Some times in life we all make decisions and we are not certain if that decision was the right one. That in turn leads a great deal of; I almost used the word stressed, but it is more worries. In December of 2011 Is when I relaxed my hair for a special occasion as I usually do every few months, then I moved in with my sister. My sister decided to "go natural" and she said I should too, so I thought about it and said why not. Her method was to get her hair washed, set and her roots blown out at a Dominican Hair Salon; I have done that plenty of times and decided I would just do the same thing. That just worked fine for about 5 months, then I realized that I did not want to depend on the salon to do my hair all the time and I wanted to be able to do my hair myself so I decided to wash my hair myself and after looking at some ( just a few ) videos on Youtube I decide to buy some moisturizing shampoo and conditioners and go for it. I was able to wash my hair and comb it out in the shower. I was ecstatic that I was able to do it myself as I was transitioning.
At the six month mark, it was Father's Day Weekend, my parents came to visit and I decided to wash my hair again. Everything was going fine until the conditioner and comb came in to of conditioners to play. I put a large amount of conditioner in my hair and tried to comb it out and it just wouldn't go through. I was so frustrated and scared that i was going to have to cut it all off or inadvertently RIP my hair out in the process. I was so scared that I decided that before my parents left i was going to relax my hair. I really did not want to but that experience was a bit traumatizing. leading up to the relaxer I had to convince my self that I was not giving up, i just realized that my hair just cant be in its natural state. It was only a child relaxer but before I even did it I knew I would regret it.
After all was said and done I kept telling myself that, it was OK and that getting a relaxer every six months was just fine. I had this nagging feeling that I made a mistake, but I kept on going and went back to getting regular wash and sets. My birthday was fast approaching and my sister suggested that I do something different like color my hair; I have never colored my hair (besides black) and I was in the mood for a change, it was for my birthday after all. So I got a semi permanent color and pin curled my hair. the whole time I was doing all this I was contemplating cutting my hair short. So the next day after my birthday, and all the pretty pictures were taken LoL, I got my hair cut in layers. I was short and I loved it.
It took a while but I decided after I cut it that I wanted to try going natural again, but I was still not completely sure. It was not until I went to go visit my mom for a few days. I was going to take a little time out of my visit and ask her to relax my hair but when I did she told me she was not going to do it because she wanted me to try transitioning again. I went home and did the Youtube search again but this time it was more extensive resulting in me finding 3 very helpful channels. I have subscribed to them and I have gained more confidence in my ability to transition successfully. I have also found that cutting my hair was the best thing ever, because it was much easier to manage at this length.
So here I am in my 4th month in my second attempt at transitioning. I am honestly having more fun this time around and I did the one thing I think was the biggest help in this second attempt. I stopped visiting the salon. I am learning about my hair myself and not depending on a hair dresser. I is the best thing anyone transitioning can do; other wise you will have no clue what to do to your hair when you are on your own.
I just wanted to get these thoughts out on "paper" since I have been thinking about it a lot lately. I really did not expect it to be so lengthy.
If anyone does read this thank you for reading.
