Going Natural: A Painful Journey with my Hair- Part I

If I had a picture of my hair in college, I’d share it and you wouldn’t even recognize me. In fact, I’ve rocked a fro I had a serious FRO… all out FRO in junior high. Thick, bushy, and just awesome. Really. But life was much simpler in middle and high school.

Do we all go through that bad breakup where we want to change everything about ourselves? Perhaps as a way to erase the person he liked but took for granted? I’m not really sure, but about 15 years ago, I chopped off my super black, super thick, super long hair and went a bit-longer-than-pixie-style. And, I colored it some wack strawberry blonde. I lost 15 pounds and found this new me I loved.

Little did I know I was about to enter a horrible, train-wreck relationship with my hair. I went through every color between rich auburn to blonde-blonde, to blacker than black and some “shades” in between. I gradually started going blonder and blonder with beautiful highlights; sometimes even my base was borderline blonde instead of just a few shades lighter than my super black natural color.I loved it this superficial lighter color more and more and kept switching up the hues of blonde, like my shoes. I started memorizing bleach numbers so I could tell the next “fabulous” hair dresser (or not) what I wanted.My styles ranged from really long and wavy blonde, accomplished by the magical hands of Dominicans (whom by the way, are not good at coloring), to accidental dark whirls of curls in 2008.  I cried when I thought of the idea of being natural again. I hated it. It was thick but entirely too dark.  So I’d pay a lot of money and risk instant loss and have it lightened again.

And I always loved rocking it curly, tho… my hair’s most natural state. It was about the only way I could manage my hair without too much fuss or a gaping hole in my bank account. Very literally, I had a wash and go lifestyle.

Sometime in ’06 I settled for a really pretty auburn color I wish I could back to. It was also extremely healthy.  My curls were amazing. Perfectly locked. Beautifully smooth. Lovely texture. Little maintenance.

See this below with my dad? The beauty of a healthy head is that just two hours later and it’d expand into a full, lioness mane)

Here I am in Nov. ’06 in Paris, enjoying the prettiest color and the healthiest my hair’s ever been.

And then I allowed it to do its own thing around 2007,  and didn’t fight the growing roots. I let this (picture below) happen and it was all good. It was super thick again, full of body, and the curls were tamed. I loved it and got stopped a lot with questions on how I got it so curly; or who did my color, or what products did I use; did I perm it, etc…

By then,  I had stopped doing roller sets or blowing it out myself, which I’d do just about every Saturday for church, and I want full out natural. At least texturally speaking.

Singing au natural at Apache Café in Atlanta, GA, 2007

I settled on that and even a bit darker and even some red tones for two or so more years. I was okay. No emotional stress over my hair. I was happy where it was. For the most part.

Some kind of horrible “red” around 2009 but it was long and still really curly.

And then one day, the imposing dark hue I had ended up with some point in 2010, started haunting me… and I decided I wanted more blonde.

Again.

And ended up with this in 2011… which I still love, love, love.

On set at CNN in Atlanta, Oct. 2011…had just colored it the day before. Roller set to get the loose look.

This is when the trauma began. I think.

It was super pretty. It’s still my favorite look and color after 15 years of torturing it. It was still thick (enough), and a great length (layered), but I was starting to become concerned with what all the bleaching and processing would do. My colorist, the best I’ve ever had, assured me I’d be fine. But she did do a lot of processing to get it to be the most perfect blonde I’d ever had.

But that started killing my hair. Literally. And a few major stressors in my life: My grandfather died a few months after I went that blonde; And I decided to leave everyone and everything I had in Atlanta after 7 years and go back home to DC.

Three days before I left Atlanta in June of 2012, I got a haircut by my colorist. She also touched up my color since I didn’t know when I’d see her again. It was still blondish.

But two days later I noticed the right side was visibly shorter. She noticed too, thought it was nothing, and snipped me equal.

The next few months and up until 3 months ago, my hair lost itself. I started losing it left and right, up and down. My roots were growing, yes, but yielding in the most horrible ombré ever; and I didn’t want to color it even or cut it. I just let it spiral into deeper destruction.

The curls wilted by about 70%. It was mostly stringy. It started feeling more and more like rope after washing it. My right side became totally stale. It gave up. Nothing. No growth. No sign of life. I’d wash my hair and would be ready to play golf with my clump of hair I’d roll up in one shower. My ends at my fore were all broken and completely thinned out. My scalp was way too accessible.

Clockwise: Stringy and barely there in April; Super blonde and kind of okay in August 2012; Stringy in Jan. 2013; Just horrible in Oct. 2012

I paid it little mind because I think I didn’t want to deal what whatever was going on. So I kept on living with ugly hair… color, length, texture, you name it.

But the 4-5″ difference between my left and right was painfully visible. Like the worst asymmetrical bob job ever done. One side was 3″ below my shoulder, the other about 2″ above. So I evened it out myself and that didn’t help. 2 weeks later my left side had grown like a chia pet and my right lay flat.

Totally stumped, I had blood work done… twice. I was starting to get really desperate. And more stressed out. And I had a new man in my life. Though he didn’t know what I had just two years ago, I hated feeling like I had to wear my hair in horrible looking buns on top of my head — I mean, I tried to make them look en trend, but it took more than a foam sponge to make it work.

And then I went to my derm who checked my scalp and said everything was fine. Blood work came back fine. All vitamin levels were solid. Thyroids were good. No infections. Nada.

What.the.hell.

I cried and cried and cried. Literally. 15k units of biotin was doing nothing. B-12 was doing nothing.

What.the.hell.

I contemplated chopping it all off but was mortified by the idea of going short. It had been 15 years since I’d seen anything above my shoulders.

But my man, being so supportive, encouraged me to chop it off and go natural. As in no more color.  He thought it’d be cuter anyway. By then, or just 3 months ago, my roots were 16 months out. I won’t even show you how disgusting my mane looked. It was a sight…

So in July… July 17 to be precise, I had a serious convo with myself while visiting my boyfriend out in Phoenix. I woke up, hated my hair and went right over to SuperCuts. Of all places, I went into Hair Cuttery‘s sister shop.

I was that desperate.

What the tatted up snipper told me was not encouraging in the least. But I let him cut most of my hair off… chopping off the blonde ends in hopes of embarking on a new journey of regrowth, restrengthening, and thickness.

And maybe going back to all black.

Oh wait, that was too much. Short and all black? No, no! So not ready. Cutting it off was dramatic enough.

So here I am… 3 months later, with a bob. A ‘do’ I never thought I’d have again since my high school days.

Clockwise: July 17th, when I cut if off—doesn’t my face show how sad I was?!; Short but looking super full &; much thicker inn August; Great bounce while cooking in Sept; Hanging at the W with my girlfriend visiting from Atlanta sometime last month.

But now, today, my hair is about 40% stronger, my curls are mostly healthy and actually curl (hallelujah!), and I’m almost all natural.

I’m not in love with the length, but I’m in love with knowing it’s starting to like me again. And no more crazy looking buns for a while. Or blonde. Or heat.

I never thought I’d talk about my hair issues, but a few of my natural hair girlfriends asked me to talk about this crazy journey…. because I’m on one… a very long one… and if I can serve as inspiration to someone going through something similar, than I’ll talk. Hard as it may be.

But I feel better. Next, I’ll share the regiment and routine I put myself on after months and months of crucifying myself for not being more careful. It’s definitely helping but still so far to go!

Share your natural hair journey with me! I want to know.

Til next time, lovelies.

B chic!

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