twist and rip. shes also my main dread inspiration. she let meknow messy was beautiful through seeing how onderful she looks with crazy dreads.
twist and rip is a method where you take a section of hair and kind of roll it in your fingers and split the section and 'rip' it upwards, essentially braiding knots into your hair. but trust me, it would be better to freeform, i had some of my twist and rip stay in. it helped some roots lock up. but its better to let your hair section out naturally. i would say try natural for a month or so. see how your hair sections out by itself. and contrary to popular belief, thin fine hair dreads up well because it knots up easily. coarse hair takes more time. to explain sectioning. you know how theres little sections of hair when its wet? those sections are your hairs natural sectioning. after a while of not brushing, little knots happen and spread up the section. eventually you have to take those sections and rip them apart. sometimes if you dont do it often enough you get a 'congo" which is two or more dreads that are now inseparable without cutting. if you are interested in twist and rip, this video explains it well. but i highly suggest you at least try free form for a month of more. and if you still want to do that, use your hairs natural sections because if you dont, it will either undread anyway and resection itself, or you might be stuck with an uncomfortable section. checkerboard sectioning or any kind of pattern will look fucked up. its better to have it hnatural so that you dont have any patches or lines of scalp that are highly visible. eventually the roots dread and get kind of slightly matted together which protect your scalp from sun. you also will have dreads that form in between dreads. new little sections of hair grow in between dreads and there will always be some undreaded hair. whick is nice and gives a very natural look to the whole thing.
just let it go as is. youcan trim them, but you probably wont want to after things get going. you would have to brush out the ends (or that would be preferable because water drains from loose ends better. i have some naturally blunted ends and i have a lil mold issue in those dreads. also with the way soem dreads ball up when they get going, brushing out the ends would look kinda wierd... and there will be unevenness as you progresss so trimming before will have little effect on the outcome of your dreads. they start as knots that move up your sections and then theres shrinkage. people with long hair have the most noticeable shrinkage. people with short hair (like my husband and daughter) wont really get shrinkgage per se but it will just seem to not grow. well his hair isnt really short i guess its down past his shoulders now, but hes been freeforming for quite a few months now. i started with twist and rip, but most of it fell out and dreaded naturally.
i was watching some korn videos yesterday and wondering if their dreads were natural. looked like a little maintinence may be done. water wont get the oil out either. baking soda rinse is the cheapest. also seems like Kirks Castile soap may be residue free, which is the quality of importance in shampoo for dreading and dreads. dont do anything to your hair.when people ask me how to get dreads i say "keep it clean, dont brush it." also separate. thats it. ive been watching my husbands dread up and its been very awesome to see them pop up. your hair knows how to dread itself. and you dont wanna have dreads like someone elses. when yours form up, youll see how uniquely you they are and how glad you are they are that way. also the less you care, the faster it goes, or at least if you dont care then it seems that way
baking soda does fade henna. but i have done an ACV rinse and nothing else and my hair was clean but got oily pretty quick. i woulndt suggest just an ACV rinse. washing less often might help.
