So it's been almost 8 months at this point since I decided to let my hair go. The few TnR ones I made fell out (except for one) and the rest of my hair has been dreading naturally. Yesterday was the first time I seriously considered brushing out my hair. It was just a wild, ridiculously crazy rats nest. I felt like a cave woman, but not in a good way. I have to tie my hair back at work which is horribly frustrating when my hair does NOT want to cooperate and honestly it doesn't look any less crazy tied back. Haha.

The customers at my job are very...blunt and...crude/rude at times. I constantly have people staring at my head like they're disgusted or making comments like "bad hair day?". I just try to ignore it/play it off, but it does become tiring/irritating at times. Also...trying to keep these bad boys from turning into one giant lock is hard work! I honestly feel like I have to separate multiple times every day to keep everything from tangling into one mass. Already some of the sections are pretty big from dreadlings merging together. I can't do anything about it at this point unless I just want to completely brush/cut them out. I figure I'll try to separate them the best that I can and hope for the best. :[

Anyway, so yesterday I decided that I was going to brush my little dreadlings out. Then I looked in the mirror and pulled at them and played with them. It made me sad to think of actually going through with it after all of this time. I knew that I'd be depressed if I actually did it. SO, I'm going to keep on keeping on. Just have to keep telling myself that it's worth it.

At first I was all like "I'm going to keep a photo diary of my progress, yeah!" Then I was like "wow, I'm really too lazy to do all of that". Haha. I'm going to try to get some photos posted soon though. It'll be cool to be able to look back and see how much progress has been made.

Anywho. Enough rambling. For now, here is one from a little less than two months in. Sorry for the weird lighting/quality/size. I had to brighten it to actually see my hair and it was taken with a crappy tablet camera. :p

After reading through the reasons behind many beginning their dread journeys, I'd like to try to articulate my reasons for doing so. I guess it's an attempt to reaffirm my own thoughts. First, it helps that I've always found dreadlocks to be beautiful, even as a young child.

The past couple of years or so has been particularly difficult for me, mentally and spiritually. I won't go into too many boring details, but in a nutshell, being stuck in a dead end job that wears me down as a human being is killing my soul. A succession of terrible decisions, harmful vices, and self-destructive behavior has turned me into someone that I hate. There's this constant, nagging feeling of helplessness and anger that is always right underneath the surface. I'm not about anger and hate. I want/need/crave peace and balance in my life.

My passions and dreams have fallen to the wayside and I've let myself become entangled in a cycle of working to pay bills, being financially secure, staying rooted to avoid the scary prospect of not knowing what will happen in the future. I wish I had the courage to let go and to free myself. My spirit is starved for adventure and beautiful life experiences. My boyfriend and I have been planning and saving up to be able to hopefully do just that one day. Letting my hair go is a small step I'm taking toward learning to not worry so much and to rediscover myself--to stop caring so much about what I'm expected to do and do what I want to do NOW, before it's too late and I regret not having done it later. I need to rediscover myself, to learn to love and accept who I am now.

I'm sure a lot of other people have felt this way too... Okay. That's a bunch of reasons. Sorry for rambling, but it was important for me to put my thoughts into writing.

So I've been wanting dreads for a million years, but there have always been reasons ( or excuses ) for me not to commit to starting them. The main one being that I needed to move out of my parents home--for obvious reasons. I guess that I also thought that my hair was incapable of forming dreads. The last time I brushed my hair was years ago, but they never formed so much as a knot. Coming to this site, I realized it's because I always conditioned my hair. So hopefully now, without the conditioner in the picture, my hair will be able to do what it wants to! Super excited about beginning the process and committing to it.

I'm also excited about having found this community. I'll try to post photos sometime soon to use as a reference in the future.

Liz