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View Full Version : Got some questions...



Tabihito
July 2nd, 2011, 11:02 PM
Mostly because my hair is contrary. Ordinarily I wouldn't care, since knowing won't change what it is, but I'm quite on the border of wavy and curly, and would rather like to know if I should treat it as wavy or treat it as curly. So would any of you more-knowledgeable people be able to help me? I took the pictures a few weeks back, after I had very patiently sat at my computer and played Dragon Age while waiting for it to dry. The only thing I did was squeeze some of the water out and then comb it, since otherwise it'd take at least seven hours to dry all the way (I've tried and given up, I think my hair is hydrophilic or something, I swear).

http://i10.photobucket.com/albums/a127/meisrunner/040.jpg
Back view. Unfortunately, lacking either a webcam or a real camera, getting pictures of the back of my head is hard. It's a little blurry, but you can sorta see that there's a mix of wavy pieces, rather curly pieces, and some that are almost straight. Also, even waves barely start until the nape of my neck, dunno if that's at all relevant.

http://i10.photobucket.com/albums/a127/meisrunner/046.jpg
Closeup of the hair on the left side of my head. I tried to do a picture in profile, but this was easier. Again, a mix of curly and wavy and straight.

http://i10.photobucket.com/albums/a127/meisrunner/047.jpg
And this is what really makes me question considering myself a wavy. Because that is either a very strange wave, or it's a curl. It basically always forms there when I let my hair air-dry.

So what I want to know is, where the heck do I fall, and if it's on the curly side, is there anything I can do to make all my hair behave like that one piece, or is it normal to have a mix?

Also, as someone who is still busy getting through the greaseball teenager/early 20s stage, is CO-washing feasible? I've tried it before, but never got great results, it never really got the grease out well enough. I have fine hair and an oily scalp, so while it did wonders for the length, it left my scalp kinda nasty. Does anyone know if there's a particular conditioner that'll work better for that? Or am I better off trying to use sulfate-free shampoos?

celebriangel
July 3rd, 2011, 01:54 AM
You look like a 2c to me - like me! Hello hair twin :)

I had horribly greasy hair, but it was fixed right up when I got glandular fever and washed my hair once every 2-3 weeks for four months, because I couldn't wash it more often.

A not on "grease", though: a really beneficial thing to do is reevaluate how greasy your hair is. Because, okay, you need to wash every day, so you have greasy hair. But actually, what does your hair look like on day 2? Is it just not as fresh and grease-free as day 1? If so, do you really need to wash? Imho, no.

I know it's the fashion to have completely sebum-free hair, where the nourishing hair oil is replaced with cones. This makes absolutely no sense to me whatsoever. Yes, my hair is better than it was grease-wise, but if I were to follow the current trend in hairwashing I'd only have a two day break from hair washing. The thing is, my day 3 hair isn't much different from my day 7 hair. So I just put it up on days 3-7, and I have asked people and none of them have said my hair looks greasy, just shiny and smooth. But it depends how much you are prepared to put your hair up. I love it up, and wear it that way all the time by choice.

One thing that made me think my hair was even greasier than it was when I was a teenager was the contrast of oily roots with poofy, dry ends. When the whole head looks moisturised and shiny, a small amount of sebum at the roots is much less noticeable. To achieve this, many people oil the ends, and hair in good condition will be smooth and shiny anyway. But if you have good sebum production, a good method is to "preen" - that is, to distribute your scalp oils down the length. Your scalp looks less oily, and your ends look shiny and moisturised.

Some people use a BBB, but I prefer this method: http://archive.longhaircommunity.com/showthread.php?t=15976 because I get a nice soothing scalp massage and I can control how much oil I put on my length. Using my fingers rather than a BBB also preserves my curl pattern. As a variation, I massage with my head upside down as suggested, but do the preening part the right way up.

CO washing is feasible. The important things to note about CO washing are:

1) FINDING THE RIGHT CONDITIONER. Sorry for the internet shout, but I never even thought about trying CO for ages, and was just running around buying whatever cheap conditioner I could find for my first C in CWC...then I found Tesco's own brand coconut conditioner. It is my holy grail for CO - plenty of slip, a sort of creamy "lather" and makes my hair almost squeaky clean! I think the other ones I tried were heavy on the mineral oil.

2) I tip my head upside down in the shower, then massage conditioner into the scalp, about 4-5 palmfuls, making sure everywhere's covered and massage well. Then 2 more palmfuls on the length.

3) I then add a bit more water (my hair was already wet) and massage some more. At this point I get the creamy "lather" I mentioned.

4) Rinse! Rinse *well*

5) Adding honey made my conditioner more cleansing, but I found I really didn't need it, as did leaving the cleaning portion on for a while. I still do this if I've done a prewash oiling.

6) condition with heavier conditioner from ears down.

7) A vinegar rinse is, for me, essential. I don't know what would happen if I didn't, but I can *see* my hair getting shinier as I pour it over.

The tipping head upside down, massaging, and adding the extra bit of water and massaging again all make my CO washes more cleansing. My hair was almost squeaky clean this morning! This is achievable with the right conditioner; my personal experience is anything with too much mineral oil or other petroleum-like substances doesn't really work. The vinegar rinse seems to ward of the greasies, or something - I'm not sure, but I'm never satisfied when I skip it.

It's true, I need to wash my hair a bit more often with CO. But only a bit (1 week as opposed to 10 days) and I wouldn't mind having to wash my hair more often than that, even, if I were COing. Some people CO every day. Hopefully you won't need to.

Most people use a standard SLS poo every so often to "clarify", though it isn't a true clarifying wash. This varies depending on how often they CO wash - for example, some CO every 3-4 days and clarify every 3-4 weeks, some CO every day and clarify once a week. This prevents the limp greasies you can get once you've been COing for a while. Additionally, a lot of people are trying putting rooibos (redbush) tea in a mister bottle and misting their roots/scalp at night, and they're saying it's leaving their hair looking fresh, clean and less greasy. So that's one to think about.

My 2c hair responds extremely well to conefree - I get a much better, softer, shinier, more defined curl pattern. Conefree CO washes are easier to manage than coney ones, and you don't have to worry about buildup. I'd give CO and conefree a try if I were you.

I'm not sure whether to call myself a wurly or a curly, personally. But you are one of us! It's normal to have a mix, but CO encourages my spirals. I'm also a big fan of the preening method I mentioned above and Nightblooming's Triple Moon oil, all of which seem to encourage my hair to clump into spirals. I have ditched my brush entirely and combed for a while, but I'm currently using my Tangle Teezer, which has the same effect as a comb on my hair but with more smoothing for doing updos and it's much faster.

Best of luck! I treat my hair mostly like a curly, but I find that with conefree the curls are more evident at the start but fall out more easily as I get closer to wash day (and as I want to wear it up, anyway, so it works for me :)).

Wavelin
July 3rd, 2011, 02:41 AM
I also recommend CO washing. But "take it slow" and add more care as you need it. Start figuring out how to CO-wash, find the right technique, find the right washing conditioner and see how your hair reacts. After a couple of weeks you could add a more caring conditioner, start using deep treatments and adding a gel to style your curls, if you want/need.

But now you could try plopping/plunking after the wash to bring out your curls instead of your waves. It works even better with a bit of hair gel in your soaking wet hair and then up in the plop. Heres a description, but I'm sure there's treads about it here on LHC also.

http://www.wikihow.com/Plop-Your-Hair

Good luck!

Mesmerise
July 3rd, 2011, 06:53 AM
I am one of those people who thought she needed to wash hair daily because of "greasy" hair. Of course, my hair was only greasy to ME. It was because I liked the feeling of freshly washed roots, and a day later, they didn't feel so fresh and clean anymore. My hair never looked greasy at all... Last year I started washing my hair every second day, and this day I've managed to get to every third day (sometimes I'll go one more day...) and my hair is only really getting oily looking on the fourth day (if I've gone an extra day without washing). I'm also COing, which took a bit of adaptation at first cause I was used to that "clean" feeling I got from shampoo. However, I've found that my roots DO get clean from CO.

It does take a bit of persistence...and wearing your hair up on the second/third day if you're stretching washes a bit! However, it is possible to adjust.

Tabihito
July 3rd, 2011, 10:06 PM
First off, thank you so much for the advice. My biggest issue with the greaseball thing is, at the moment, my bangs. Or what's left of them, they're about mouth-length right now and too short to fit in any style just yet. My insanely fine hair tends to start 'clumping' really quickly, so I tend to wash earlier than I'd like so that they don't betray me. Is there a way to clip them back without looking ridiculous that will also stay put with a baseball cap on? I work at a Seattle's Best cafe (soon to be Border's cafe, since we're dropping that contract with SB), and so have to wear a cap at work. Health regulations and all, have to have something on our heads.

I am super glad though to know that there are other people in the same borderline boat that I am. Not really wavy or curly, sort of stuck in the middle there. I've been struggling for ages trying to figure out how to treat it, and it only gets more confused the longer it gets. At least when I had GI Jane hair, it was easy to know what to do: absolutely nothing, it's a buzz cut.

Already been conefree, SLS scares the heck out of me, so I've been using sulfate-free shampoos and conefree conditioner for the past... I guess year or so. But I guess I'll try CO again, with different conditioners this time.