Relaxed Hair Journey: A New Beginning

I'm going to be straight up honest about this. Maybe my trials & errors will help someone else.

I'm no longer natural. No longer tex-lax'd. I'm now fully committed to RELAXED hair. Why? I'll leave that for another entry if requested. Otherwise, welcome to my relaxed hair journey. I've had issues that NO ONE could help me with. I started out on Black Hair Media forum. They gave great tips that didn't work for me. Some of the users mocked me, even. I decided to say "Screw you" and read books on african hair care (I have several book reviews on this blog). With this wealth of knowledge at hand, I set foot off...

Relaxer of Choice... LYE vs. NO LYE

(Left to Right) Healthy hair, Lye relaxed
hair, No-lye relaxed hair EEEK!

For a while, I had this mentality that a relaxer is a relaxer and it didn't matter which you used. Boy, was I wrong. I do a lot of research and I actually have a few book reviews on this blog (I'll try to add a search feature so you can find them or you can check the side bar for the proper label). There's a difference between LYE and NO LYE. Lye relaxers end up leaving your hair strand cuticles smoother than no-lye. This explains why for years of relaxing with at-home kits (Yes, even ORS Olive Oil), my hair has suffered extreme breakage and dryness.

I decided to choose Mizani Butter Blends as my new lye relaxer because I've heard so many good things about it. I'm a believer. My hair feels smooth and buttery soft! ALL THE TIME! Certain products make my hair feel even more soft or a bit more dry, but in general, my extreme dryness is cured. I know it is the MBB because I've used Designer's Touch which was okay, but I still got dryness. I upgraded to normal Mizani and I was quite impressed. MBB blew my mind away. It doesn't relax my hair pin-straight which is totally fine with me.


Breakage Issue

I don't know if you can tell, but IRL you can
clearly see when I started using MBB

I think changing my relaxer has drastically improved the health of my hair. Even though I was "tex-lax"ing before, I was still getting an embarrassing amount of breakage. Now, I'm using MBB, breakage has DRASTICALLY reduced. I'm using Aphogee 2-step Protein just because I have it. It doesn't help very much with my breakage, surprisingly. I'm using it until its all gone, just for good measure.

I also bought Redken Extreme: Anti-snap from UltaBeauty because it contains proteins that are great for hair, silk amino acids, and ceramides.  I use it after every towel-dry and I also plan to use it to protect my ends before a retouch. So far, I don't think it actually helps much, either.

Finally, Divasmooth. This product is a holy grail product for me. This has always dramatically reduced breakage for me (even though anti-breakage is not its marketed use). I'm going to use it up later next week & join their frequent buyer program. Why is it so good? I think it has to do with the sugar. There's something special about sugar... updates on that later.

Growth Regime
My goal is to have long hair and regrow my temples. For those of you curious and/or desperate, yes. I have seen temple regrowth success! I'll make a new entry about it later. For the most part, here's what I'm using to increase my hair's growing rate.

Vitamins - From time time, Flaxseed oil. I'm using Hair Vite vitamins.  Primarily because its cheap, easier for me to swallow, and contains calcium. I take 2 daily with meals. For you nosey folk, here's the ingredients:

The tan one is the Hair Vite. See how thin
it is? Easy to swallow for me.

Vegetable Silica - 500mg
Calcium Carbonate - 300mg (30% dv)
Magnesium Oxide - 25 mg (6.3% dv)
Iron Gluconate - 10 mg (56% dv)
Vitamin A - 5000 iu (100% dv)
Vitamin D - 400 iu (100% dv)
Vitamin E - 30 iu (100% dv)
Zinc - 15 mg (100% dv)
Iodine - 150 mcg (100% dv)
Chromium - 25 mcg
Selenium - 50 mcg
Copper - 1 mg (50% dv)
Manganese - 6 mg

Topical - I use my growth aid mix that is essentially Kimmaytube's leave-in + essential oil + MSM. However, I am tempted to try "Grow-aut oil" in my mix. I use this to make sure my scalp & new growth are moisturized. I massage for 5 minutes a day and if I can, I lay on my bed with my head dangling to further increase circulation to the scalp.

Edges - Step 1. Scrub w/ sugar scrub Step 2. use growth moisturizer Step 3. Keep slicked (& split end free) with Kinky Curly gel (or flaxseed gel).

Pictures, of course. Later. I'm beat!
  

Diva Smooth & Texturizer (long post & review)

I finally used Diva Smooth Review!

Product: Diva Smooth

Price:$25.00 (8oz)

Company:Janelle Beauty (http://www.janellebeauty.com/shop/shopexd.asp?id=68)

Claims: Helps stretch out relaxers, makes going natural easier.

Ingredients: Organic raw wild honey, Olea europaea (Organic olive) oil, Sucrose (Sugar) Extract, Zea mays Starch, Citrus medica limonum (organic lemon) extract, (Acetic acid) vinegar, tocopherol (vitamin E), blended essential oils

Opinion: Don't use this as a deep conditioner. Put this on dry hair, otherwise it won't do anything. Unless honey is great for your DC. For me, honey does nothing as a DC. When I use this on dry hair, ladiessss.... smooth, silky, omg. I can't say much for what it does to curls because that is not my concern. My concern is to have manageable new growth to last me until the next chemical treatment. It is messy. Next time, I might add a few oils to see if it makes it a little less sticky. And I'm sure heating it will only make it work better!

Verdict: Yes, I will buy this again. I have been pre-poo'ing with oils with my natural hair which is nightmare-ish. This makes my hair manageable and soft and oh my god. This is a staple in my regime now.  I only put it on my new growth to make the bottle last longer. Considering that I use this when I am taking down braids. I already have a conditioner on my relaxed hair. This goes the extra mile for my new growth and when some gets onto my relaxed hair - Oh, heaven! This is expensive so I gotta make it last. This works with or without aid of anything. I tried to use plain HONEY (organic) to see if it works as well as this. Nope. Hah. Not even close and WAY too sticky. Someone, create an alternative to this so I can save money! In the mean time, Janelle is getting mine. ;)

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I texturized my hair today!! Here is what I did/should have done/will do next time.

One-Week Preparation:

1.  EXCELLENT Pre-poo for new growth (Diva Smooth)

2. Cleansing wash (Mane n Tail, but looking for sulfate-free alternative)

3. Heavy Protein treatment (Aphogee 2 step)

4. Deep condition (still looking for a decent one...)

1/2 Hour Preparation:

1. Sectioned my hair into 6 parts (I bought cute NON-METAL clippies)

2. Grease scalp and shaft (ANYTHING with petroleum as main ingredient) 

3. Put conditioner into relaxer chemical (I put DOVE volumizer because I needed to hurry up and finish that product)

After Treatment:

1. Rinse chemical out

2. Apply yogurt to hair (A LOT! Pile it on, baby, otherwise it does nothing) and leave for 3 - 20 minutes

3. Neutralizing Shampoo

4. Conditioner (from the box)

5. Moisturize (Aphogee Greet-Tea Reconstructor for some extra protein)

6. Seal (Coconut oil and shea butter)

Results: Excellent! I was very scared and distraught earlier because I had quite a bit of new growth (thankyou MN, Sulfur, and Hairfinity!!) that I didn't know how to control and may have been causing me a lot of breakage. I couldn't find any product that was working for my hair. It was just a mess. I was going to wait until SEPTEMBER to texturize, but I couldn't take it anymore. I am extremely pleased. My hair hasn't completed dried yet, but its very soft. It is thicker than it was. Its longer. The texturizer came out very well, even though my mother insisted on making me wait a little longer (I think I was there for 25 minutes instead of 15) and she over-laps a lot. Let me tell you, a TEXTURIZER does not straighten your hair like a tex-lax or relaxer can. I don't know why people would suggest a beginner like me to texlax! First of all, how do I stay within the time limit? Second of all, how do I deal with over lapping? Ridiculous. I'm texturizing for a long time, people.

My Texturizer

I have been texturising my hair...

I use Soft & Beautiful® Botanicals™ Texturizer. The chemical that straightens the hair is LITHIUM HYDROXIDE. It's a less harsh chemical than the typical relaxers (calcium hydroxide, guanine, etc). I think the PH level is slightly less. My guess is between 12 and 13 while usually you can bet your regular relaxer is at least 13.



With this texturiser, I left it in for 10 - 12 minutes. We smooth the chemical in the new growth and now my curls are exactly as the box says. Loosely curled. I was thinking of using the texture softner that I mentioned before, but it has the same chemicals as a relaxer. You can't smooth it at all, or your hair WILL be straight. If you make a mistake, you won't get the look you want. With a texturiser, my mom makes a lot of mistakes. One side of my head is curlier than the other. But at least there are still curls. Hum...

I think next time I need to strategically wash out wherever my mom put the chemical FIRST first for better results. So anyway, I washed it out with water for a few minutes, then I put the nuetralising shampoo twice. A third time, I left it on for 5 to 10 minutes. Then, I used the conditioner and left it on for 5 to 10 minutes. My hair was incredibly soft. I ruined it by using Aphogee 2 minute re constructor, though. And lastly, them moisturiser that comes with the pack is just jherri curl juice!! Which works well when I use it as a deep conditioner, but not as a moisturiser!

For next time I will be sure to use Aphogee 2 step a week before I relax. I will be sure to deep condition every other day while my hair is no in weave or braids because last time that gave me great results. I'll be sure to only do moisture treatment after textursing. And we'll see how that goes. :)