5 Mistakes That Are Costing Naturals Length

If you scan our message inbox and search for these two words ‘not growing’ you might find more than 100 instances of that very phrase in that order highlighted in yellow.

There are healthy women out there that genuinely believe that their hair is not growing, and can attest to the fact that year after year their hair is the same length regardless of what they think they might be doing to prevent that.

News flash, your hair IS growing which is a great thing because your body is doing what it is naturally supposed to do. If you want long hair your job is to retain the length that you grow with healthy hair practices.

In this post we want to take a critical look at some of the errors that we make when trying to retain length and maybe see if we can root out some of the most common mistakes that naturals make.

1. Uncontrolled shrinkage – I recently read a post on Urban Bush Babes calling naturals to embrace shrinkage because that is our hair in its healthiest form. When you tug on your coils and they spring right back into position and you can rest assured that your strands have not been subject to any heat, chemical or mechanical damage that can break the bonds in your hair to the point of it remaining straight or ‘permanently stretched’.

While this is true to some extent, when you have high shrinkage hair, allowing it to shrink fully after every wash is a sure fire way to cause unbelievable tangling, knots and breakage. Nothing ‘healthy’ about that.

When you are rocking a TWA or other short styles full shrinkage is fine and unlikely to cause you too much harm. But when you attain a bit of length, many of us prefer to use healthy ways to stretch our hair, such and braid outs or bantu knots to avoid full shrinkage that can be linked to tangling and breakage. Still stretching is considered by some to be over manipulation that causes stress to our strands too, so which way is best?

There are negatives on either side, but unfortunately there are more negatives on the side of wearing your hair fully shrunken than if you stretched it a bit to avoid tangles. Not to mention the time you would have to put aside each week to detangle fully shrunken hair.

While many of us have embraced and love our natural textures, most of us have busy lives so we may not be able to put aside the hours it would take to detangle and groom long shrunken hair weekly. It’s simply not practical.

While the UBB article was a good one, it doesn’t mention the damage that can ensue from the host of single strand knots, tangles and snarls that would have to be cut out, and the dangers of allowing your hair to free form without any sort of clumping that protects the strands ultimately.

I would have loved to spend a bit more time on this topic because honestly we might feel like we are doing a disservice to our strands by not embracing what they naturally do, but in retrospect the strands suffer more in the long run and if length is your goal, and that’s the point of this post, your will find yourself unable to retain as much length as you could if you stretched and protected your hair in healthy ways.

2. Ignoring your scalp – Your scalp is where all the growth magic happens, so if you have scalp ailments try to take care of them first before worrying about your growth.

If you are constantly suffering from an itchy inflamed scalp or constant dandruff, we always suggest that you see a dermatologist as the first point of call especially if you find that you are suffering from hair loss, because you never know what could be causing it and it may need to be treated with medication rather than shampoo.

Do not ignore the signs, flakiness, uncontrollable itching, and excessive shedding are all indicators that you might want to take a critical look at your scalp. We will not under any circumstance recommend a bunch of oils*, massages, or shampoo products to you if you have not seen a professional first to ensure that it is not an internal issue.

3. Not listening to your hair as you comb – POP POP POP, what’s that sound you ask? That’s your hair breaking at various points in the strand as you comb your hair!

Do not ignore these sounds when you manipulate your hair as this spells disaster especially if the breakage is in the middle of the strand or even further up towards the roots.

Most times you will hear us mention the importance of using your fingers to detangle your hair and even if you have to use a comb, just make sure you get enough of the knots out first using your fingers before following up with the wide tooth comb*.

See this Back To Basics article on proper combing technique for natural hair.

4. Daily manipulation – This might mean, co washing and slicking your hair back into a ponytail every morning, or twisting and braiding nightly for the perfect set the next day.

Your hair strands are fragile, even in their natural state because that is the natural state of very curly hair, so manipulating it often can cause breakage which affects your length retention ultimately.

The most ideal way to style your hair is once a week and maintain the style for five – seven days without having to re-style. We understand that this method might not be for everyone, but cutting down on the parting, combing and twisting/braiding your hair will ultimately be very beneficial to the inches you are trying to gain.

5. Insufficient conditioning – Have you ever wondered why conditioning your hair is so important? Well we are here to tell you that conditioning is a key factor to length retention because when you condition your hair especially with a formula that has great slip, it prevents your hair from tangling and matting, the very thing that encourages breakage.

Water based conditioners hydrate the strands allowing your hair to avoid the dryness which makes your hair prone to friction and breakage. Protein conditioners strengthen the hair strand and keep it from degenerating to the point of the strand disappearing like a thief in the night. With that said if you use conditioner, try to use enough to coat all your strands and for sufficient periods of time.

Most of us in the hair care game prefer huge bottles of conditioner because we know how beneficial it is to keeping our hair hydrated and intact enough to stay long and healthy. Those small cutesie brand specific 8 to 10 oz bottles that we might get from newly opened all natural stores may have the best ingredients but they are barely enough for a single use on our thick natural tresses.

If you cannot afford to spend the money to get enough of that conditioner to cover your thick hair then try to get economical with your purchases and buy the drugstore brands that do the same thing with a lot more product in the bottle.

If your hair is not as thick or you have fine low density strands, you might be able to get away with smaller bottles of conditioner just as long as all of your hair benefits from the same treatment.

Allow me to create an analogy…

The hair strand is like a piece of string, I am sure I have said that before too, but stay with me. The whole point of everything you do daily or weekly is to keep that piece of string intact so that the growth you are experiencing will show in length retention.

1. The string needs moisture so that it can remain elastic, the more elastic it is the less like likely it will break. Have you ever seen a string old and dry, and if you pull it, it just breaks in half, that’s your hair strand without moisture.

Note that this is very different from over elastic hair that is a result of too much conditioning. Do not condition your hair to the point of it feeling like mush because if it’s too elastic that will cause breakage too.

2. The string needs protein because as it rubs on stuff little fibers break off and it gets thinner and thinner causing splits and breakage. Protein fills in the gaps strengthening areas where the little fibers of the string are missing so it looks like new again!

3. The string needs you to leave it alone, because it can only take so much more pulling tugging, twisting and smoothing, that’s why we encourage protective styling. Take a soft brush, similar to the one a little baby uses and put a piece of string on a flat surface, now use it to brush the string in one direction over and over again. Even though you are using a soft brush, you will notice that the string starts to degenerate eventually from the excessive manipulation.

Whenever you do anything to your hair strand think about it like that, it has no life, it cannot regenerate itself. Girls, let me break it down like this, your hair is ALWAYS growing, did I say that in the first paragraph? Yes as a matter of fact I did and but I want so much to drive home that point!

Hair care is simply a series of manipulative processes that maintain something that cannot maintain itself. This is very different from growth; growth is the process of cell generation that pushes this lifeless thing we love so much out through our scalp.

Make sense? Let me know below!