8 Tips to Grow Your Natural Hair
Growing out natural hair is definitely a process and a journey. It takes a lot of time and effort to start over fresh and grow the hair that is naturally yours. There are some tips, tricks, tools and products to help you during your natural hair transition.
1. Avoid manipulating your hair as much as possible.
Manipulating your hair includes combing, brushing and styling of any kind. Finger combing is usually best to keep away tangles and reduce breakage, especially for coily hair. If you’re going to brush your hair, make sure you do it right.
- Separate your hair into 6-8 sections.
- Start with your ends and work your way up to your roots.
- Always add some kind of moisture to you hair to prevent tangles. Give It To Me Straight Leave In Conditioner by The Mane Choice is great for combing purposes.
2. Keep heat styling to a minimum.
While using heat styling tools is a great way for a stretched out and tame look, it also highly increases the dryness and breakage of your hair.
Keep heat styling (flatirons, blowdryers, curling irons, etc.) to a minimum when growing out your natural hair. It reeks havoc on your ends, which calls for more frequent trims and defeating the growth of your natural hair. However, if you are going to use heat tools, make sure you protect your hair with heat protectant.
3. Take vitamins that work for your hair and your body.
Human hair is affected by many things on the outside, but also by what is going on inside your body. The food you eat and the amount of exercise you get every day affect the make up of your hair, just like the inside of your body, as well as your skin. You may take a multi-vitamin, but you can also take vitamins that are good for your health and your hair. Vitamins, such as Manetabolism Plus Vitamins, contain calcium, thiamine and magnesium to provide nourishment to the body’s cells and target hair follicles to ensure healthy hair growth. Courtney Adeleye, founder of The Mane Choice, created Manetabolism for the exact purpose of nourishing the body so that your hair may growth thicker and stronger.
Courtney Adeleye, founder of The Mane Choice
“After having a baby, I experienced shedding in my own hair. None of the vitamins on the market satisfied all of the elements I was looking for, so my husband and I decided to create our own solution,” says Adeleye
“[Manetabolism] is a product that works from the inside out. It is a supplement not just a hair vitamin, so it works to fill in the gaps for what the body may be missing,” says founder of The Mane Choice, Courtney Adeleye.
4. Use oils that penetrate your hair and roots.
Some people prefer certain oils because it makes your hair feel really soft, but it really only puts a thick coat on the surface of your hair without actually doing work inside your strands. Use oils such as coconut oil, ucuuba butter or The Mane Choice’s Doesn’t Get Much Better Than This Natural Growth and Retention Solution. This not only makes your hair feel soft, but the oils penetrate your hair shaft to strengthen and silken your growing hair.
“Our products were designed for the healthy hair user in mind, regardless of hair type, gender, or ethnicity. We take a holistic developmental approach. Therefore, we produce our product lines to work from the inside out to promote healthy hair,” says Courtney Adeleye.
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5. Moisturize your hair often.
This by far one of the most important things to do for your natural hair. Since natural hair is very kinky/curly/coily, it takes a while for the natural oils you produce to get to the ends of the hair strand and because of this you have to supply your hair with its needed moisture.
Try the “LOC” method as a means for moisture. L stands for liquid, O is an oil, and C is conditioner. After your hair has been detangled, spray it with a liquid, like water or a liquid conditioner, next put in an oil like argan oil, castor oil, etc. and then top it all off with a cream conditioner. Doing this at least 3-4 times a week will give your hair all the moisture it needs to grow long and healthy.
6. Deep condition your hair frequently.
Deep conditioning is something that women oftentimes forget to do, but it is crucial for hair strength and length retention. Try the Green Tea & Carrot Deep Conditioning Mask.
“A lot of times people can grow hair, but not necessarily retain what they have. It seems to be the problem that a lot of African-Americans have. It’s growing, but it’s still shedding and breaking. The stronger your hair, the more durable your hair will become, the more you’re going to retain it,” says Adeleye.
7. Use protective styling.
A protective style is any style where you can put you hair away (for at least a week) that doen’t require any manipulation and will prevent your hair from brushing against your clothes, which also causes tangles and breakage.
These styles also allow you to put in extra care with moisturizing and conditioning. These styles include buns, braids, twists-outs or braid-outs, sew in weaves, and wigs. There are tons of tools and accessories to make styling your hair in these ways easy and accessible!
8. Be patient
Everybody’s hair is different. Some curls are tighter than others and some people’s hair is dryer than others. This is important when trying to find the kinds of products and hair care routines that work for you. It doesn’t mean there isn’t something out there for you, it just means that what works for someone else, might not work the same for you.
You obviously can’t change your hair, so the only thing you can do is embrace it and do what you can to take care of it. Growing out natural hair can be tough, but with patience it will happen. So just enjoy the journey and before you know it your hair will be where you want it to be.
This is a sponsored post. All opinions are 100% our own. Our campus blogger Jasmine Tuitt also contributed to this article.
Sources:
blacknaps.org/low-manipulation-protective-hairstyling/.
http://napturallycurly.com/growing-black-hair-the-hard-facts/.
