The creature made of black residue?

Well everyone, I'm new here to the site but I'm in a bit of a pickle. When I started on mydread lockadventure I decided to start with back combing due to the fact that I needed them to start dreading quicker due to my profession. I back combed for 2 1/2 months about once a week before I let it go all natural. It has now been 5 months and my hair has really started to lock! The unfortunate thing is that there is black residue in my hair and I believe it's from the initial back combing. The person who did it usedpetroleumjelly. Now I am stuck wondering if I'll have to start over again or there may hopefully be a fix to this. Also, this has made some of my dreads kinda hard, mainly all the tips, they're not supposed to be really hard are they?

I have tried the vinegar wash way (washed with baking soda first, then did it with whitevinegarand let it soak.) and I normally wash with dr. bronners shampoo. So... does anyone have advice on what I should do? I will post a picture of what's going on in a few minutes.

updated by @rachel-c: 02/14/15 11:14:53AM

Here are some pictures from this morning! Hope to hear from you guys back, so far I've found this forum to be one of the most helpful ones

You shouldn't keep backcombing them, if you start off that way then you do it once and that's it. Same with any starting method, you do it once and then leave them alone, but I guess you know that now, but I figured I'd say it just for future reference. As for the black residue, I'm not sure how petroleum jelly works, but it's no doubt one of those things that don't help at all, so I imagine the black residue is dirt/whatever trapped there cos of the petroleum jelly, and the same problem for the hardness, presumably. I heard that petroleum jelly is harder to remove than wax, but I'm not sure about that. There' a wax remover advertised here that you can buy and should help, but besides that, I wouldn't know what else to try.

petroleum jelly (vaseline), is a hydrocarbon. So is wax. Neither will wash out with normal soap and water, or baking soda. Petroleum jelly is just that, petroleum. It's an oil product. oil and water don't mix, so you need to get something that removes tough grease like Dawn dish soap, or the wax remover from dreadlockhampoo.com. If you used it once, it will take about a month or so to get it all out. Use the wax remover before each normal wash, and wash 3 times a week. Once it's all out, you will probably notice that your locks are no where near locked up. The jelly holds your hair together like wax does.

And Tara is right. The black stuff you are seeing is dirt and grime stuck in your hair. When you get the jelly out, you will clear out the dirty as well.

Be very careful around open flames. Dreadlocks are like pure wool. They don't catch on fire; They smolder. but with that in your hair, you are a walking match-stick.

This iframe is not allowed

Well it's good to know my hair couldpotentiallycatch on fire!! I will be sure to avoid open flames as much as possible!

And yikes I didn't know all of that was happening in my hair. I have used dawn soap when I was washing the vinegar out of my hair, but I have yet to use it on it's own. I will try using just the soap and my shampoo in a couple days, since I washed my hair yesterday, and I will also probably order the wax removal as well.

Hopefully this will solve mydelima, thanks for the advice!

The wax removal sessions are bit more involved than normal washing.

Get a pot or bucket of water and fill it with as warm water as you can stand. squirt in a generous amount of soap. The take 1 lock at a time and dunk it in the water and need the soap into the lock. It can take a minute or 2 for each one. Then rinse and do your normal wash.

If you're doing the BS/ACV methods, don't skip the ACV cmpletely, just use a little less.

I hope it fixes it too

backcombing over and over was reallllly bad idea all u did was reset the progress to day 1 everytime u did

petroleum jelly/ what wrre they thnking? that not only will prevent dreads but make them slip right out its a lubricant

thats ..mindblowingly stupid

the bronners might be causing some buildup if u have ghard water

so

use nutragena anti resididue once..or twice to remove the gunk

then switch to these www.dreadlockshampoo.com

whenever u try to rush it u screw yourself

u reset your profgres over and i]over and did a fair ammount of damage rebackcombing

--
My new book Ban The Taboo Vol 1

also do u livein a city or smoke ive seen black gunk like that buildup in mine and on my skin while living in the city car tires from millions of cars driving by leave a rubber mist in the air that can coat your skin and hair and make u filthy jut walk barefoot 1 blick in the city and your feet are black much of thats car tire residue and other air polutions i imagine its not great for lungs either

but smi]oking or living in a city can cause some gunk

--
My new book Ban The Taboo Vol 1

your page says u used clay in your hair too whats that all about?

--
My new book Ban The Taboo Vol 1

I know I know, I was foolish to rush, but I needed my job and I couldn't get hired to play professional concerts with unwashed hair, ya know? >.< But! I'm hoping the damage isn't too bad. My dreads seem ok, the root damage from the backcombing isn't too bad and has been recovering since I've stopped a couple months ago.

As for living in a city, I guess you could call it a city but it's just Wichita so in comparison to city's such as Chicago or L.A. there isn't a whole lot of smog. Living in the suburbs helps too. As for smoking, I do smoke hooka, and bit of green here to there, but I don't smoke cigarettes.

I will have to try the shampoo change along with the wax remover suggestions, and I again thank you guys for the advice. I hope my stupid mistakes won't leave permanent damage to my hair.