Yesterday was my washday and this time after conditioning my hair for hours with a plastic cap,  I decided to try bantu knots out as part of the gahl healthy hair challenge which started on 1st of November and will end on 1st Feb.

The bantu knots took ages to dry so i ended up sitting under a hooded dryer for two hours! They took too long to dry but I loved the results. This is my best bantu knot out so far 😃

The bottom half of my hair and edges are currently 62 weeks post relaxer while my crown is 37 weeks post relaxer. I have a lot of new growth and have been facing some challenges with my transitioning hair. It was breaking a lot and had crazy tangles which were just driving me crazy. 

I knew I had to change something in my hair care routine but just did not know what. After looking online for sometime I decided to try out something new. I sectioned my hair into six parts and de tangled these with my fingers and then proceeded to apply the herbal essences hello hydration conditioner mixed with a little olive oil on each section. I then covered my head with plastic bag and let the conditioner sit on for at least 1Hour. The results were just amazing!

The conditioner really did a great job de tangling and softening my hair. For the first time in weeks there was very little hair breakage and combing was just a breeze. I did not shampoo my hair after that but it still felt moisturised, clean and easy to manage. After rinsing the conditioner out I just put my hair in twelve braids and then I rock a braid out or a braid out bun for the rest of the week. To blend in the relaxed ends with the new growth I curl the ends with perm rods. It has been about four weeks since I started the new routine and I am glad that I tried it out. I will be shampooing my hair only once a month with a sulphate shampoo from now on.

Gahl Tip: Feel free to try out something new if whatever you have been doing to your hair is not working like you would like it to. sometimes just a small change will make a whole lot of difference.

The Gahl length retention challenge is officially over and I would like to share what is going on with my hair. I decided to straighten my hair so as to be able to see if I retained length during the last six months and yes I did retain length. My hair is now a little past bra strap length. However, I will be trimming off a little of my relaxed hair soon.

My transition is going quite well and I am learning more about my hair everyday. For instance I learnt never to go more than a week without washing and detangling my hair. I made this mistake last week and as a result my hair ended up being tangled and matted. I had too much shed hair caught up at the point where the relaxed and natural hair meets (Line of demarcation). It took me more than one hour just to detangle my hair and this also caused unnecessary breakage. The back and edges of my hair are currently 53 weeks post relaxer while the crown is 28 weeks post relaxer. 

Hello Dear readers,

So it's been a while since I re-started my healthy hair journey.

I haven't posted any update to date but to be honest it has been quite a challenge dealing with such short hair.

The mega trim that I had last time left my hair so short that even holding all my hair into a ponytail needs bobby pins support.

I've been washing weekly and I've realized that the moisturising Deep Conditioner is really minimizing breakage and so I haven't used my protein Deep Conditioner for a while.

My new growth and the texlaxed hair form such a dense base that has to be treated differently from how I normally treat my straight relaxed hair.

Finally I am able to write a blog post! The last few weeks have been so busy and just was not able to do any posts. But I do have great news for you. The long term transition is going very well. The back of my hair and the edges are officially 1 year post relaxer. And the crown is now 6 months post relaxer. 

This was one of my goals and I am so happy to have reached it, now I am more sure than ever that I will have a successful long term transition. What is really working for me is keeping my hair moisturised all the time. This keeps my new growth soft and manageable. Not combing on a daily basis has also proven very effective in combating unnecessary breakage. 

Many of you have been asking me how I pull that off since I don´t put my hair in protective styles like braids.

Well it does take a little practice. If you are just beginning try combing every two days, then proceed to three and go on until you are comfortable going for days without using a comb on your hair. It also helps to decide what hairstyle you are going to wear that week. Maintaining one hairstyles is much easier than changing it up everyday. A nice soft bristle brush and some kind of styling cream/ gel will also come in handy in order to keep your edges down all through the week. But remember to only use a Gel that will not leave your hair hard to touch. A good example is aloe Vera gel. In the pictures below I Used a mixture of water and glycerin to moisturise my hair and Aloe vera gel and the soft bristle brush to keep my edges down.

 Are you on a long term transition journey? what is helping you go through with it? I still need more tips ;)

I have already began treating my hair as if it were fully natural by trying out hair styles I have seen done by

If you would like to recreate this protective hairstyle below is a step by step description of how I achieved it.

So for this Hair do we will need:

Step 1.

Part your hair into four sections, part the crown depending on how big you would like your bangs to be at the end.

Step 2.

Moisturise the two sections above the ears, if you need to keep your edges flat, this would be the best time to either apply your styling cream or hair Gel. Either roll the hair or do a flat twist and make sure to do a two strand twist/ roll until you reach the ends of the hair.

Step 3 & 4.

Moisturise the hair hair at the back and use your brush to make sure it looks neat. Then pin down the twists as shown. Depending on how long your hair is you might want to fold the twists to make them easier to work with.

Step 5

Roll and tuck the remaining hair into your twist and use some pins to secure the hair.

Step 6.

Pin down the sides to achieve the shape you want.

Step 7.

Moisturise your crown.

You can add a little styling cream at this point if you feel the need to. Again use your brush to make the hair neat then proceed to make a loose two strand twist.

Step 8 & 9.

Tuck your ends into the base of the twist. Depending on how long your hair is, you might want to fold the twist and pin it down. Use pins to secure the hair and to achieve the look you desire.

I am still looking for more hairstyles to try out and would love it if you ladies gave me more suggestions :)

May was the 4^th Month of the Gahl length retention challenge and I am already very excited to find out how much length I will have retained by August when the challenge ends. I have not trimmed my hair since the challenge started and I am quite proud of myself because I have only used heat once in those four months. And I have been religiously moisturising and sealing every other day and my hair is almost in a bun every single day.

I promised to update you ladies on my long term transition to natural hair so here goes the first update :)

The back and edges of my hair are currently 44 weeks post relaxer/texlax while the crown is exactly 20 weeks post. I do have a lot of new growth! 

I have been getting questions as to how I manage so much new growth without wearing protective styles such as braids or weaves. Well I have come to realise that my hair loves to be left alone and it does not like any kind of stress and manipulation whatsoever, Any time I did braids, twists or weaves in the past I always ended up with a small setback. This is why I decided to try and deal with my hair regardless of how much new growth I had. By sticking to this method I have been able to learn how to manage my own hair even with three different textures ( relaxed, texlaxed & Natural).

Managing different textures on one head can be challenging at first but it can be done, however you will need a great virtue which is patience. You will need to find out what works for your hair.

Here is what works for me.

So far the transition is going on well and I hope that it stays that way. If you have any tips on how to long-term transition to natural with less breakage, please do share. I need all the information I can get . And thanks to all our readers for all the support you have been giving us. We really appreciate you for taking your time to share our hair journies with us :)

It has been long since we had an inspiration feature! ladies meet Patricia Mulinge.

I am Patricia Mulinge, a 21 year old at the Kenya school of flying. I hold a private flying license and currently studying for my commercial license which i am almost done with. I plan to also get a degree in communication at Daystar University which i will be joining in August of this year. I am a newbie blogger beautiful african woman inspired by Gahl.

Are you relaxed or Natural?

I have been transitioning to natural since Sepetember last year when I had my last relaxer. Wasn't too happy about it so I decided Natural is healthier and better for me. However, two weeks ago I decided to put dreadlocks and so I big chopped too. I am currently natural and loving it!

What is your hair type? Describe your curl pattern

My hair is a 4a/b

What was your starting length and what is your current one?   And   what inspired you to start a HHJ and when was it?

I started my HHJ on February 15th 2012. Inspired by Gahl and my desperate need for healthy hair. I started at neck length and progressed to grazing armpit length right before I  locked and big chopped.

How easy was getting into a regimen, knowing the right products etc? what´s your regimen?

Well I didn't have a hard time getting into a regimen. I read about different products before I got into my own regimen. All I wanted was to keep it simple and affordable. I used Organics kids moisturizer, coconut oil for sealing, motions protein reconstructor and for my deep conditioning treatment I used pretty much any DC treatment.

Is this ‘regimen thing’ complicated?

Not really. Just find what works best for you and keep it simple. 

How soon into your HHJ did you start seeing results?

About three weeks into my HHJ, my hair started to look thicker and moisturized and it had a nice shine to it.

Do you think what you achieved would be possible without learning the Proper techniques necessary to grow African hair long?

Absolutely not. My hair was weak and damaged and that was the precise reason that I searched the internet for answers. African hair needs special care and attention specific for it. I have learnt and continue to learn a great deal during my HHJ.

Do you believe anyone who adapts the correct techniques can grow fabulous hair or is there such a thing as bad hair?

I definitely think so. I have seen so many inspirational pictures and read so many HHJ stories of women who had damaged hair and just by following the right hair care routines. Good hair is healthy hair and it is achievable.

How many people have been inspired by the length you have gained and decided to start a HHJ?

So many of my friends and random people. I find myself talking a lot about hair these days. So yeah....many people and I am glad.

What is the most heart-felt advice you would give to other African ladies thinking about but not so sure about starting a HHJ?

Well, be willing to invest  time for a HHJ. Do your own research as well, be patient and consistent. African ladies have beautiful hair I believe. We should take pride in our kinks and curls and uniquely textured hair. No hair type is better than another. Its how well you take care of your hair that determines its health or even length. We should set our own standards as African women and we should all start our HHJ!!

What would you advice a Newbie NOT to do?

hmmmm do not compare your progress to that of others. We are all different.

So are you hoping to grow your hair to ankle length? what are your short term and long term goals?

Hallo Gahl readers,

I have finally made up my mind to go back to natural hair, the last time I was fully natural was back in 1999. You are probably wondering why I want to go natural now. Well to make things clear I love my relaxed and texlaxed hair, I think it is beautiful and I have absolutely nothing against relaxers.

 My main reason for going back to natural is because I don´t really know why I relax my hair any more. Before starting my hair journey I used to straighten my hair to make it manageable, now I have learnt how to manage it. I purposely started under processing my hair with the relaxer so that my texlaxed hair would have almost the same texture as my new growth and as a result, I can´t tell the difference between my new growth and the under processes hair. Now I am confident that I can handle my hair in it´s natural state just as well.

Another reason for me deciding to go natural is that I love the versatility of natural hair. It can be worn straight and curly. And I surely would love to rock a big fat twist out one day ;)

I am planning on doing a long term transition, my regimen will stay the same. The only difference will be that I will not be relaxing my hair any more. By the way the back of my head, edges and nape are currently 41 weeks post relaxer while my crown is 16 weeks post relaxer today. I am so in love with the curls and coils I am seeing grow out of my head. I keep wondering how come I never noticed them years back and the answer is simple, I used to relax my hair every 12 weeks, which is not enough time to be able to really see your curl pattern. Now I have seen it and I can´t wait to be fully natural :)

I am so excited about this new hair journey and as always you can join me in the long term transition if you want to go natural but do not want to cut off your relaxed ends immediately.

 It has been a little over three months since the Gahl length retention challenge started. According to the rules of the challenge, each participant is allowed only one heat pass every three months. This challenge has really helped me stick to my regimen and to stay away from heat, we still have three months to go before the challenge ends. Do feel free to join in :)

So on Sunday 5^th of May I applied a mixture of sunflower oil, olive oil and tea tree oil as a pre shampoo treatment onto my hair and left it on for about one hour. I went on to clarify my hair with the herbal essences clarifying shampoo since I wanted my hair completely build up free.

 After rinsing the shampoo off with warm water it was time for a protein treatment. At the moment I am using the nivea long hair repair 1 Min express treatment as a protein treatment and I am absolutely loving it. I followed with the Aussie moist conditioner which is my moisture conditioner for about 5 minutes and rinsed this off with cool water under the shower while detangling with my wide toothed comb. ( rinsing with cool to cold water leaves my hair soft and smooth). To dry my hair I simply used an old but clean cotton T-shirt.

To keep my hair from having to much build up I did not apply any moisturiser at all, I just applied the chi silk infusion serum which I use as a heat protectant and let my hair air dry. I then blow dried my hair on the cool setting and finished up by flat ironing. This was so much work! 

                                                         

You probably remember that I suffered a major setback back in April of 2012, if you are new to our blog you can read all about it here. It has been one year and a month since then and here is a comparison of what my hair looked like then and what it looks like now. 

I am quite happy with the results even though I did not retain any length in 2012. My hair is much healthier and thicker too.

 In April 2012 my hair was very damaged, but after a major trim and lots of time, it finaly looks healthy :) Thanks to all of you who encouraged and supported me to carry on when this setback occurred, I really appreciated your support.

Food for thought:

Don´t let a setback keep you from pursuing your hair goals, with the right care your hair will definitely grow back healthy again. To find out how I dealt with mine check out this post on my major setback. It will take a while but you will get there so please stay motivated and encouraged to carry on with your hair journey.

I've gone missing for such a long time, actually this was my last hair update, but to justify this, its been for a worthy and time demanding course because I went back to school last June. The biggest downside is that I got too busy that I neglected my hair journey. As a result, I ended up with very damaged hair. My hair was breaking  a lot due to split and my ends we so thin.
                                           Back in July 2012: The thinning had already began.

The length of my hair also became so uneven and for months I'd been too dissatisfied to continue keeping unhealthy hair.( especially being aware of how well Joanne's hair is doing)I resorted to a fresh and healthy start as at 28th April 2013. 

I texlaxed my hair just enough to retain the thickness that I desired. I cut my hair to a healthy neck length and that's my starting length. I have such a long way to go but I'm happy about a healthy head of hair and definitely about a whole healthy new journey.

Is there anyone out there who would like to take this new journey with me? we could keep track of each other share our challenges and just walk with each other. I envision a healthy arm pit length hair come December 2013.
 

I will try to do posts as often as I can to keep you posted on my new healthy hair journey.

Check out the pictures of my new hair!

                                                       This is what my hair looks like now.

Till next post, healthy hair journey and God bless.