I haven’t shared my natural hair journey on here in a while, and I recently received the sweetest message from one of our readers about how she got inspired to go natural and stay natural, after reading my posts, sooooooooooo… here goes. As many of you know I started my transition in September maybe October of 2010. I did my big chop in January of 2012, and have been fully and happily natural ever since. I read that it was wise to keep your hair in protective styles during the transitioning process and after; as this not only helps the hair from breaking, but also aides in bringing back the once lost curl pattern as a result of a relaxer. So I kept my hair in twists all the time, which got incredibly boring as I like to change my hair as often as I can (everyday). I noticed there was lots of growth for a while and then my hair seemed to stop growing and was breaking a lot, despite the bi-weekly trimming I was doing (so unnecessary by the way). I hadn’t changed my haircare regimen, I was still deep conditioning and moisturizing like a maniac so I’m not sure what was happening… then I realized I’d been doing all kinds of things with my hair. I’d coloured it red, I was switching protective styles weekly, some days I fell asleep without a satin wrap… my hair was clearly pissed off, and showing it.

Day 1 of the challenge

So 12 weeks ago, I decided it was time to stop being lazy and to go back to loving my hair. I went onto BlackGirlLongHair for some Kink-spiration (my go-to for everything natural hair), and while perusing hundreds of articles, I came across a few that stressed keeping your protective styles in for as long as possible, as this not only helped eliminate breakage, but also helped retain length.

9 days in…  Fuzzy and already locking/meshing

That’s all I needed to hear, the only problem is my hair normally starts to lock/mesh after a week, and this is why I was always messing with my hair. I wanna rock a big sexy afro this summer, so I need to do all that I can to ensure that my hair is strong and healthy. So I decided to challenge myself.

First twists with Elentee Soy Organics Twist & Lock Gel

I would do a protective style and leave it in for as long as I could. Sounds easy enough right? Wrong, I couldn’t even bare to think about the boredom of rocking one hairstyle for weeks… Ugh. So long story short, I did mini-twists and lasted 9 days. Then I found this miracle gel, called Elentee Soy Organics Twist & Lock Gel, and managed to keep my twists in for 18 days!

Re-twist after 18 days!

My hair didn’t lock/mesh once, it was so easy to untwist, and there was little to no breakage! I kept those twists in till about the first week of January (WHAT!!), but was in desperate need of a change; so rather than re-do the mini twists, I went for chunky twists instead. I’ve deep conditioned three times since putting in the chunky twists, and other than re-doing the front ones to make them look neater, I haven’t touched my hair… well until today when I did a deep condition 🙂

Things I’ve discovered since my low manipulation challenge:

1. It’s definitely harder than I thought, but so rewarding when you see the progress in length, strength and overall look of my hair.

2. Elentee Soy Organics Twist & Lock Gel is a winner for girls who wanna rock mini-twists but are worried about it locking/meshing.

3. My hair is longer, stronger and thicker.

4. I will ALWAYS ALWAYS…ALWAYS twist my hair with Elentee Soy Organics Twist & Lock Gel. Always.

My hair now (with shrinkage). Happy 🙂

peace and love

Bella