Pampering my hair

We (husband, kids, and my mom) spent the weekend just outside of Port Antonio along the north coast.  It is a beautiful place to relax.

View of San San Bay from our villa

Another view of San San Bay

After 4 days of hot, hot sunshine, chlorine and salt water, my hair was extra dry and in dire need of pampering.  This is what my hair looked like at the end of the weekend.  It is also due for  re-tightening.  It was supposed to have been done today, but I postponed my appointment, because I am going to do the retightening class this coming weekend, so that I will be able to do my own hair.

I got a bottle of Black Castor Oil to put on my hair.  This is not the stuff that you buy online, or in the beauty shop.  This stuff was purchased at the farmers market, where Mrs. Farmer's wife makes this stuff at home.  As we say in Jamaica "This is the real McCoy".  My mom used to use it in my hair when I was a little girl, and  I remember it making my hair really thick and lush.  Today I was also reminded how bad this thing smells.  After a few hours of walking around with it on my hair, I had to wash it out. I first shampooed my hair with my usual White Rain Shampoo.  Then I decided to do an Apple Cider Vinegar/Baking Soda Rinse.  Please see this link from Francesca Ramsey where she demonstrates how this is done.  Dreadlocks Baking Soda Deep Clean Tutorial/Review  I was a little disappointed that my hair did not have any gunk in there that I could see (Well maybe I am not that disappointed).  In any case, the rinse left my hair feeling very, very straw-like. I could feel this even though my hair was still wet.  I slathered on my Pantene conditioner, which I use occasionally.  My hair felt moisturized again.  While my hair was still damp I rubbed on a little Jamaica Mango and Lime Cactus Gro Oil, which is my current favourite. This is what it looked like at the end.  Boy, I cannot wait to do my retightening on the weekend.

R.I.P. little lock of hair

Last night I was examining my locks and trimming the fuzzy bits off the ends.  I noticed that one lock was really very thin in the middle.  It was hanging on by about three hairs.  I decided to put it out of its misery.

Poor broken lock looks so sad.

I made an appointment for the end of the month to get properly trained in retightening my hair.  I am very excited by the prospect.  I have an appointment with my consultant for my routine retightening which is about a week before the training.  Should I postpone my appointment with my consultant? Or should I keep my appointment with her and ask her to leave a portion of my hair un-retightened so that I will have something to practice on?  Decisions, decisions.

Two Years and Nine Months

My locks seem to be growing really fast at the moment.  It's funny how sometimes it seems to take forever to grow, and at other times like now, it grows fast.  Here is a picture of my last Caruso Roller set.

My hair was looking flat and somewhat blah.  So I did a quick Caruso Steam set which perked my hair up quite a bit. The Caruso rollers do not make well defined, long lasting curls, but they are adequate for giving your hair a little oomph.

Hot Oil Treatment

My hair has been feeling extra dry lately.  I think this may be because of the colouring that I have been doing to cover up the grays.  Yesterday I decided to give myself a hot oil treatment using a combination of Olive Oil and Jamaican Mango and Lime Island Oil.  I heated the oils briefly in the microwave oven, then put it on my slightly damp hair.  Then I covered my head with a plastic cap and left on for about an hour.  I then shampooed my hair as usual and did a soft spike set.

Still can't manage the back

So I went for my professional re-tightening today.  The front of my hair which I had done myself looked great, and was done well.  However, the back was another story.  I only did a few rows, but they were not well done.  I apparently messed up my lock pattern on some of these locks.  My loctician encouraged me once again to take a retightening class so that I can be taught properly.  I am seriously thinking about it.

By the way, my retightening session lasted one hour!! Yes, one hour!!  This was because I had done the front myself, and therefore cut the loctician's time in half. This really encouraged me to continue to try to help myself.

Doing it Myself.........Again

I bought a Nappy Lock Tool some time ago, with the intention of doing my own retightenings.  Well, I have not been very good about doing it myself.

Well, I now have a newly revived enthusiasm for doing my own retightenings.  I hope I can stick to it this time.  Last night I did one half of the front of my head, and tonight I did the other half of the front.  It took about 1.5 hours to do each half, which included fixing slippage and loose tufts of hair.  As in the past, I have found that the front is easy to do because I can see what I am doing. The back of my head is the real challenge.  I really need to overcome the difficulty of feeling what I am doing rather than seeing.  This will take patience and practice I know.

The main difference between a professional re-ti and my DIY re-ti is that my head is not sore at the end.  I don't tighten my locks so much that there is tugging at my roots.  And because I don't tighten them too much, I don't have too much of the "scalpy" look.

I will tackle the back tomorrow.  And I will do a post on my progress.  Any tips would be more than welcome.

Strange hands in my hair

I have been contemplating how I feel about people touching my hair.  I have come to recognize that many people really feel violated when other people touch their hair without asking first.  In fact, I have been an offender in doing just that to other people.  However, I have no such hangups about people touching my hair if they ask, and if I know them.  It really is a violation if someone I don't know touches my hair, but even then I don't go ballistic on them.

Just recently, a good (male) acquaintance of mine, whom I had not seen in more than two years since I had my locks installed, saw me and immediately leaned in toward me, put both hands in my hair, and exclaimed how much he just loves my hair.  "Your hair looks fabulous darling!" I was a little taken aback, but he did it with no intention whatsoever of offending me.  And I did not take any offense.  It was completely in keeping with his loving, flamboyant personality.

I do have major remorse about touching someone's hair without asking first.  It was a couple of years ago, and this lady came into my office.  She had really gorgeous locks and I was totally impressed.  I reached out and touched them, while commenting on how lovely they were.  She froze, and she didn't acknowledge the compliment.  It was an awkward situation and I realized that I should not have touched her hair.  I have regretted it ever since, and I  apologize to her from cyberspace.  I guess because I don't have any real issues with other people touching my hair, it took me a long while to recognize that some people really hate it.

Oh well, you live and you learn.