Curly Girl

Let's talk about hair for a minute. If you were born with stick straight hair, then you are rather a lucky one. I know straight haired women bemoan their lifeless locks, but seriously, you have no idea what it is like to be on the other side. I know curls *look* like fun, but the day in day out care taking of curls is a job in its own right. And besides, straight haired people can be curly on a whim anytime they want. There's only 157 different curling methods on Pinterest and Youtube ranging from hot rollers to socks overnight. We curly girls can't use any of those methods because they fuck with our natural curl pattern.

This is a fantasy - these curls do not occur in nature

And then you've got folks like our lady Taylor Swift here - propagating lies about what "naturally curly hair" looks like. Fess up, Taylor! How many stylists and how many hours to achieve that look?? If you had to use curling irons, curlers, etc. then what we have here is not her natural curl pattern and therefore not an example of naturally curly hair.

Seems kind of silly how worked up I can get over hair, huh?

Well you're WRONG! - *ahem*...

Over the years I've become a kind of radical militant about the cause for naturally curly hair and how to care for it. You know why? Because the rest of the world - all the non-curlies out there- don't know dick about curly hair and yet still try to instruct us about what to do with our hair. ::swivels neck:: You don't *know* me! You don't know my life! That's right, I pulled out the sassy attitude. Because curly hair gets a bad rap in popular culture, advertising, and the media in general. Well I'm here to defend it and speak out the truth!

First of all, most people have *some* curl to their hair - be it the gentlest of wave pattern or super kinky-curly. If you call yourself straight-haired, but find yourself flat ironing out a natural wave or even frizz, you my friend are a curly-girl in denial. And that accounts for a LOT of people.

Right now, straight hair is the ideal, at least in American popular culture (I can't speak to other nations). I can't tell you how many magazine articles and morning/daytime talk shows I have come across that claim to show you how to tame your hair during the humid months of summer or whatever. They refer to waves and curls as "frizz". Stick straight is the way and if its not stick straight, then you man-handle that hair with tools and products until it IS stick straight! (By the way, a lot of the products and tools they tout can be really bad for your hair in the long run).

Don't tell me straight is the standard for beauty.
This hair is *gorgeous*! Can I scalp her and wear her hair??

Am I sounding crunchy granola enough yet? Well just wait - it gets worse ;-)

The book Curly Girl: The Handbook Changed. My. Life. It opened my eyes to the fact that I had been trained to hate my curls by companies that bank off of our desperation to control them. Gels, Mousse, Shampoos, Conditioners, Waxes, Pomades...All full of moisture depriving sulfates, silicones, alcohols, and parabens. Bad BAD juju for curly hair. But we fall for the commercials and the photo ads. The empty promises that if we just use their products, we too can have Taylor Swift's mythical, perfectly coiffed hair. In reality, their products only serve to make our curls dehydrated, damaged, and angry. Oh so very angry.

So let's be real. Do you have "frizz"? Do you flat iron to get rid of your hair's natural wave? Are you a curly girl in denial? Its time to come out of the closet. Stop hating and abusing your hair and start loving it! Here's the deal:

Rule 1.) No sulfates.

Probably 90% of all shampoos on the market contain sulfates. These chemicals are extremely cheap and extremely harsh cleansers. Oh they cleanse alright - they remove every last drop of natural oil from your scalp and hair shafts. 'But,' you say, 'that's a good thing right? Oils are gross and dirty, that's why we wash our hair!' Well, yes and no. We need *some* oils on our hair or it dries out. Straight haired people (and yes, a lot of the lighter, wavy curly girls, too) have to wash their hair everyday because oils from the scalp slide on down the hair shaft unimpeded. Not so for those with curls. The oils don't travel down a curly hair shaft as easily so we tend to have dry hair. Washing with sulfates only makes the situation worse, i.e. even drier hair. Dry, curly hair = frizzy, unmanageable hair.

Rule 2.) No silicones

Silicone ultimately dries out and damages your hair

You like that slick, slippery feeling your hair has right after you condition it, don't you? It just feels so nice and moisturized! That's the funny thing about silicones. They feel like they're moisturizing your hair, but what is actually happening is that your hair shafts are encased in the chemical. The slick feeling is the silicone, not your hair. The chemical minimizes (or eliminates) frizz because no moisture from the air can penetrate the silicone. Which sounds all well and good except no moisture can penetrate the silicone. So ultimately, your hair is going to dry out because nothing is going to get through the chemical barrier surrounding you hair shafts. Silicone is not water-soluble which means the only way you can get that gunk out (and get moisture in) is to use a cleanser like sulfate (see rule 1). And that is how we create a vicious cycle.

There is hope, though! You DO NOT NEED *either* of these chemicals to tame and control your wavy/curly hair! Don't listen to the commercials, don't read the glossy magazine ads - they *want* you to be dependent upon their products! So what do you do? How do you clean your hair? How do you condition your hair? Oh, my friend, welcome to my world...

I'm gonna keep blathering on about this and the basic how-to's (or how-not-to's) of curly girl hair care in another post - cause this is gettin' long and ridiculous.