Welcome to the Hair RX Podcast, brought to you by Nywele Advanced Hair Solutions. I'm Joy Aifuwa Okwemba, pharmacist, hair health educator, and founder of Nywele Advanced Hair Solutions. Is there a hair dream that has been lingering in your heart for the longest time and you don't know how to fulfill it? I can relate to that definitely, and I'm glad you tuned in today as I share with you how to accomplish and achieve your hair dreams. What are your hair dreams? Is your hair dream to have long, beautiful, curly hair? Is your dream to have straight hair? Is your dream to have a shorter, thicker look? Is your dream to have a different color that you've never been bold to try before? Is your dream to have hair that doesn't break easily? Hair that seems to weather more conditions better and not be so frizzy, for example, or not be so easily dry? These are all hair dreams that are valid and can be fulfilled with the right strategy and the right tools. I'd like to share with you today why I think hair dreams are worth fighting for and worth pursuing, and then how to accomplish your hair dreams. My hair dreams started when I was a little girl. I grew up in Sunbury, Pennsylvania, which is a very small rural town, and it was predominantly Caucasian. So a lot of the girls in my school that I wanted to look like were either Caucasian or Hispanic, but they all had long, beautiful hair that was past their shoulders or down their back, and they could enjoy, they could put in clips, they could play with and flip as often as you as they wanted to, and I would look at that sometimes and just be amazed at the things that they could do with their hair. When I came into the country at that time in 1995, I had very short hair because my parents cut it short. Previously, my parents had been braiding my hair, so it was pretty long. But for some reason, my mother convinced me that if I got my hair cut, she would buy me a new comb. And I have no idea why I agreed to that. But as a little girl, you find a shiny toy that you think is interesting and you are willing to trade everything for it. For me, that's what I did. So I don't know what made me trade my hair for a comb, but that was the persuasion that my parents tell me that led to my hair being cut short. So when I came into the country from Nigeria in 1995, my hair was less than one inch long. So starting over was something that was very hard. And being in an environment where all the girls near me were so beautiful with their long hair, and I was really envious. And I remember one day I had a mental picture of myself with long hair past my back, and I wanted it to be something that was luscious and thick, just like the girls in my class. Well, it didn't happen right away. In fact, many years would come and my dream seemed further away from me. Over the years, I then introduced chemical relaxers, which made the matters worse. But it in that time it was the greatest thing that ever happened because it allowed my hair to be straightened so I could kind of feel like I was part of the group at school with straighter hair that was easier to manipulate. So I introduced chemical relaxers around the seventh grade, and I didn't do it by myself actually, it was a family friend who applied the Just For Me Relaxers. Some of you may know what exactly I'm talking about. The Just For Me Relaxers were, you know, is a relaxer brand that's designed just for children, and that was my first encounter with it, and for the next 20 years after that, relaxers became the things that I did on a regular basis to my hair. So, what exactly did I do after that? During my high school years, I continued to wear my hair in protective styles. I wore my hair with relaxers. I then decided the summer after high school graduation, in the summer where I was supposed to get a break and then start college in the fall, I decided that I wanted a brand new look. And guess what that look was? To dye my hair a lighter brown. What I didn't realize was that my hair was already naturally dark brown, especially when it's held in the light. But back then I thought that my hair was black and I just wanted to go lighter. So you can see there's a lot of ignorance that was operating in my life when I was younger. First, I trade my beautiful hair for a comb because my mother convinced me that it would be a nice little toy or nice little piece to have, and then I decided that I want to go lighter, not realizing that my natural shade was beautiful enough as it was. As I did that, I added the hair dyes and started doing that every couple of years too. So hair dyes were in the mix, chemical relaxers were in the mix, a hair straightener was also in the mix, and a blow dryer was in the mix. So I had all these things in the melting pot of my hair routine, and guess what happened? My hair became very fragile. I would touch it, especially at the beginning, it would disintegrate. If you don't know what that means, it simply means that it would snap. It would snap so quickly and be so obvious that my hair was badly damaged. At this time, my hair was still never past my shoulders, and I could never figure out what was going on until I did my research. After my research, I realized that my hair was growing because I would still see new growth from time to time. Well, not really from time to time, really on a monthly basis. I would still see new growth. So I knew that my hair was growing, but the growth rate was slower than the breakage rate. And I'll say that in reverse. The breakage was faster than the growth rate. The breakage rate was faster than the growth rate. So that's why whatever new growth I was seeing was being shed or broken off at the ends. So it kept me in a perpetual, perpetual state of short hair. I laugh at myself now, but it was not funny when I was trying to figure this out because some of you are like this too. You're scratching your head, you have all these things that you do to your hair, and you don't know what is wrong and why your hair is just not growing or thriving the way that you've dreamed or imagined that it would. When I finally did my research and realized that my hair was growing and that the breakage was what the problem was, I decided to do something about it. You know, little steps is all you need sometimes to achieve your hair dreams. The first little step that I did was to stop using a blow dryer on a heat setting, and eventually I did away with blow dryers altogether. The second little step I made was to stop using a flat iron to flat iron my hair because up until that point my routine was to apply a hair relaxer every six to eight weeks, apply a hair dye every couple of months, blow dry my hair after every wash, and flat iron my hair after every wash. So you see that I was doing certain things repetitively that was breaking my hair and aiding in me not achieving the lengths that I desired because long hair was my hair dream. It doesn't have to be your hair dream. Maybe your hair dream can be something else altogether. Maybe it's even trying a new protective style or trying a new style that you never thought that you could do well in or look good in. But my hair dream was actually having long, beautiful hair. So when I stopped using the heat portion of my styling tools, I began to see progression gradually, but I began to see progression. I saw progression in my hair and it began to grow longer. My ponytail began to look thicker and fuller, and within a matter of a few years, my hair was down to my back, and finally I had achieved my hair dreams. But dreams have a way of expanding. When you fulfill one, another one takes another shape, and so that's what happened to me. Even though my hair was now very long, it was still very fragile because it was chemically straightened and chemical relaxers, even though there's a lot of products and you know protein reconstruction that occurs with the kits and things that are used to try to gain some strength back into the hair, it's not perfect. Your hair will still be at a certain level of weakness when you're using chemical relaxers, even if you're deep conditioning on a regular basis, even if you're using proteins, um protein products on a regular basis, it's still going to experience some kind of damage because of the relaxers itself. So that's what was happening to me. My hair was long, but it wasn't strong. So the next thing that I wanted as a hair dream was to have long, strong, thick hair that was easy to manage. So all those things were my heart's desire. And the next thing I knew I had to do was to stop using chemical relaxers. And I will share that there were friends and family members who cautioned me about using chemical relaxers for years, but I was just not ready to take the plunge. But when I decided I was ready to stop using chemical relaxers, it was on June 24th, 2021, and I decided that day that I was no longer going to apply chemical relaxers on my hair. So instead of having a full big chop, I decided to transition from chemically treated hair to my natural hair, which is 4C, and boy, was that a world of difference. It was difficult for me because I was dealing with the two different textures of hair simultaneously. And when I would wash my hair, my straight ends would behave a certain way, and then my curly roots would behave a certain way, and it was always challenging, which required me to have a lot more patience when dealing with my hair. But over time, as I continue to trim the dead damaged parts and the new growth grew in, it was something that became easier and easier. So that's the thing about changes that you need to make. It becomes easier and easier the more you do it and the more consistent you are with it. Following that, I would also put my hair in protective styles. Protective styles became my best friend as my hair was transitioning from relaxed hair to natural hair. Protective styles became my mainstay. They were very helpful in allowing me not to over-manipulate my hair and to allow my hair to just rest at times and just grow and thrive. I'm so grateful that I did that. I'm so grateful that I had the courage to transition from chemically straightened hair to natural hair because it has made my hair today longer, stronger, and thicker. It's been more thick than I've ever seen it. And I never knew that my natural hair was so thick. It may not look very thick right now because I kind of have it stretched out a little bit like this. So, but just so you realize, even with this, the way I'm stretching it right now, it's you know, it's even though there's a lot of shrinkage that hurts on the inside, I'm like, oh my gosh, all this shrinkage, but you can see hair has been progressing, my hair has been thriving, and I'm so grateful that I did not let fear and other obstacles to keep me from my hair dreams. So let me just give you a highlight of what I shared and how to accomplish your hair dream. Number one, do your own research, find out all you need to know about what's preventing you from accomplishing your hair dreams. If there's a specific process or procedure that you are doing, identify it and try to do the opposite. Take a step in the right direction. Take a step, stop doing something that you were doing that's causing you to not have your hair dreams, and start doing something that will promote you to have your hair dreams. And then stick with it, stick with the routine, stick with the new style, stick with the new process, and don't give up. It's tiresome sometimes, it takes longer times and longer periods of times to do your hair sometimes, especially when it comes to transitioning from a chemically straightened hair to a natural hair, but it will always be worth it. I'm so glad that I didn't quit along the way. I'm so glad that I didn't go back to relaxers because believe me, there were so many times when I wanted to do that. I wanted to consider even texturizers, because anything that would relax my curls a little bit, and my curls meaning my tight curls, anything that would relax it a little bit, I was looking for because it's just so hard to deal with tightly coiled hair that is also prone to a lot of dryness and prone to a lot of tangling. So I hope that your hair journey and you achieving your hair dreams is a lot smoother than mine. But if you are able to apply these practical steps that I shared, I guarantee you that you can have similar results. And if at the end of all these steps you've taken, you still are nowhere closer to your hair goals, then I suggest that you seek a hair professional, seek a dermatologist if it's maybe something that is going on with your scalp that's preventing you from growing your hair or having the style or the look that you want, or seek hairstylists, seek hair colorists, people who are experts in their field and in the field of hair. And with all these elements put together, I believe that you can achieve your hair dreams a lot more easily than you realize. I hope you found this episode to be helpful. If you would like assistance with achieving your hair dreams, I would be honored to work with you. Please visit Nywele Advanced Hair Solutions.com to book your free personalized educational consultation by submitting the inquiry form. You can also contact me, and if you have any questions or concerns, I would love to hear from you. We also have products and resources that are geared to people like you because my heart is to support and provide hair support in all fashions and in all individuals and in all hair types. Until next time, I'll see you soon. Thank you for tuning in to the Hair Art X podcast. If this episode spoke to you, let's take the next step together. Visit Nywele Advanced Hair Solutions.com to book your free personalized educational consultation, explore scalp safe accessories and products, and access the Nywele Digital Hair Wellness Library, including the ebooks I've written on hair and scalp wellness. Remember, your hair deserves care. That's backed by science and compassion. Until next time, stay rooted in confidence.