T Re: Keratin Treatment on Afro Hair

If you’ve been following me on my blog and social media you may have noticed that I’ve gone from Afro to straight hair recently. No I didn’t get a relaxer, but I’m not sure I can technically say I’m natural anymore either because I got a Keratin treatment.

I decided that I was fed with my Afro struggle. I love my natural hair, it’s so versatile, but with versatility comes work. If I wanted to wear it down, I’d have to be sure to do some kind of twist out or Bantu knots the night before. More often than not, I’d either be too tired or just fully lazy. The result is that I was wearing my hair in a bun practically everyday and, damn it, I got bored!

I knew I didn’t want to go relaxed again. I think I was relaxed for like 16 years, but about 3 years ago I decided I was sick of my trashy, stringy, short and dead looking hair – I needed a change. I researched going natural and when I discovered that I could transition instead of doing a big chop, I was like, yes I can do this. I allowed my hair to grow out the relaxer for a good 18 months before cutting off the ends. I haven’t looked back since. My hair is in much better condition and way longer than it ever was when it was relaxed.

I always knew I preferred having straight hair, it simply fits my personality and style a lot better. So I found myself in a bit of a dilemma – how to get straighter hair without the permanence and complete chemical destruction of a relaxer? Then a little thing called the Royal Wedding happened and it suddenly occurred to me, Meghan Markle, as a mixed race woman is highly unlikely to have hair that straight. So I googled/stalked for pictures of her real hair. That’s when I came across the pictures from when she was a child, evidence – thank you to parents across the world for taking embarrassing pictures of your children that can one day be used as motivation for the next persons glow up!

This is what my hair was like when I straightened it before the keratin treatment. Still nice but a bit dry and I had hella split ends!

…and now after 2 weeks and I’ve only blowdried it. Much smoother and easier to handle.

Anyway, all the articles referenced regular keratin treatments as being responsible for her habitually straight hair. Again, I consulted google – this hair I have is nearly 3 years in the making, no way was I going to use some random salon and come out bald. Darren Scott salon in Madia Vale kept popping up, perhaps it’s fate, maybe they have little techies working in the background on their search engine optimisation, whatever it is, the universe drew me there.

The experience was pleasant and painless. As far as I understand it, keratin is basically a protein, hair is made up of protein and the treatment puts protein back in to your hair – in the process your hair becomes straighter. It is great if your hair is damaged, or like mine, highly porous. The results are said to last around 3-4 months.

First they wash your hair, then the Keratin is applied (Inoar Morrocan Treatment Brazilian Blow Dry), it gets blow dried in and then your hair gets straightened. Then you have to wash it all out. When it was wet, I immediately nothice the difference, instead of shrunken Afro, I had a full on beach wave and I was like, wow! After that, you do your final, blow dry, straighten and style.

I did look in to this treatment beforehand, obviously. When I read about the amount of heat involved in the process I had to sit down and think about it. For me I decided that I prefer straighter styles and this is an alternative that doesn’t involve permanently relaxing my hair. I’ve had relaxers before and over time my hair just became weak and used to break off – admittedly, I know a lot more about hair care now than I did then (thank you YouTube). I liked the sound of the strengthening properties of the keratin treatment, if the expense is hair that doesn’t quite go back to full Afro, then so be it. I mean, the whole point is I want to wear my hair straight, so complete no brainer! The best thing is that over time it washes out so I guess if you left it long enough, you could probably get back to natural anyway.

T

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