So, OMGoodness, I cannot believe I have yet to dedicate a post on this topic! To not discuss this subject is to conceal a vital part of my being. Haha, I'm being exaggerative but hope you still get my point. This past October marked my 1 year anniversary of being "natural." First let's define natural hair: (Natural hair is unprocessed hair that has not been chemically altered in texture or color.) To make you further understand this concept for those who are not familiar with black hair I suggest watching a documentary by Chris Rock entitled "Good Hair."
I did not understand the concept of natural hair until I got to college. I mean I never really thought I knew anyone with natural hair but I realize I've seen a few in high school. I used to think they just had really bad perms. Ignorance - I know. Actually two of best friends in HS had natural hair but they wore it differently. Let's simply just say I was a confused teen. Here's a brief hair background story. I was natural for sometime in my life, probably the first 6 years. Honestly a large chunk of my childhood is pretty hazy to me. Moving here from a different country at the age of 7, I forgot a lot of my life before. Not sure the exact age I got my first perm but I had it and it was just a part of life...like brushing my teeth except it wasn't on a daily basis.
So the question I get asked most is why did you decide to go natural. My answer is probably not what you're going to expect. Here we go... So I had my hair constantly straightened for a while instead of getting a perm. (Define perm: a chemical application that changes your hair texture from curly to straight.) One day browsing the internet, I stumbled upon a forum on natural hair and found this other world on 'naturals' on the internet I was not familiar with. I was so fascinated that I would spend hours reading all this info about natural hair. At the time, I was an RA and I brought up my findings during a meeting and said 'I'm going natural' (of course I wasn't SERIOUS) but everyone laughed at me as if it was a joke, but my tone was seemingly serious. Boy did that make me angry! The fact that people thought I couldn't do it, fueled my passion to want to prove them wrong. So that's how it all began. I went the entire summer without a perm. Of course since I wasn't 100% committed I almost chickened out till I took out braids I had done during the summer. I wasn't all that familiar with braids either since I usually didn't wear them in my hair. I did something horribly wrong that could not be fixed. It's like getting gum stuck in your hair. But I had 'gum' stuck in my entire head...a detangling fiasco!!! The hair stylist had no idea what to do, I was frustrated, sad, mortified. 50 minutes after trying to fix it at the salon, I grabbed a scissors and asked her to cut it all off. "Girl, you sure?" "Yes cut it all off!" I replied. And so she did....and I bawled.
And there my natural journey began. Glamorous right? NOT. I didn't fully embrace 'natural' in the beginning. I would wear scarves, hats, weaves, anything to conceal my head. I was very self-conscious because my hair had always been my safety net and to not have that safety was devastating. I felt much more beautiful with longer hair, which I partially blame on society. There's a certain mold of beauty that we ingrain in our minds which we inherently and subconsciously pass on to impressionable kids whether we know it or not.
I'm sure I've said this many times - I have the greatest friends in the whole world. I received a lot of encouragement from both my girl and guy friends. I love my family...but they were the least bit supportive of this movement initially. I finally had the courage to show off my new 'do' 5 months post-cut. The amount of compliments and great feedback I received was outstanding. Not to say this made me more confident, because I was honestly at a point where I could have cared less what others thought about me. This change in the perception of myself was so dramatic. The idealisms of beauty I once had was completely shattered. I created a new image of what I thought was beautiful and boy was I in love with it. To embrace the hair that grows out of my head was liberating! I remain natural because my hair is so much healthier, it's very cost-efficient, and I love the versatility in hair styles. I would be lying if I said I didn't face many challenges and still do. But like so many other issues we face in our lives, you have your happy days, your not so happy days, your extremely angry days, but you wake up the next day get over your frustration, learn from it and keep it moving.
It's been 1 year and a few months since I was 'forced' into making the decision to go natural but honestly that's one decision I'm glad I was forced to do. Out of the plethora of decisions I've had to make, this is certainly one I've never regretted :)
Here are some pics...
relaxed hair.....................big cut.........................1yr natural :)
Au revoir mes amis! - as you can see my French has greatly improved. One day my entire post will be in French and you will have to translate :)
