Coarse Hair, Detangling, Fine Hair, Hair Care
It’s a common misconception that black people; those of African decent, and even more so Africans, have very tough hair. Some equate it to Brillo pads or wire-type strands–hard, coarse and just downright rough and tough.
This is a something that has been often passed down generation after generation and I’d argue that at the core of this unfortunate misconception is the reason a lot of black women who do not know much about hair care struggle to achieve and retain length. We’ve been lead to believe that our hair is so tough that it can almost take anything which leads to many of us sitting in the salon chair as we wince in pain while our hair is braided too tight, our scalps are burned, our edges pulled and prodded and our heads giving slash a run for his money as plastic bristle brushes that rip through our roots sling our heads back and fourth against the resistance of our necks.
In reality, kinky and kinky curly hair are the most fragile of all hair types. I see this often, a natural who wants advice on how to grow her hair gets caught up in hype by thinking kinky hair is coarse by default. “My hair is so coarse and dry and keeps snapping!” she laments, when in reality her hair is so fine and fragile that by keeping it smothered in product–even the good stuff–she keeps her hair dried out therefor making it brittle and prone to breakage. The response to my answer is always the same, “Wait, my hair is fine? How can it be coarse and fine?” and I have to follow up and explain that they actually don’t have coarse hair. Some naturals have coarse hair, of course, as i’m one of them, and like many others, I also have very fine hair that is prone to breakage if I’m not careful. I cannot rip through my hair during a hasty detangling session and I must take my time to style my hair because for as many coarse strands I have I have as many if not more fine strands.
Lil Wayne’s perception of black hair or African hair is a common one shared throughout the black community–“I’m a young money millionaire, tougher than Nigerian hair,” but he is dead wrong and if one would take advice from him, they’d surely end up bald. Hair should be treated like a fine silk, especially kinky hair because it’s the most fragile of them all. It’s important for kinky and curly haired women to know that their hair is not tough enough to take anything but that it should be handled gently. Can some naturals beat their hair to death and still retain healthy hair? Absolutely, but keep in mind that this is the exception and not the rule. Learning that my hair was actually fine and fragile was something that occurred in my adult life, but just picking up this knowledge completely changed the way i handled my hair which in turn lead to more growth retention for me.
[…] type. However, many people think the opposite of black hair. Some people think it’s “tough” and able to withstand anything, but that isn’t the case. This false dichotomy leads […]