This is a guide for all my curly headed cuties who have just started to try take care of their natural hair or are trying to find new tips/advice for their hair.
This all works for me but it's not guaranteed to work for you although it doesn't hurt...
What is a protective style? A protective style is a style that tucks your ends away safely and let's the hair grow/stretch in peace. A protective style should not cause pain or tension on the scalp or that'll damage the roots because that means it's too tight. You're gonna have to get used to protective styles such as buns, Bantu knots, braids, and even wigs to let your hair grow. Some of these can be long term protective styles which I will cover maintenance for in a later chapter because holy crap is it a lot but right now, I'm going to cover the daily ones you can take in and out.
Protective styles are hugely important for when you're going to sleep because if you move around a lot (like me) especially without silk pillowcases, the hair can snag and break. It can also make all the hard work you did in the last chapter frizzy and matted again. One of my go to's is the two stranded twists. If you don't know what that is. Think of a generic braid but with just two parts instead of three. Strand the hair, put a scarf on, and then a satin bonnet. Some people also like to pineapple (a big bun either on top of the head or at the nape of the neck). A lot of these have the side goal as well of stretching the hair (safely tugging the hair for the curls to be longer because fuck shrinkage). It also helps create a beautiful twist out if you decided on two stranded twists but please put oil on your hands before you start taking them out if that's your goal in mind. Please also bear in mind that where it's parted is how it's going to come out. If you don't like middle parts, don't part the twists like that.
Oops! This image does not follow our content guidelines. To continue publishing, please remove it or upload a different image.
Don't forget to oil the scalp as well before doing this if you need to and spray it down gently with either water or a water/conditioner concoction to bring back the curl. These should be done every day but listen to your hair and scalp on when it needs to be done since you don't want to deal with the buildup.
