How Jackie got her Groove Back

by Jackie C
(Paris, France)

A year ago, I was 4 years into my natural hair journey. I was also still trimming my hair back and forth from shoulder length every year. My hair was indeed growing at a reasonable rate, I just couldn’t seem to keep those inches healthy.

I would wait for my annual length check, excited to see all the progress I had made. As all the guides suggested, I restricted my use of heat to once a year. I did often stretch my ends to see how far down my shoulder they’d grown, as my version of a length-check. I would pick out the hair salon meticulously and count down the days to the appointment. My hair would finally be visibly APL (armpit length)!

Eventually, I would just end up being disappointed to see what the 2-3 inches of progress actually looked like. There’s really nothing like the harsh reality check of a silk press. “Your ends are all split and thin,” the stylist would say. So out of the salon, I’d walk with my newly (once again) collarbone length hair.

It felt like an endless cycle! I was following all the rules and using all the right products for 4c hair. I just couldn’t understand why I still didn’t have the drapes I expected to show for it.

This was all until I discovered the practice of Ayurveda and all the natural ingredients for hair care! Even starting out, I was really skeptical. There were claims about the benefits of flowers and oils being the secret to long beautiful hair for Indian and Middle Eastern women. I could hardly believe it.

I thought there was no way that using this powder or that oil was going to do a better job than my deep conditioners and products in my existing natural hair regimen. Products I had worked so hard to curate over the years. I was truly pleasantly surprised.

I started adding ingredients slowly, one after the other, and marveling at the difference it made to my hair. I found myself modifying recipes to make sure the consistency worked for my 4b/4c curls and my hair was really responding well!

In the meantime, I was learning more about my hair. I found out I had high porosity hair, medium density, and medium strands (and not coarse like I previously thought). This additional information was even more crucial than the simple standard “4C” label.

This knowledge was foremost in my mind as I built my updated natural hair regimen. As I progressed, I noted what worked for my hair, and what would probably better suit someone with low porosity hair, or hair of a different texture.

I was finally seeing my hair’s potential! I understood what strong, moisturized hair was supposed to feel like and how far that was from what I had previously thought. Because I made most of the products myself, I understood better what each ingredient did and how my hair reacted to it. It was a new beginning to my natural hair journey and I’ve never looked back!


Note for the editor: This story was originally posted by me on my blog https://www.hibiscusroots.com/homemade-recipes-work-wonders-for-4c-hair-care/
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