Eyes Opened (my twist and rip timeline, with some mistakes in the middle)

I have just got to say that i started off with SO many bad habits. I made my locs with twist and rip and made so many mistakes with them. if i can figure out how to do that timeline here right now ill show you. trust me, the story has a happy ending

Here is what they looked like immediately after i made them. Knew nothing of what to do to them, and honestly, that's how it should have stayed, then they woudlnt have went through what they did

they are minutes old here

Then i waxed the one and only time. Realized without help that that was just not helping them lock and i have always HATED the feel of grease and stuff in my hair. see how nasty and matted they look?

few days in

heres where it finally started to dry up and wash out

then i started crocheting, big mistake. its harmful in general but much more for twist and rip as i learned. for so long i wondered why my locs were made in nearly 40 sections and yet they were as thin as if id made 100. but i was tightening them and didnt know it.

this was about a month in and about two and a half weeks or so into the crocheting

then i blunted the tips here which i intend to do again but not til theyre mature. in the meantime im lovin the look they have

Now here's where i combined a few of them thinking that would solve the thickness issue.

bout a month and a week or month and a half in

Here's what they looked like after they were fully combined down to 29 now

Here's where i made a big mistake. in another effort to thicken them, knowing i couldnt spare anymore to combine, i shortened them using a crochet hook. basically bunching them up, pulling them into themselves then tightening them from the side.

Lucky for me some of the length came back when i washed them

Now here's the happy ending, well not really the end, ill be posting more along the timeline as they mature. they just now turned a full two months. but here is where i have finally stopped putting in endless effort on blunting the tips and stopped harming them by crocheting the bodies. i absolutely love how they look here. so much more healthy

these were taken just now as im first making this timeline. i have come a long way and learned so much in the short two months ive had these locs

they look amazing and i cannot wait until they fatten up, they are gonna get so thick with these so few sections, and that was exactly what i wanted, nice fat ones. anyway ill be adding more as they mature by the month. in the meantime here's a few of the tams and things i have for them which i love

these were all crocheted by my brother throughout my dreading process

my first tam

second one, rasta colored, haha i love it

theres my camo dread band (keep in mind these were made when i was still crochething them)

and last but not least my newest beanie.

thanks for all the advice everyone. cant wait to show you the (natural) progress of my locs. absolutely loving their healthy look

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ok nearly 3 month update. you may notice they look like crap now. thatd be because the crocheting has finally wore off and so ive pretty much undone all the damage i did to the dreading process.

its a good thing though. im so excited to see how they dread on their own. i pulled at em very gently and a bunch of the hairs just slipped apart. which tells me their solidity was only due to the weaving of the crochet hook. so i took that apart as much as possible. they look about the same as they did when i first started, which from what ive seen from other timelines, is very approrpriate for the small amount of time theyve been in.

also you may notice, i have a ....drumroll.....CONGO!!! haha

also happen to have more dreads. nearly all the ones i combined intentionally before have separated, with a little help but they were already coming apart. im up to 39. so now ill be able to congo as they get longer. the one congo i already have was from one that didnt quite separate all the way down. but i love it haha.

ok so we're at a lil over 3 and a half months now, i have more than ever and they look better than ever. i wish id never made the mistakes ive made and they could be even better by now

first i wanna show off my new dread wraps haha

now here's how my dreads look now, along with the new method i learned to tie them back more effectively (may seem simple but i hadnt thought of it haha. id been tyin them at the bottom back)

i absolutely love how much fuller they look. also (as i said in another discussion) i am keeping the tips loose. watch the timeline for the next change, all good ones from now on

ok so i am long overdue for an update. it's been a year and 1 month now. over the few months after my last update i undid alot of the dreads and some i re-twist and ripped, others i left loose to form naturally. i cant figure out how to post pics the way i used to on here though. seems to have changed. now you can only attatch them it looks like. anyone know how or if you can still post them the way i did the others? i wanna be able to post more than 3

updated by @ethon-obrien: 02/14/15 03:08:32PM

They look much better now. Did you manage to get all the wax out, or are you just banking on hoping it's all out from how they feel? Wax tends to stick around long after you think it's all gone. It's just hidden deep inside.

As for blunting, why did you decide to do it? Blunting adds hours and hours to it's drying time. Some of mine blunted on their own, and now it can take an easy 24 hours to completely dry. I understand people cutting them when they get longer than they want. In that case they will blunt, but to do it intentionally for cosmetic reasons is harmful to your locks.

I'm glad you realized how damaging and time consuming maintenance is. Hopefully you'll enjoy your locks more now that you are letting them be

yeah i washed them a whole bunch to get rid of the wax. one has even been taken apart since then (that was the last one i ended up combining, and there was absolutely no wax left in it. it wasnt even really wax, it was this stuff called miracle grow. it just slowed down the locking so much by slickening it up.

and i dunno i just like the way my dreads look blunted better than the loose hair. and i havent really had a problem with the drying, they dry in like a good 6 hours fully. i squeeze em and shake em real good before i start drying. besides i just find the extra time worth the sacrifice for the look. but im not gonna blunt the tips until they mature. you cant tell in the pictures that well but almost all the tips are loose now. so im not gonna waste the time to reblunt them every day like i been. im just gonna do it when theyre mature and itll only have to be the once and then itll just stay. til then im completely leaving them be other than washing and keeping the loose hairs next to the dread they belong to. i wouldnt even do that except for the fact that i cannot afford any congos haha. too few locs.

and thank you. the support is real encouraging while im still in the awkward beginning stages of the dreads. though i truly am enjoying how healthy and natural they look now that i stopped. i just quit it all and washed em a bunch of times to undo most of it.

You are going to have some bad ass locks when they get longer and more mature! They look awesome now but it will definitely be worth it to wait and see how the journey goes.

Thanks for posting your timeline.

I can see in a few of the later pics that they are looser at the tips. But if at 2 months they are taking 6 hours to dry, at 1 year, you'll be like me taking 24 hours. Careful with that. PM me if at any point you want some pointers on how to help cutting down on that time. The long they take to dry, the better chance of mold growing.

I'm willing to take the time to dry them, because I have really fat roots. Most people have between 25-45 locks. I have 12- 14. The size alone makes them take longer. Your's will be fat too. The combination ofgirth and blunted tips will make it harder than you might want. But I'm always here to help you out. Some people like what they like. I just want to make it more pleasant for them

Loving how they look now! Definitely worth the wait!

Amazing timeline man! So glad you realized what you were doing wrong in the beginning. I just combed out my year-old dreads about a week ago because I made the same mistakes in the beginning. Yours look like they're bouncing back well. Mine just never felt to me like they should. I felt like I had permanently messed them up, so I'm starting over. This is such a nice timeline to use to share your experience with people, and also explain to them how bad that stuff is for your hair. Congrats on your dreads

How could it possibly seem logical to say that blunting the ends by cutting is perfectly ok, but doing it for cosmetic reasons is harmful? that just makes absolutely no sense. I think you may be more concerned with people remaining completely natural than the actual health of the loc...

Baba Fats said:

They look much better now. Did you manage to get all the wax out, or are you just banking on hoping it's all out from how they feel? Wax tends to stick around long after you think it's all gone. It's just hidden deep inside.

As for blunting, why did you decide to do it? Blunting adds hours and hours to it's drying time. Some of mine blunted on their own, and now it can take an easy 24 hours to completely dry. I understand people cutting them when they get longer than they want. In that case they will blunt, but to do it intentionally for cosmetic reasons is harmful to your locks.

I'm glad you realized how damaging and time consuming maintenance is. Hopefully you'll enjoy your locks more now that you are letting them be

I could understand if using harmful methods to blunt, but root rubbing, or simply cutting them at an angle as you mentioned seem perfectly fine to me. If they want to wait on them to dry thats their personal choice right?

Spencer Mcduffy said:

How could it possibly seem logical to say that blunting the ends by cutting is perfectly ok, but doing it for cosmetic reasons is harmful? that just makes absolutely no sense. I think you may be more concerned with people remaining completely natural than the actual health of the loc...

Baba Fats said:

They look much better now. Did you manage to get all the wax out, or are you just banking on hoping it's all out from how they feel? Wax tends to stick around long after you think it's all gone. It's just hidden deep inside.

As for blunting, why did you decide to do it? Blunting adds hours and hours to it's drying time. Some of mine blunted on their own, and now it can take an easy 24 hours to completely dry. I understand people cutting them when they get longer than they want. In that case they will blunt, but to do it intentionally for cosmetic reasons is harmful to your locks.

I'm glad you realized how damaging and time consuming maintenance is. Hopefully you'll enjoy your locks more now that you are letting them be

u missed the piint he said cyputting because they are too long is understandable cutting to make them blunt is dumb

Spencer Mcduffy said:

How could it possibly seem logical to say that blunting the ends by cutting is perfectly ok, but doing it for cosmetic reasons is harmful? that just makes absolutely no sense. I think you may be more concerned with people remaining completely natural than the actual health of the loc...

Baba Fats said:

They look much better now. Did you manage to get all the wax out, or are you just banking on hoping it's all out from how they feel? Wax tends to stick around long after you think it's all gone. It's just hidden deep inside.

As for blunting, why did you decide to do it? Blunting adds hours and hours to it's drying time. Some of mine blunted on their own, and now it can take an easy 24 hours to completely dry. I understand people cutting them when they get longer than they want. In that case they will blunt, but to do it intentionally for cosmetic reasons is harmful to your locks.

I'm glad you realized how damaging and time consuming maintenance is. Hopefully you'll enjoy your locks more now that you are letting them be

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My new book Ban The Taboo Vol 1