Taffie's Hair Journey

Journey

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BACK IN 2013

My hair journey begins in 2013, when I decided I would go natural. I had been contemplating going natural for a while. What was holding me back from going natural was the fear of the unknown. Throughout my life I never really had to do much with my hair. Matter of fact, I never really been much into hair. When I was a little girl my mother use to press and curl my hair. After a while my mother got tired of me complaining about the hot comb being too hot, or her accidentally burning me on the neck, and I got tied of her yelling at me to be still! LOL!

A CURL AND A PERM

Once I reached middle and high school I got a curl. Boy did I love my curl. All I had to do was put activator in my hair and go. You couldn’t tell me nothing because my curl was off the chain. LOL I used to get so many compliments. After the curl came then the perm followed. So, going from a curl to a perm they were both easy to maintain.

TOO MUCH TIME AT THE SALON

I had grown tired of spending hours on in the hair salon getting a perm. I loved my perm because it was so easy to maintain. I would just wrap my hair at night and tie a scarf on my head. When I would get up in the morning, I would just unwrap my hair and be out the door. I loved this easy to manage hairstyle. What I didn’t like was the time and money that I wasted over the years. I knew my hairdresser really well, too well. At times I would have an early morning appointment and wouldn’t get out until dinner time. Crazy I know right!

TRANSISTIONING

When I started teaching fitness classes I knew it was time to transition to natural. I would get a perm one day and the next day I would sweat it out. Yet I was still nervous about going natural.

My oldest sister helped me out, she had already made the transition years before and was loving it. My problem was I focused, on what other natural hair looked like and wondered if my hair would look as good. Then there was so much information out there about the do’s and don’t that I didn’t know what to believe.

I wore braids for a year and finally completed that phase of my journey. I became a product junkie. I really just didn’t know what I was doing although I read books, went to natural hair shows, looked online, and talked to other people. If you never had to take care of your hair, being natural would require some work for me. One thing I was told being natural requires you to learn about your hair.

FRUSTRATION

My frustration lead me to tying up my hair a lot. What that did to my hair was devastating. My hair ended up falling out due to putting too much tension on my hair. I even consulted with an African American dermatologist on my hair. After that experience it was time for me to seriously learn how to deal with my hair. I consulted with some experienced natural hair stylists, had discussions with women who went through transitioning from permed hair to natural hair. I started to embrace my kinky hair. My hair started to grow back and I started to love my hair. I still struggle at times, remember I have never been much for styling my hair.

BETTER PLACE

I’m still on my hair journey. I’m in a much better place and learning to embrace what God has blessed me with. I still need to learn how to style my hair in different ways. I do have my niece who has a head full of beautiful natural hair, who styles my hair. My go to style is the two-strand twist. Hey I even get compliments now. With all the struggles I will never go back to a perm! That I know for sure! My husband loves my natural hair and that really helps my hair journey process.

Taffie Toney