Post by signature420 on May 10, 2016 6:26:21 GMT
So here's my dread journey, this is my third set of dreadlocks. The first set I ended up shaving off, grew my hair back and ended up re-dreading it again, then sadly about two months later I was forced to get rid of the locks for work. well here we are again 4 years later and I can finally dread my hair again without worrying about the job thing.
Now with all that being said. I have always pictured myself with dreadlocks since a young teen age. The first set i had had to be shaved off and so did the second set. I had no control over this. I spent all those years growing my hair and it was just taken away from me. The last set I had was about 5 years ago and after about a year and a half of short hair cuts I started to really miss my dreads and simply just my long hair. I've always felt out of my skin without it. so after about 4 years of growing my hair i finally decided that it was time to start my new dread journey.
This time i was going to make them perfect from the start... I had the experience, did a ton of research within the last 4 years on all of the different methods that one can use to attain their locks. I then very knowledgeably decided MY path into the dreadlock journey yet again. I knew I couldn't go with messy locks for months on end because it would just drive me nuts and I wouldn't be able to tolerate it, SO I knew that I have to make perfect locks from the start and really maintain them heavily for the first two months with it getting easier after the first 4-5 weeks.
So the method I chose is, Back combing clean sections that are anywhere from 1x1inch to a few slightly bigger and a few slightly smaller, I ended up with only 37 sections, so that's not too many dreads, and I would say most of them are about sharpie size now and they are tight and solid but bend easy. the first day we(my wife and I) sectioned and back combed all of my dreads, now the back combing here was really tedious and done really tightly and made really stiff fluffy dreads that shrunk may hair length in half. Yes HALF. This created a perfect base for my new dreads. For the next nine days I did NOTHING to it except shower. Nothing came loose yet. On Day 9 was the initial waxing this waxing was drastic and considered on the heavy side, but what it did to my dreads was amazing it made them super tight, and when I washed all of the wax out 3 days later they were still really tight and compressed.
Now keep in mind that wax will never lock up your hair, it is meant to only compress your dreads and you do not need much. The downside to wax is that when its in your dread no hair can lock up because the wax actually prevents it from doing so. So you really want to wash it out with HOT water every three days. Yes HOT water will remove your wax, it will take some time but HOT water will always work and after that shower you can apply a little sea water spray on your dreads and blow dry them on HOT. Blow drying them on hot will allow you to melt any wax still stuck inside the dread to the point where you will feel it with your fingers, back in the shower you go, or just re-rub it into the rest of your freshly clean yet blow dried dread as you dry it. here i recommend that you either re wash your hair to get the rest of the wax out, or completely blow-dry your dread with the wax in it to melt the wax into the rest of the dread. Do not apply any more wax to any dreads that have wax in them.
Anyway back to the subject, because we can talk about wax later and you really do not need it in your dreads at all, I only used it in my dreads because of the texture of my hair, and i need to speed up the tightening process.
Notice how i didn't even mention a crochet hook yet. Those are tricky and really require knowledge on how to use it properly or many bad things can happen here.I didn't put a crochet hook to my dreads until AFTER i blunted all of my tips which happened at about a month, i started doing it at about 3 weeks and at a month i think I had done them all. At this point I started thinking about adding extensions but not really because they were kind of a spur of the moment type of the thing, I just decided and went to action.
Meanwhile My dreads were locking up FAST, yes they had loose hair but they were manageable with strict palm rolling routine. So I went ahead and purchased me some human hair...I didn't want some synthetic fibers that would deminish over time. I made those extensions the same exact way as my hair, Since it was super close in texture to my hair it dreaded up exactly the same, Except this time I started to crochet the extensions after the back combing. The crocheting made instant mature dreads in the extensions. SO I went ahead and made me a whole set of extensions. The only downside was the length of the extensions due to the fact that it was human hair i was limited in length.
SO at about a month and a week or so I started adding extensions to all of my dreads I had finally blunted my tips so i knew it was possible to add them.
Here is my journey...
about 1 year Before dreads.
DAY 1 Back combing ONLY. No wax, No crochet Hook.
Day 5. Still NO wax. No crochet hook.
Day 8. Last day before initial waxing. Still no crochet hook(Hair is to fine and silky)
Day 10. Day after initial waxing(done the night before) Yes That's a lot of wax I know. This is the only time this much wax ever goes into my dreads. from this point on I do not add any more until all of this wax has been washed out.
Day 12 I start to wash the Wax out because it was driving me mad.
This is Shower and Blowdry, And palm roled while blow drying. Light wax is in the dreads at this point.
Blunted tips around week 3.5
3 and a half weeks and Blunted tips, Some tips in smaller dreads were coming loose. small dreads always take more time to tighten and mature.
1 Month. a few semi loose tips. but mainly i had a patch of super short lose hair on the back of my head by my neck area that i ended up shaving off, because we couldn't get them into any dreads or make new dreads with them.
AT THIS POINT there is no more wax in my hair nor do i add any more ever.
This is my first TEST extension. using it to tie up my dreads. Yes its installed(by me I installed all of my own extensions as well)
My first extensions. Back combed then Crochet hook.
More extensions to be Crocheted more.
First set of extensions nearly done this is at about 6 weeks ( see that patch of hair i was talking about shaving off) Yeah i have ocd haha!
7 weeks first set of extensions finished.
8 weeks MORE extensions
2 months. On the couch with my wife.
I hope this was educational as well as enjoyable for you guys.
Cheers!
Now with all that being said. I have always pictured myself with dreadlocks since a young teen age. The first set i had had to be shaved off and so did the second set. I had no control over this. I spent all those years growing my hair and it was just taken away from me. The last set I had was about 5 years ago and after about a year and a half of short hair cuts I started to really miss my dreads and simply just my long hair. I've always felt out of my skin without it. so after about 4 years of growing my hair i finally decided that it was time to start my new dread journey.
This time i was going to make them perfect from the start... I had the experience, did a ton of research within the last 4 years on all of the different methods that one can use to attain their locks. I then very knowledgeably decided MY path into the dreadlock journey yet again. I knew I couldn't go with messy locks for months on end because it would just drive me nuts and I wouldn't be able to tolerate it, SO I knew that I have to make perfect locks from the start and really maintain them heavily for the first two months with it getting easier after the first 4-5 weeks.
So the method I chose is, Back combing clean sections that are anywhere from 1x1inch to a few slightly bigger and a few slightly smaller, I ended up with only 37 sections, so that's not too many dreads, and I would say most of them are about sharpie size now and they are tight and solid but bend easy. the first day we(my wife and I) sectioned and back combed all of my dreads, now the back combing here was really tedious and done really tightly and made really stiff fluffy dreads that shrunk may hair length in half. Yes HALF. This created a perfect base for my new dreads. For the next nine days I did NOTHING to it except shower. Nothing came loose yet. On Day 9 was the initial waxing this waxing was drastic and considered on the heavy side, but what it did to my dreads was amazing it made them super tight, and when I washed all of the wax out 3 days later they were still really tight and compressed.
Now keep in mind that wax will never lock up your hair, it is meant to only compress your dreads and you do not need much. The downside to wax is that when its in your dread no hair can lock up because the wax actually prevents it from doing so. So you really want to wash it out with HOT water every three days. Yes HOT water will remove your wax, it will take some time but HOT water will always work and after that shower you can apply a little sea water spray on your dreads and blow dry them on HOT. Blow drying them on hot will allow you to melt any wax still stuck inside the dread to the point where you will feel it with your fingers, back in the shower you go, or just re-rub it into the rest of your freshly clean yet blow dried dread as you dry it. here i recommend that you either re wash your hair to get the rest of the wax out, or completely blow-dry your dread with the wax in it to melt the wax into the rest of the dread. Do not apply any more wax to any dreads that have wax in them.
Anyway back to the subject, because we can talk about wax later and you really do not need it in your dreads at all, I only used it in my dreads because of the texture of my hair, and i need to speed up the tightening process.
Notice how i didn't even mention a crochet hook yet. Those are tricky and really require knowledge on how to use it properly or many bad things can happen here.I didn't put a crochet hook to my dreads until AFTER i blunted all of my tips which happened at about a month, i started doing it at about 3 weeks and at a month i think I had done them all. At this point I started thinking about adding extensions but not really because they were kind of a spur of the moment type of the thing, I just decided and went to action.
Meanwhile My dreads were locking up FAST, yes they had loose hair but they were manageable with strict palm rolling routine. So I went ahead and purchased me some human hair...I didn't want some synthetic fibers that would deminish over time. I made those extensions the same exact way as my hair, Since it was super close in texture to my hair it dreaded up exactly the same, Except this time I started to crochet the extensions after the back combing. The crocheting made instant mature dreads in the extensions. SO I went ahead and made me a whole set of extensions. The only downside was the length of the extensions due to the fact that it was human hair i was limited in length.
SO at about a month and a week or so I started adding extensions to all of my dreads I had finally blunted my tips so i knew it was possible to add them.
Here is my journey...
about 1 year Before dreads.
DAY 1 Back combing ONLY. No wax, No crochet Hook.
Day 5. Still NO wax. No crochet hook.
Day 8. Last day before initial waxing. Still no crochet hook(Hair is to fine and silky)
Day 10. Day after initial waxing(done the night before) Yes That's a lot of wax I know. This is the only time this much wax ever goes into my dreads. from this point on I do not add any more until all of this wax has been washed out.
Day 12 I start to wash the Wax out because it was driving me mad.
This is Shower and Blowdry, And palm roled while blow drying. Light wax is in the dreads at this point.
Blunted tips around week 3.5
3 and a half weeks and Blunted tips, Some tips in smaller dreads were coming loose. small dreads always take more time to tighten and mature.
1 Month. a few semi loose tips. but mainly i had a patch of super short lose hair on the back of my head by my neck area that i ended up shaving off, because we couldn't get them into any dreads or make new dreads with them.
AT THIS POINT there is no more wax in my hair nor do i add any more ever.
This is my first TEST extension. using it to tie up my dreads. Yes its installed(by me I installed all of my own extensions as well)
My first extensions. Back combed then Crochet hook.
More extensions to be Crocheted more.
First set of extensions nearly done this is at about 6 weeks ( see that patch of hair i was talking about shaving off) Yeah i have ocd haha!
7 weeks first set of extensions finished.
8 weeks MORE extensions
2 months. On the couch with my wife.
I hope this was educational as well as enjoyable for you guys.
Cheers!