What Are Realistic Expectations For High Shrinkage 4b 4c Hair?

When you hear the term ‘realistic expectations’ there is almost a tinge of negativity to it right? It might not be that bad but when the words ‘let me bring you to reality’ is thrown around with that one wagging finger it indicates somehow you were living in a bubble, that the real thing is not quite as nice.

Its kind of like when your man says to you, well don’t get your hopes up let me set your expectations, implying that the way things are may not be what you imagine them to be. But if you are a smart girl, you will welcome that sort of reality check, because truth be told you probably have some reality checks you can dish out to him too, but that’s a whole other post.

From the title of this post you may feel a bit slighted if you allow yourself to but you shouldnt, it is actually a great thing to know what to really expect from your hair so that you can set the right goals. I don’t know about you but ever since I discovered what my hair actually likes, and not what I wanted it to like, things have been a lot easier on wash day, my pockets have been a little heavier with all the cash I’m saving and I am less stressed about what the next chick is doing.

What then are the realistic expectations for high shrinkage 4b and 4c hair? Following I have compiled a list of the most common realizations that you may come to as your healthy hair journey progresses.

1. You may never have hair that shrinks to BSL – This is a common theme that we hear from women regularly. We don’t want to have to deal with stretching our hair all the time so how about we just grow our hair long enough so that when it’s shrinks, it will still be BSL?

But the truth is that if you have the teeny tiny curls that are typical of 4b and 4c hair, your hair will retain the ability to shrink up to your shoulders even when your are at waist length stretched, and as crazy as that sounds it is an absolute fact. This means a couple of things, for one you might have to have your hair  grow to your knees before you see BSL shrinkage, something that genetics may not ultimately allow.

Your 4b 4c hair also swells a lot when it is wet and not only does it swell more as a unit but individual strands swell as well and so full shrinkage shouldn’t be something that you allow your hair to do regularly. Your focus should be always on healthy stretching techniques to keep your hair organised and mostly tangle free.

2. You may never be able to pull off a curly ‘do that lasts all week without restyling –  Yes when you have hair that loves to shrink then your natural texture will fight against you and any style that involves a large deviation away from your natural curl size.

That means that without an industrial amount of holding gel, you will probably find yourself having to restyle your hair every other day to keep the same style all week.

3. You may have to give up moisturizing daily – ‘What you say gurl?’, let me explain, by no means are we saying that your hair does not need water, as a matter of fact it does and a lot of it.

What we are merely suggesting is that when you do add moisture to your hair, do it in a way that allows you to maintain that moisture for a couple days especially if your hair is in a stretched style.

Even with pure h20 being the best moisturizer, it may turn out to be counterproductive to spritz your tresses with water daily. The goal is to avoid full shrinkage and tangles so dunking your hair in a bucket of water every day is a no no.

4. You may have to to accept that wash and go’s are not for you – This brings us to the infamous wash and go. A wash and go embraces shrinkage, it is a way to freely show off your curls free form, allowing them to do what they want to do. Girl no! When you have high shrinkage hair, if you want to experiment with a wash and go every now and then, feel free but allowing your hair to freely hug and commingle regularly is disastrous.

A wash and go works best when your hair can naturally clump together and not individually wrap around itself. For this reason if you have 4b, 4c hair you might find yourself dealing with intense tangling when doing regular wash and go’s . Just make your life easy and do it only once in a while to get it out of your system or just don’t do it at all.

5. You may never be able to grow it long without protective styling – Girls we hate to break it to ya, but your strands are divas. They don’t like to be touched excessively, they do not like to be outdoors free to be one with nature and the elements, they like their ends healthy and tucked all the time.

Now if you have a diva in your life maybe a family member or a bestie you know you can either love her or hate her  but she ain’t going nowhere so in this case we suggest that you choose love.

If you want to see some real length retention in your hair you may have to wear protective styles at least 90% of the time. Why? Kinky* hair textures can be fragile, and again prone to tangles so to preserve it you have to protect it.

Additionally if you are wearing it stretched and you hope to maintain the moisture levels in your hair for a couple days, then you have to make sure that it is not exposed to excessive sun and wind or friction with your clothing.

6. Product recommendations based on hair texture may not work for you – 4B and 4C hair can either be coarse or fine. Knowing the difference between coarse hair and fine hair is very important to any category of hair but there is a misconception that all 4 category hair is coarse which just isn’t true.

Coarse or fine refers to the width of your individual strand, so if your hair is coarse the width of the strand is wider than a strand that is described as fine. Additionally coarse hair does not refer to how your hair feels or even look aesthetically.

You may find that product recommendations based solely on the hair typing system may not work very well for you because of the huge diversity even among similar curl sizes. A lot of trial and error may be in the cards for you.

In terms of your regimen what it further means is that you can’t weigh your hair down with heavy butters* and oils* because your hair will break, literally. Our hair has the tendency to be porous anyway so if you hair is porous and fine, you don’t have a lot to work with in terms of weight of product, using chemicals like color or even heat styling.

You want to pick quality products that are light but work to add moisture keep your hair healthy. For example using aloe vera juice* for moisture, is foolproof or using coconut oil* to seal and maintain your strands is again smart and you don’t have to worry about what’s in it.

7.  Regular heat and color may never work out for your hair – The thing is if there is a chance it might kill your hair, you might want to politely say no thanks, and walk away. Kinky* hair can be considered porous naturally so with high porosity doing anything to further degrade the strand is not healthy to say the least. Obviously if you do decide to use any of the two you have to pay close attention to the protein side of your regimen and make sure that deep conditioning* is a priority.

8. The rate at which your hair grows is not determined by your texture but it will always appear to grow slower – If you have 4b 4c high shrinkage hair and you are a healthy person, your hair is growing.

You need to do your best to make sure you have great growth by eating well and exercising but know that your texture has nothing to do with your ability to have long hair. It may appear to grow slower because your shrinkage is much higher than others with looser textures but it is growing! If you want to retain length, then focus on the health of your hair, protective styling and low manipulation techniques.

Do you have high shrinkage 4b and 4c hair and what challenges have you faced?