The Relaxed Hair Thread

[AutobotsAttack]

Hola to my lovely peeps!

I've been searching around for any threads of this sort, and I haven’t really found any. Most of the ones I’ve come across are just question threads, and I wanted to provide a place for the chemically straightened haired ladies to come and converse. You can think of this thread as a “cousin” thread to the Kinky 4’s thread.

So welcome! to the ladies who chemically straighten their hair, and even chemically perm or curl theirs!

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Edit: I have added an addition to this thread called the Relaxed Hair Series. It is a full-in depth analysis of how to care for relaxed hair, and how to continue to maintain and retain as much length as possible.
The Series starts on page 26, post #225, with the introduction starting on post # 256.
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everyone is free to hop on in here and share any and everything.

I am definitely not a hair expert, or stylist, or a trichilogist (although I love anything hair sciency), but I’ve managed to grow my hair to a decently long length (although to me my hair is never long enough), and I’ve stuck with some methods and principles that work, as well as finding new ones to try.

Note: Let me know if there’s a thread like this somewhere out there (Mods).

[AutobotsAttack]

Oh and pictures! PLEASE! I love hair pictures! Everybody is encouraged to flood this place with hair pictures and progress pictures!

[AutobotsAttack]

At the moment for myself, my biggest concern right now is manipulating protein and moisture content. I know hair differs from person to person, but I find generally speaking most relaxed haired ladies overshoot their protein applications.

I’m just speculating, but I think internally getting your protein from food sources and supplements, and iron, will take care of needs to apply protein treatments frequently. At the moment I consume 130-160 grams of protein a day, and I find that too frequent of protein treatments gives me a bit of a protein overreaction (protein sensitive).

After that is where the moisture comes in. Quite a few ladies overlook how crucial moisture is. Even if you might be a bit over moisturized, I find with gentle manipulation (detangling) and backing off completely of the heat tools, small toothed combs, and high tensions hair styles, your hair will usually hold its integrity.

The 90/10 and 80/20 rules for moisture vs. protein are very good rules to keep in mind, but I wish to tweak it a bit and say 90/10 is better. With 90 being a very good moisturizing percentage (frequency), and 10 being a moderate to light protein treatment (also frequency), with maybe a heavy protein reconstruction treatment once or twice a year at most.

Again, this is all speculation, and my thoughts on the matter.

[YvetteVarie]

At the moment for myself, my biggest concern right now is manipulating protein and moisture content. I know hair differs from person to person, but I find generally speaking most relaxed haired ladies overshoot their protein applications.

I’m just speculating, but I think internally getting your protein from food sources and supplements, and iron, will take care of needs to apply protein treatments frequently. At the moment I consume 130-160 grams of protein a day, and I find that too frequent of protein treatments gives me a bit of a protein overreaction (protein sensitive).

After that is where the moisture comes in. Quite a few ladies overlook how crucial moisture is. Even if you might be a bit over moisturized, I find with gentle manipulation (detangling) and backing off completely of the heat tools, small toothed combs, and high tensions hair styles, your hair will usually hold its integrity.

The 90/10 and 80/20 rules for moisture vs. protein are very good rules to keep in mind, but I wish to tweak it a bit and say 90/10 is better. With 90 being a very good moisturizing percentage (frequency), and 10 being a moderate to light protein treatment (also frequency), with maybe a heavy protein reconstruction treatment once or twice a year at most.

Again, this is all speculation, and my thoughts on the matter.

Yaaaay!!! I am very lightly relaxed (texlaxed you might say). It looks as if I am still natural, and I experience about 50% shrinkage. I use a light protein conditioner after every wash (currently every fortnight). Currently using ORS Replenishing Conditioner and it works pretty well for me

[AutobotsAttack]

Yaaaay!!! I am very lightly relaxed (texlaxed you might say). It looks as if I am still natural, and I experience about 50% shrinkage. I use a light protein conditioner after every wash (currently every fortnight). Currently using ORS Replenishing Conditioner and it works pretty well for me

I really enjoy ORS replenishing conditioner because while it’s technically classified as a protein treatment, I find it’s more or less a balancing treatment, if anything else.

[proo]

Could you share your routine please, Autobots?

[chomsky]

Could you share your routine please, Autobots?

Seconding this! Do you and YvetteVarie stretch your relaxers at all, or do you touch up regularly? And do you notice a difference with the two textures?

I've grown out a relaxer 5 times, but I never paid much attention to my hair and it was always kept short. Seeing relaxed routines does make me wonder if I could every grow my hair with one.

[AutobotsAttack]

Could you share your routine please, Autobots?

Sure thing!

Here’s the routine I’ve been keeping up with since Christmas and New Years:

I CWC, either everyday or every other day. I keep the shampoo on my scalp and conditioner on my ends. Depending on if my scalp is getting dry I’ll let the conditioner make its way to my scalp because it doesn’t cause itchiness. (Shampoo is sulfate free because I suffer from eczema, but sometimes I’ll use a sulfate shampoo and be alright)

My hair is extremely fine so about once a month or once every two months I’ll clarify, to get rid of buildup.

Deep condition when it’s needed. (Maybe 4x a month) I typically can tell when I need it because the weather will make my hair go funky, But with the amount of conditioning washing I do I don’t need it very often.

I’ll do one or two hard protein treatments a year

For relaxer day and the week proceeding a relaxer, I’ll shampoo my hair with a chelating shampoo in place of my regular shampoo every other day, to get the PH of my hair back to normal, and to keep removing as much calcium deposits as I can. This is also when I’ll be more generous with the deep conditioning, and follow up with a hard protein treatment.

I manage to stretch my relaxers to twice a year, and if a corrective relaxer is needed I’ll have one done.

I oil my scalp every two to three days, and oil my ends after every wash. I mainly use coconut oil for my ends and mid shaft. For the oil mixture I put on my scalp, I mix jojoba, coconut, and essential oils like rosemary, or citronella. During the summer months when I sweat a lot more I’ll do a few ACC rinses to calm my scalp.

Sleep in a satin bonnet every night.

I don’t use heat, and I don’t delve too much into high tension styles, wigs, or weaves.

Other than that, my hair routine is fairly simple.

[AutobotsAttack]

Seconding this! Do you and YvetteVarie stretch your relaxers at all, or do you touch up regularly? And do you notice a difference with the two textures?

I've grown out a relaxer 5 times, but I never paid much attention to my hair and it was always kept short. Seeing relaxed routines does make me wonder if I could every grow my hair with one.

I stretch about 6 months between each relaxer, but depending on some years where I have large amounts of growth I’ll add in a third relaxer day to the year. I’ll do a corrective relaxer whenever I need one, and I typically won’t know when I’ll need it until months have passed and I’m having trouble with two varying textures that I can no longer work with. The corrective relaxers are rather random, so I don’t worry too much about constantly applying chemicals.

And I definitely notice a difference. When detangling I notice the comb slows down going through the more textures areas, and towards the bone straight parts it just glides right through.

Last year I had a very hard time detangling. I had the very textured new growth coming in, the textured parts that didn’t take well to the relaxer, and my pin straight parts, so I was dealing with three different textures. That’s when I decided to apply a corrective relaxer because I was experiencing so much tangling. And that’s the main reason why I try to keep an eye on varying textures.

[AutobotsAttack]

Although I do find no issues touching up regularly or every 2-3 months. The key in doing that, is removing as much of the calcium build up as you possibly can. Which is why I encourage people to buy the bottles of neutralizing shampoos to keep throughout the year. That initial week after relaxer day, I’ll encourage people to wash their hair 1-2 more times in that week, because the washing after the relaxer, you never really get it all out even if the color indicator turns white.

After that you can go about your deep conditioning or protein treatments however you wish, but I find a deep conditioning treatment helps the most, but that is just my own speculation.

Same for lye formulas too.