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Monday, June 3, 2013

Do Healthy Natural Hair Regimens Have to Be So Long?



Recently, I went to a natural hair meet up (shout out to The Trendysocialite) and during the hair discussion we talked about establishing a natural hair regimen.   If you recall, my cleansing & conditioning regimen was detailed in a recent post of mine.  There were 4 weekly steps (prepoo, shampoo, deep condition, style), but during them there were at least 2 times that I was detangling my hair (after the prepoo & after deep conditioning) & I was retwisting my hair - A LOT.   The intent was to keep my hair from tangling while going through the various steps of my regimen. This took about 3 -4 hours to do when I incorporated styling my hair in twists.  One of the discussion points was how long it took to do our hair.  We even considered whether all the steps we were incorporating were truly necessary for healthy natural hair.  One of the steps that I have eliminated over the past 2 years was using a cheap conditioner to detangle in addition to deep conditioning.  I figured that if I used a deep conditioner with enough slip, I could detangle after deep conditioning.  Over the past two weeks I've also eliminated the prepoo & going through the process with my hair in twists.  I tended to lose more hair during this step rather than waiting until after deep conditioning to detangle.  This has saved me about 30 - 1 hr in my regimen.

Old Regimen 
Prepoo
* detangle & twist hair
Shampoo
*take down each twist, shampoo section, retwist
Deep condition 20 -30 mins
*add conditioner to each twist & add heat
*detangle & retwist, cool rinse
Moisturize & style
*untwist hair & add leave in, oil, creamy moisturizer (LOC) while loose
*section in 4 large sections & add styling product
*create medium sized twists in each section

Current Regimen
Shampoo
*hair loose, really cleansing scalp & smooshing shampoo in downward motion on the hair shaft
Deep Condition 20 - 30 mins
*hair loose add heat
Detangle & twist in medium twists
*cool rinse
Moisturize & style
* untwist 1 twist at a time
*do LOC moisturizing
*add styling product & retwist

  What modifications have you made to your natural hair regimen over the years?

2 comments:

  1. My regimen has gone down to considerably less steps than ever.

    Pre-poo w coconut oil

    Shampoo w coconut shampoo

    separate into 2-4 sections (depending on time and style i want to do afterwards) while applying coconut conditioner

    finger detangle as i twist/braid the sections

    let it dry to a little more than damp

    each section then gets my leave in conditioner, my sealer (either coconut oil or shea butter), then gel.

    *DC and ACV rinse once a month.

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    Replies
    1. Thanks for sharing your regimen! It sounds like you have come up with a fairly concise regimen as well!

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