WHY IS IT SO HARD STARTING A CURLY HAIR JOURNEY?? ARE ONLY 3A-3C CURLS ACCEPTED? (bonus: How to start your hair journey)

 Hi, so first I wanna say everything I'll say in this article is MY opinion based on MY experience as a curly hair girl because I noticed some things! I dont want it to come as like you need to have 3 type of curls to have beautiful hair or as a 'proven' thing but as I what I noticed!

I'm writing this to help others starting their hair journey, some tips that will help and an Hannalyse (Analyse from HANNA aka DICTATOR CHIASSE) to help ALL OF YOU!!

Since I'm 13, I take care of my curls, as an ex 'brush them dry' type of girl and try to hide my  hair cuz after years of brushing dry, my heavy curls just became a barely wavy frizzy mess, it's at 13 that my mom tried to help me gain more confidence as I had jusft accepted to be an "ugly" girl (I was confident, I just knew people percieved me as ugly, no matter what they said) and my hair first were wavy, I had no curly cut, I was just brushing it wet and scrunching some cream into my hair and I was not really expecting anything from my hair, I just knew it was better, so it was the curls or nothing! (straightening wasnt an option in my head for some reason)

At this time curls weren't "in" yet, I was the only girl with curly hair, I would even say the only person with curly hair in my class at first, and the girls with curly hair were more coily, and always had a slick back, and I would sometime get comments, but it was more "you should try defining your hair" "your hair would be beautiful if you took care of it" my hair was defined, it was just still loose yet, I was not even one year into being a curly head, but nobody knew that since I was new, and my friends were trying to help me bc it was flat, the top was straight, the bottom curly! But they didnt know how to help me cuz they were all straightening their hair!

but let's imagine what would that be like for a girl that's not me, that had worn straight hair majority of her life bc she didn't like her curly hair, go tell her that she should define her hair, no matter if you didnt mean no harm, she'll never wear them out again!!! That happened to my friend when she tried, only some wave were there, it was winter, her hair was frizzy, since then she never even tried curling it.

And I think that would be our first point

Why are loose curls/wave seen as so unattractive, even tho they're necessary to YOUR curly hair journey?

When you first wear out your curls, most girls are VERY scared! What if you get picked on? And people dont make it easier, I mean saying to a girl that's trying to take care of her curly hair that her hair is not defined? Not cool! 

And Waves can be defined too! You can have waves that are beautiful!! You can have healthy beautiful waves! 

And even if your hair IS curly, they wont be curls at the start, no matter if you never straightened your hair, you could have even tried hair mask, or whatever, 

I think honestly it's rooted in racism! Before I get into it, what I say is not scientifically proven, No professional helped me get to that conclusion, it's just my theory with my overthinking, and what I got together,

So first, Beauty standard are political, I think that's pretty clear, for exemple feminism made the bob trendy, Nazi made the red lipstick a big NO, the way we express ourselves and what we found beautiful, wherever we like it or not comes from a political thing, something that has been taught for us to like, and that's where insecurities come from, and there's a message behind it! When black women's hair became a big NO (which I will develop later), straight hair became the standard to make sure only white women were beautiful, so curls? No! Even tho white woman have curls and waves, because the thing about beauty standard, and oppression (oppression to one is oppression to everyone), they dont think about anyone, they dont make straight hair the standard to uplift white women, they do it to oppress Black woman, so even in this system white women are oppressed (not as much as black women but still) cuz they are still not thought about! And let's not even start about latinas, arabs, etc...

 But another belief of mine is that whenever a minority is doing bad, all minorities are doing bad (which I'll develop  deeper in another article!)

Because to oppress a comunity, the last thing done is explictly saying that this IS bad, but that another thing is just so good, and better and that going closer to that is self improvement so everyone started straightening their hair! Hoping to be the perfect skinny white blonde with silky straight hair! But after, when curly hair was in again, for exemple in the 80's, you didnt see anyone having to get their curls back, Everyone just got Perms, to have 3type of curls, so that was the standard, because wavy is seen as part of the journey but not the final look! And I also think the uplift of type 3 hair is a way of uplifting white women since it's still called an english curl (boucle anglaise) in a lot of country

Which is so dumb because wavy is for the mermaids, it's fairy like, it's whimsical and it's necessary!!

Why do your hair will pass by the loose curls/wave phase??

Well, curls are made by unevenly distrubuted keratin, so you can kind of play with that to give it a shape while straight hair is from evenly distributed keratin! 

So when you train your hair to be straight, it's going to learn to be straight, but the moment you start trying to get curls back, they cant just unlearn to be straight so fast, it takes time and discipline, so oustide of some exception where all the hair  is fully getting your original curl pattern but the ends, please DONT CUT YOUR HAIR!! Just be patient and train your hair to be curly!!

You're not going to magically get your curls back just bc there's not straight ends, and your ends sometime just need more time to get the curls back especially when chemically straightened and stuff.

But now that we talked about the wavy phase

Why dont we want to claim coily hair either? And Is that why coils are not claimed as curly??

I mean with this logic, Coily hair is CLEARLY the end game if we take the logic we just showed of why do we hate wave?  the most curly, so why do people ALSO have a problem with this!

Outside of it being rooted in racism, as I said earlier, Black women didnt have the right to wear their natural hair before, that was a way to keep them opressed, doing everything to hide stereotipical black feature, making them ugly and assosiate it them with unattractivness so every beauty would get closer to white or straight hair. Also by making afros the hair of the clown august (which I can talk about in another video) and all that

It's like when plus-size women have an hourglass body, and try to enhance it and people tell them "why are you trying to be skinny", you associate skinny with hourglass, when it's 2 different things! 

So they'll describe tight curls as unproffessional, as lazy, as too much, which used to also be how 3types curls were hold to, until the big transition, and you will believe it because you believe what you're constantly being told.

See the double standard? Women need efortless beauty, but they cant be efortless with certain trait, or it's lazy! That's how propaganda will present things to you so you'll start liking a look and not another, and that's why beauty standard and trends change during differents climate change! And that's what I mean when I say beauty standard are political cuz political figure are the one making the propaganda!

Now people claim coily hair is NOT curly, and coily hair is still not loved, still criticized, I'd say it's also because of the volume and frizz train hate,

we want curly hair but we dont want to let it do what it's meant to, we want complete control over what it does, if your hair is not finger coild it's messy, it's lazy, people want BIG curls (even 3C is not ideal in some case cuz "too tight" and I say that from experience)

 

I feel like I've noticed that twice, first time when I was with a black friend of mine, she was always wearing braid, which I never really noticed or care, we were talking about hair when she asked "you're lucky, your curls are so big!" I didn't really understood what she meant at the moment, I mean my hair was flat, I was really struggling with my hair,

I understood it when I followed a girl's instagram, she showed her natural hair, she had EXTREMELY tight curl, close to coily hair I'd say, but I'm not really a expert of the hair type chart, and everyone told her to wear her curls. 

She took a curler, a big one and did her hair, everyone yelled at her confused, and I sent her a message asking 'you have naturally curly hair, why would you do that' she said 'Yes but I dont have big curls, my curls are tight' and THEN I saw the difference and what those 2 girls meant.

Also, this one time I was talking to my best friend, she has curly hair but she straighten them, she's the girl I spoke about earlier who tried to wear her natural but that had gone wrong, she asked me why dont I do my hair? I told her what do you mean, she said that my curls were not defined, I said it is, I mean try to have your hair like that you will struggle, and it's by talking to her that I really got the difference of treatment depending on your curl type, 

For context I have 3B hair now, no matter if I do it or not, I get compliment, I like my hair BIG, I want volume, I want frizz!

So that's when I noticed, in the 'define your hair, no thanks' video, all the girls they were showing were girls with big hair, and defined curls, or tight curls!

Or when my friend showed me what she meant, we went to pinterest together, and she looked up 'fingercoilling' which I HATE, I'm the biggest hater of finger coiling, and when a girl with wavy hair who finger coiled it showed up, she said no it's not what I mean, when a girl with 3C curls appeared, she said 'no that's not what I meant' but when a 3B girl with 30 pounds of gel, still wet hair and fingercoiled, she told me 'yes that's what I mean'

My friend herself being a girl who struggles to love hair, I told her all that, 

First, finger coiling is so bad, if your hair is like mine, your curls will turn wavy if it doesnt get 30 pounds of gel. You get no volume no nothing, and you're not embracing your curls, you're recreating yoour curls to fit beauty standards, and over time your curls will turn more and more close to straight because of tension, and for some people can cause hair loss (but that's rare, and I dont get how you get to that point) , that's why you will never see anyone fingercoiling in the long run! Nobody I've ever saw fingercoiling from the start to the end of their curly journey CUZ ITS BULLSHIT and one day you will realise it is! but my hatred for fingercoiling is a story for another day!

Flat hair is also bullshit, that's why people with flat hair only show you their hair and not their hair with their face cuz when you see both together, you can always tell those people would look better with big curls

Cuz a strand of curly hair is bigger that a strand of straight hair, so flat hair wasnt made for you, and you have to keep your hair wet and with 500 pounds of product, for it to get bigger at the end of the day, so you have to do your curly hair routine everyday so you WILL have hair loss I mean it's a loose-loose situation, I will never get it!

So...How to love my hair? How to start wearing it?

First, DONT LISTEN TO PEOPLE ON THE INTERNET

Frizzy hair doesnt mean damaged hair, frizz is caused by enviroment, humidity and tones of things YOU CANT AVOID!!

Do your hair everyweek, be patient, if you do straighten it make sure it's OCCASIONLY and use Kardoun (algerian technique to keep straight hair for as long as you want honnestly) but honestly I didnt straighten my hair for 3 years during my curly journey so I wouldnt reccomand it

Dont do slick back everyday, you're going to have hair loss and thining hair and you should focus on health (even tho you can have damaged curly hair and you wont even be able to tell, you will feel it and its the wrost feeling) 

At the start of your journey (you will be able to test those things later just not at the start) Avoid gel, avoid heat (if it burns your skin it will burn your hair, so when I talk about heat Im not talking about diffusing even tho I would reccomand heat protectant when diffusing for shiny hair)

OILS are so goood

Honestly depending on your hair you will have as a must either LEAVE IN CONDITIONER OR MOUSSE (maybe there are other MUST options but those are the only one I saw), , just test both and see what your hair loves the most

And Last and MOST IMPORTANT: FOLLOW PEOPLE WITH YOUR HAIR TYPE!!

You cant decide who will say what about your hair, How much representation you will see on the street, but you can on your phone, PLEASE go watch people that look like you

SO here are some curly hair creators:

afro:

theesudani : Afro and LGBT+ supporter, and she honestly has the most beautiful hair,the best tips and her creativity! (tiktok)

beautosal : Afro and she even has a hair care line, I like that she has to much diversity of hairstyle with only an afro, no straightening or anything! (tiktok)

destineewrayy : Her content is usually about her hair,she has an afro, I've just discovered her page and lately shes been doing slick backs, but usually she doesnt, so I hope it's good! (tiktok)

matthevie : MAN but the best, he got known for giving shapes to his afro, he's litterally so cool! (tiktok and Instagram)

vienna_shore: 3type hair, volume baddie, she often does curly hair routines!!

majdoufrmdao: Volume baddie, cant tell you what her hair type is cuz Id probably be wrong but Id say somewhere between 3C-4A, she doesnt do content about her hair, but she always wear it natural and she's often used in curly video

emily.demian: THE OG curly head, she's been doing content to make people wear their curls since before the Roman empire if Im being factually correct! If it was not for her I dont think the curly community would be where they're at, honestly I'd even say she's trust worthy, I mean I trust people that change their mind! 

I also would reccomand curly salon they're so good, for exemple the curly scandal of defining brush being damaging?? Was already said by curly's salons wayyy before!!! So good to get tips most of the time, they work with variety of hair patterns!!

curlvision and Thairapy Salon : He often gets hate when he says things about curls cuz he's bald, but honestly, everything I've listened from him helped my hair get healthier, bouncier 

shynessl.hair: She has so many account in different language, but honestly she's SOOO empowering, I follow her and I've never felt so good about my hair

kianadalleave: Wavy/curly influencer, She's one of the closest I found to 2type hair (it's really hard to find representation)

jazvnessa: 3type hair, she does Curly hair style!

artseysmart: Colorful and fun curly hair! She's once again not 2type hair but the closest I could found

Lindsay.meade : My proudest found,niche creator with wavy hair 

I'm Dictator Chiasse, this is Hannaconda Land, my blog, follow to become a citizen of Hannaconda Land!! Or just check it out, you might like it!!

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