadelphia area. I’ve been to Duafe several times, and I knew that I would be in good hands. My micro loc install was also quoted to be less than 1/3 the cost of sister locs and as a budgeting girl this made me very happy.
I opted to start my micro locs with two strand twist instead of the traditional coils. I’ve worn comb coils before and because my hair is a softer texture in the back I knew they wouldn’t hold up for too long. At least two strand twist would allow me to look presentable at work. For my install, we opted to go a little larger than traditional micro locs and after my first retwist I think god we did. Syreeta also parted my hair in a pineapple pattern which enables the hair to fall more naturally.
Here a few fuzzy iPhone photos of my hair after the initial install that resulted in 212 micro locs. I wish my hair would have stayed this long but of course, shrinkage set in and my hair drew up into a classic bob. I even tried to rod set my hair on my on and ended up hating it as I felt like it made me look a lot older than I was.
After my hair was done people kept asking how it felt to have locs and unfortunately for me I really didn’t feel any different as I simply felt I just had two strand twist. Albeit I was wearing them a lot longer than I normally would but I didn’t feel like I was part of the loc’d crowd just yet. As my twist grew older it dawned on me how much of a commitment this was going to be. I was thankful that I still had hair color on the ends of my hair as it helped to bring life to my hair and my curly ends took attention away from my frizzy scalp.
I had my first retwist at eight weeks which is a bit long but it was the only time my loctician was available, and while I couldn’t wait to have water run over my scalp, my loctician opted for a dry wash instead, which cleanses the scalp but does not wet the hair. As my hair is softer, my loctician felt this method was best to keep my hair twist from curling up on themselves instead of lying straight. Another thing Syreeta did differently was palm roll the entire length of my twist instead of just the roots. Since two strand twist tends to flatten out, she wanted to help my hair start to form the coil of a traditional loc. I’ve found that I am not a fan of how my hair looks after a fresh retwisting. I love for my hair to look dense and full, retwisting create just the opposite effect. Luckily this only last two days before my hair began to expand again as shown below.
So here I am a little more than a week away from my second retwist and I’m starting to see a little bit of what they call budding happing with some of my locs. This is where the hair begins to swell in areas as the hair begins to loc. The back of my hair is a lot softer than the front so I’m experiencing more frizzing. Luckily this is hidden by the rest of my hair laying over it.
As far as products go I am only using an African Pride Moisture Miracle hair oil on my scalp as needed.
Be sure to check back as I continue to chronicle my journey to the land of beautiful locs!
