My TnR dreadlocks are 9 months old (1 week shy) and I dig them. I have been way more patient than I thought I would be and have learned to embrace the journey without losing my mind trying to make my hair do what I wanted it to do (pointless anyways, right?!) That being said, I have lost a lot of length (to be expected) and while my roots are tightening up nicely it is my ends that are driving me nuts right now (for the last 2 months really). I have included a pic so you can see (please excuse the webcam, before bed, jammies pic). It seems like as they mature they are forming dread clumps/balls where the length will fold up on itself many times until there is this clump of hair, which is annoyning because I wanted skinny dreads and now they are fat, but only at the bottom or in the middle wherever the clump happened to form. Then at the end of the clump/ball is a bunch of undreaded strands of hair that just look all tangled up and scraggly. So, I know this is a phase, but it seems like it has been doing this forever (like 4 months now) and I am wondering what happens next? Will my dreads eventually eat up this undreaded hair at the end and become VERY short? I thought that my ends would just remain undreaded and wavy (what I wanted), but it seems like they are gonna form more blunted ends.
Also, I have not touched my hair and don't want to dye it or cut it, but I was wondering what if I cut the loose hair off the dreads? Would that speed up the process or weaken the ends?
I know ultimately I will continue to be patient and do nothing, but I don't like this phase really. I wanted dreadlocks not dread clumps will this remedy itself or will I have dread clumps forever??
pic to come...
updated by @mama-harrison: 02/14/15 03:31:29AM