I want to straighten my curly hair regularly

[noisette]

Hello all, I have a question about hair and I hope I'm in the right place.

I have naturally curly, medium-length hair. I recently decided that I want to straighten it regularly, but was wondering if this will do any real damage to my hair in the long run? I dont' want to do the "permanent" relaxer thing, cause I'd like to go back to curly hair if I want to.

Has anybody here done this and did your hair get really damaged after been doing this for a couple of months?
Will my hair lose its curls? I've heard it can. Thx for the help and input!

[Avital88]

Yep your curls will get less and yep your hair will break! Think split ends and white dots. I used to straight it twice a week for 5 months and my hair got a lot thinner and is really damaged now.(The ends especially)
So i would not do it regularly if i was you. Good luck!

[chopandchange]

It depends how you straighten it. Are you going to use heat?

There are some kinder methods talked about on here, that don't involve heat. Doing a "doobie" is one. Another is just drying your hair in a banded ponytail. I love the banded ponytail effect because it smooths out my curl pattern a lot.

But, yes, if it's electric straighteners you're considering, they are not good for your hair. They heat up hotter than an oven. :eek:

[Anywhere]

My hair after being straightened (and dyed too but..) for maybe 4 months every few days (notice the frizz and frazzled ends):

http://forums.longhaircommunity.com/picture.php?albumid=4113&pictureid=53040
(ETA: Noticed you can't see pictures yet. But trust me, it's not how you want your hair to look)

It will be damaging in the long run. There's no escaping that fact.


ETA: I wrap my hair ("doobie") occasionally to get a straighter look. I don't know how long your hair is but there are plenty of videos on youtube showing how to do it. Sometimes the crown gets an awkward dent in it though.

[noisette]

Hi all, thank you for your quick replies.
Yes, I want to use heat, like maybe a curler to have softer hair cause my hair tends to frizz at the ends.

I've never heard of a "doobie" or banded ponytail so will look into that.

[pinchbeck]

Why do you want to change a part of your body that is what it is? Frequently, I see women with straightened hair and their ends are fried from midway point to the bottom of their hair. It looks bad.

Embrace your hair's texture and learn to love it and leave it alone!

[Athena's Owl]

I used to heat style my hair to be straight perhaps once a month. I'm still growing out the damage I did from thinking that only sometimes would be okay. I stopped my occasional heat styling three years ago.

you'll be fine to heat style, I think, if you're not trying to grow your hair any longer than it is, so you're regularly getting the most damaged parts cut off. But if you're wanting longer hair than what you have now I'd advise against using heat to style your hair.

depending on how tight your curl is you might be able to wrap it into a doobie and let it dry that way but it does take some practice. another thing you might want to look into is the massive oil shampoo thread. A lot of curlies report that their curl loosens with the method, so an oil/shampoo and a doobie wrap might be a straight hair solution.

[Anywhere]

My friend has coarse, ii/iii hair. She straightens it daily (she actually told me twice daily, once after she blowfries it, and again in the morning after she wakes up :eek:)
Her hair is an inch above SL and there are layers that are as short as 3" on her. I see splits and white dots all throughout her length even at such a short length.

I'd still advise against doing it daily, if you must straighten it then don't wash it for a few days and give it a good DT every week or so.

[rose.grace]

Ouch! Is the first thing that comes to mind. So many women spend a lot of time and effort (and sleeping with rollers and rags in their hair) who would love to have what you do. Maybe if you wrap it around your head while damp (if it's not too long), it will relax your curl enough to satisfy you. I used to have a friend who did that and it worked great for her; plus, no damage! Also, it may relax on it's own as it grows.

I hope you will leave it as it is naturally, but best of luck to you whatever you decide. :flower:

[Jenn of Pence]

While not using heat styling would be optimum for hair health, it is definitely your hair and you should be able to wear it however you want, accepting the possible consequences. There may be a time in the future you decide to go with your natural texture, but if straight is how you want it, there are ways to do it at least a little more gently to minimize those possible consequences.

As some have suggested, there are ways of "wrapping" your hair to let it dry straight. But if you want to use a straightener, the best thing I can suggest from my own experience is keeping the temperature as low as possible to be able to handle your texture. For me, my hair is only 1c/2a-ish, so I didn't require a very high temperature. I was able to straighten every two or three days for years without completely devastating consequences; I could accept a few white dots and splits while keeping it all trimmed regularly. As soon as I cranked up the temperature, I fried it within weeks; it was horrible.

The second thing would be do it as few times a week as possible. If you're stretching washes, then you should hopefully be able to just do it after each wash.

Thirdly, use a heat protectant, though after years of straightening, I never really found one I liked and wondered if it actually did much to help. But I'd suggest doing some research on that since I don't have any specific suggestions.

After frying my hair that last time and losing a ridiculous amount of hair to trimming off the damage, I decided to stop straightening altogether, but this was my experience from straightening for a number of years. So no worries; you should be able to experiment and find a method that will work for your hair without turning it to toast. :)

[GRU]

Since I started treating my hair the way it wanted to be treated, my hair stopped being so frizzy and icky. I'm still growing out damage, and will be for a few years, but the difference in my hair has been amazing since I stopped brushing and shampooing it.

Not sure how "curly" your hair is (wavy/wurly/curly), but you might want to look into some of the gentle LHC ways of treating your hair to see if you maybe enjoy being a curly-girl when your curls aren't fried to within an inch of their lives. I *never* used a curling iron or a flat iron on my hair, and I only rarely used a blow-fryer, and I still had majorly damaged hair. Curly hair is special, and it needs special treatment to meet its special needs.

I don't hate my hair anymore... and it only took me forty years to figure it out! :lol:

[EbonyCurls]

You can just do rollersets, using setting lotion, and allow to air-dry. So you'll have to do it on a day you will be hanging around home. Depending how tight your curls are you might be able to get away with just putting setting lotion in wet hair, brushing it smooth, and putting it in several large braids to dry.

[angelfell]

As somebody who has (if I don't have too many layers) naturally straight hair, chemical/heat processing to do the opposite of what your hair naturally does is not a very good idea.. unless done seldomly, then it may not be too bad. My hair is so heavy and flat, it holds no shape except for straight. First I abused it by loading it with mousse/hairspray to FORCE it to hold a 'scrunch', then with the curling irons curling it daily, and finally to top it all off I killed the rest of it with a perm :D. That was.. Nov. 2009. 2 weeks after, I straightened it daily. Hah. I finally just got all the perm damage out.

Anyways, I guess what I'm trying to say is embrace what you have naturally, because chances are (GOOD chances), there's tons of people with different hair types that envy yours :D