haha it always surprises me when ppl fear getting theyr e dreads wet i almost want to tell them "u cant ever get them wet you have to move to the dessert cause even 1 drop of rain will destroy them but dont you dare sweat if you sweat yoir doomed and no you can never swim again or wash them ever"
havent they ever seen ppl with dreads in the rain?
this is the first timeive dreadedand i decided to let my hair go completely natural from the getgo. it took literally a week or 2 for me to start seeing littlelocks popping up here and there, then those formed into larger ones, and now ive gotthem all overand am totally happy with how theyre progressing, only being about2and a half monthsin. i always get the funniest looks from the well kept, businessish people around town when i have my hair outso ive started giving them goofy ass looks back..and then i just start dying from laughter haha. but my baby locks have already started teaching my to have more confidence in myself, patience for whats to come, and content with where im at here and now..which were all things i struggled with earlier. stoked and lovin it!
So I'm that back comber girl. When I saw your description of someone that didn't go natural, I was like "damn...he's got me."
I got a friend to help me back comb my hair days before leaving the country for a year. I arrived in Beijing with goofy hair and had been freaking out ever since. First it was the rain, granted they were acid rain, but it still freaked me out that rain was getting on my hair. Then it was the fizziness, the constant maintenance. Finally, the other day, I decided I wanted to go swimming and then realized "oh! I can't! my dreads!"
Then it dawned on me. This is not how dreads are suppose to be! I can't let it decrease my quality of life.
My dreads are still babies, only 2 months old, I want to take the natural route. Do you think if I just let mine be from this point on, it'll transition well? Or do I have to start over?
you'll be fine but what "consatant maintenance" do u mean? u shouldnt be doing nothing and u should swim oplay ij rain and wash are u not washing them?
they love getting wet
I was twisting them to keep it neat. (My hair's super frizzy, not because of back combing, but because its just like that...) I'm currently in midst of a job hunt...in Taiwan. Where they're accepting most of the time (an improvement from China), butI still get theoccasional "WTF?" because they don't know what to make of me. I'm normally good about not caving under societal pressure, but when you need the society to live, it makes things a little bit more difficult. I'm still committed in keeping my dreads. I've been using a kirkland brand shampoo that is supposedly vegan and have no sulphate, the closest thing I could find here to a non residue shampoo. However, I just ordered some essential oils online to be shipped to me and I'm going to try your baking soda rinse as soon as possible! I'm curious as to what the process from back comb to a natural will look like. I combed through the site and didn't find any examples, I was wondering if you'd be able to point me towards the right direction.
look at virtualy anyone who backcombed cause after u do u shouldnt do much after backcomb only defines the sections after thar u should let natural process take over now alot made the mistake of crochet so had to recover from that but look at any that say all they difd was backcomb oncve and theres what they will do
It seems....
natural process = takes far more patience (because usually when we want dreads we want them NOW), but is a continually forward moving process.
forming dreads= is immediately satisfying because you get dreads NOW-- but then you have to go through all the "backward" steps of watching those dreads you worked so hard twisting and ripping unraveling and going mad and loosening at the roots, so they can eventually become solid dreads.
For me I went with the formed dreads because I wanted them right away and also because I wanted to section them a certain way and wasn't down with just letting them do whatever they wanted. But I'm also pretty okay with the loosening/loopy process... I wasn't at first but I fell in love with the journey and the excitement of watching them change every day. I just pull them back with a bandana if they are being annoying.
My dreads r starting to dread together near the roots and I have a massive clump of hair at the back of my head....Do i need to restart and make them closer to my scalp?
This is for Blond Dready who posted on p. 1 of this conversation:
So are you going to do like your friends said and try to clean up your life some? Just curious. Dreads have nothing to do with it. I only tried weed a couple of times back in high school, never did anything else. And trust me, I have made my share of mistakes too - it's part of life. But you do have total control over what you do, and the minute you are ready to make changes, you will.
Cheers,
Janice
