hair ch-ch-ch-changes

Has anyone else gone through a complete hair type change?  😮

About 6 years ago, give or take, my hair started to change. It used to be shiny, soft, sleek, never tangled and never got dry. I never used to have a problem with my hair until my 20s. I guess it crept up on me slowly, getting dry and frizzy and kind of wavy instead of straight and I didn't really notice how bad it was until like 2 years ago.

That's when I started trying to deal with it by doing something other than putting it in a bun and hiding it. I started by cutting it, went from lower back length to above shoulder length (because the hairstylist must've failed anatomy and didn't know where the collarbone is). I figured I had got rid of the frazzled lengths and things would get better as it grew. As it grew I started realizing what was growing out of my head was dry and the hair strand itself was not uniform in thickness all the way down. If you ran your finger down it you would feel bumps. It was also breaking and splitting like crazy. I didn't really know what to do with it though. I tried all the crappy silicone loaded "oils" sold in the drugstores and just got flat, greasy looking hair. It was so depressing that I wore wigs almost every time I went out and I considered shaving it all off. I stopped washing it every day and started washing with conditioner instead of shampoo. It helped a little bit. I get sick to my stomach thinking about the thousands of dollars I wasted on hair products and treatments.

I developed a PPD allergy around the time my issues started so I also stopped dying my hair black. I only dyed it once every 6 months and only colored it black 4 or 5 times total so I don't think I had much damage from using permanent dyes. They certainly didn't help matters though.

Before anyone asks, I have had blood work and health checks and was pronounced normal and healthy, but I do have issues with female hormones and had periods that sent me to the ER (A&E for those across the pond). It's not yet confirmed but it's suspected it has something to do with my hair and skin issues.

I stated to realize about a year ago that my scalp was part of the problem. My scalp doesn't seem to produce any oil at all. It looks like a dry cracked lake bed if I don't do anything to control it. At this point I started throwing away the silicone "oils" and replacing them with coconut oil. It helped loads but my hair was still a mess. I struggled to find the right amount to put on and often was left with greasy hair but I preferred it to dry and scruffy. Unless it was greasy it knotted and tangled and tried to turn itself into dreadlocks.

I wish you could've seen how bad my hair was a year ago. I want to cry just thinking about it. The glossy bouncy vibrant hair I had as a kid was a world away. The closest thing I can think of to compare it to would be the hair of a wire haired dog. And to think it was like that when I bleached it last year. I didn't think I could do it but the strand test didn't melt. My boyfriend had been bugging me to go red and I spent a year trying to improve my hair's condition for bleaching so I guess I did something right, even though to me it still seemed bloody awful.

I lurked on this forum for months before I bleached and dyed my hair and learned as much as I could before taking the plunge. I'm very grateful for this forum because my hair has transformed completely over the last few months. I think the two things that had the biggest effect are vinegar rinses and K-pak DPR. My hair feels smooth and normal, it's not wiry or bumpy. I think the K-pak has filled in the gaps. The vinegar has helped with the dry scalp and really makes my hair smooth between K-pak treatments. I was really impressed with my hair this winter, it hardly got dry at all.

The best thing in the world to me right now is I can sleep with my hair down at night and not wake up with an unmanageable tangled mess. One of the last times I did that my comb got stuck in my hair and broke! Victory at last. I think I can finally manage the weird mess that grows out of my head.  *yay*