A Different Start. A Different Finish.

An early stage in life for me and having a different way of growing up was my early path of growing into an older naturalista adult. I was raised in a combined family household because my father married after gaining custody of me as a young child at the age of four years old. My dad and I are of African American descent. My father's wife, and stepmother was of Caribbean descent. She was from Kingston, Jamaica. Little did I know growing up would teach me a different way of life, morals, upbringing, feminine care and hair care to show me my heritage roots. My hair as a child was faithfully braided all the time. My stepmother did a deep conditioning every two weeks after my braided hair style wore down and then a repeat again. At five years old, my aunt on my dads side of my family of African American descent permed my hair behind my stepmothers back. She was furious, and I had no idea why. She spent months afterwards repairing it back to normal and getting it back to the best way to take care of it naturally and to get it back to growing. My hair grew so beautiful, long and thick. Every night I wore a satin scarf to sleep to cover the braided style to keep it neat and this was my routine until I turned 11 years old. At 11 years old my father and his wife underwent a divorce and I no longer had the hair care i needed and went on as a preteen learning how to do my hair and take care of my hair the best I could. My father did the best he could but as a man but he just didn't understand and know the right techniques. I attempted spending a whole summer learning how to braid and I kept my hair in under braid's often during my preteen school years. That was the only braiding styling I knew how to do. I used products such as cheap sauve shampoo and conditioner that were in my eyes close to what I needed. I attempted again at 12 to relax my hair using chemicals. Relaxing seemed like the easy way out from caring for it properly and not having to deal with it. My father and I just didn't know how to care for it properly. By this time my scalp was so sensitive to any chemicals from no perms and relaxers but only once in my life. I had to rinse the relaxer out early. The relaxer didn't do as much damage as it could have. At thirteen my father and I tried one more time to get myself a perm. After one of my African American aunt's found out what was happening she came running over to my house and gave me a old fashioned straightening comb and oven to use in exchange. She told me never to perm my hair and gave me a talk on what happened to her when she permed hers. And that was the best thing she could have ever did for me then. And something I will never forget. From 13 to 20 years old I used a straightening comb. And then I did the stupidest thing as an adult. I bleached my hair. First honey blonde, then to fire red like Rihanna's hair at the time. My hair took an extreme hit. It shrunk, fried, thinned and broke off really bad. I tried my same routines to try and restore but it was not budging. I came to the conclusion that my hair wasn't going to grow anymore because it would not grow. That it was at its max growth. Lol. Then I started the weaves, braids, sew ins, etc. My hair still was not budging. Then one day I was on Facebook and one of my friends liked a picture of a natural hair woman on the kinky chicks page. So I checked it out. I saw so many beautiful non extreme weave wearing, beautiful natural haired women. So I liked the page then afterwards I got recommendation's to like other pages that help with natural hair care tips. I learned all the hair care I had as a child and learned why my hair wasn't growing like it did when I was a young girl that my Caribbean mom took such good care of. I noticed my hair starting to continue to grow very long and thick. I found better hair products. And also started routines on how to keep my hair moisturized and conditioned properly to restore the damage back to normal. I will never ever regret my childhood. I am so grateful for the opportunity to have that upbringing. It shaped me to who I am today. A African American girl with a little spice of island. I didn't know I would have the opportunity to go back to that and the routines I had as a child and that was what I needed to go back to. I was raised Caribbean and I never knew there was a difference. I never knew it would be the best thing to happen to me as a young black women who cares for her afro, nappy, 4c hair would be the difference in my mind in loving my beautiful hair.