My hair decided to dread before i decided it.

Hey, i'm new here. I'm glad I found this place because i've been looking around the internet and i was almost convinced i had to start dreads with wax. It didn't seem right to me though, and i didn't want to put product in my hair. And people had dreadlocks before 'knotty boy' wax was around.

I decided to start letting my hair dread after fighting it for a couple months. I haven't used shampoo in probably 3 years now, just baking soda and AVC rinse. There was a time I went 8 weeks without washing my hair as a kind of detox ( i worked in a kennel cleaning and caring for dogs, they didn't care how i looked or smelled). I never have time to brush my hair or care to because i'm a single mom of a new baby and a very active toddler. My hair just started clumping together.

So i'm going the neglect route, i've read the sticky post in this forum and have been lurking here for a little for a bit. But i'm still not sure how much i should intervene with naturally forming dreads? I want to let them do their thing, but also don't want one big knot. Should i just keep the different locks apart by ripping them if they start to combine? And if i tie my hair back will it interfere with them locking closer to the root? My hair annoys me and my baby when i'm breastfeeding if it's not tied back.

 

My hair used to be like that. I found that the clumps tended to stay separate forming natural dreads. I'm talking about in the early 70's when dreads weren't really seen so I had to continually be cutting chunks out of the back of my hair. How things change eh?

 

rip them for comfort and to avoid congos (a bunch of locks fused together). you can tie them up when it's convenient. i always use this rule: leave it down for the same amount of time that you have it tied up. it needs to move to lock more. try headbands or even tams for a less restrictive way of keeping them out of you and your baby's face.

 

Nice I love surprise dread stories

 

I don't really have anything to add that wasn't already said. I just wanted to thank you for breastfeeding. Sooo important! YAY!

 

wool tams not only keep your hair out of the way, they also help with the dreading process.

 

Hey girl, just let them do their own thing You can kind of rip em apart and form em yourself without product (use a flea comb) You know what those are if you worked with dogs. Yeh, you don't want one big knot, but I think it's awesome you just let your hair do it's own thing...so let it!

 

Thanks! Best thing i've ever done (besides making another human being). Sad more don't.

 

Unless you have HIV/AIDS or take harmful medication that is secreted in breast milk?

 

Yes of course. Though i wish more who could would give it a chance, it's great. This is getting off topic now....

back to dreads. So when you rip then apart, it's literally ripping right? You don't cut or try and untangle dreads that start growing together? You just pull and break the hair?

 

if you have hiv/aids you shouldn't be having sex or children at all, let's get that shit out of the gene pool one intelligent choice at a time

 

harsh..
it's not their fault that they had a shitty hand dealt to them, they have every right to live their lives the way they choose, with special precautions of course.
i bet if you got hiv you wouldn't be saying that dude. like really, that's a pretty terrible thing to say.

on another note, pictures of these surprise dreads?

 

I like you.

It's fine to tie em back, just give them a little time not tied, even if just while in bed.

Rip if them combining bothers you for whatever reason, be it comfort or style.

All there is to it

 

I would THINK that anyone who had AIDs and can actually come to grasps with their situation should understand how important it is that they don't pass it on. You should understand, wether or not you have HIV.

That's a generally niave/all round stupid thing to say. It's got to be stopped in it's tracks, which can't be done with that sort of stupid hedonism in the way.

 

there are ways to have sex without passing it on dude. people with aids are required to inform potential sexual partners that they have aids. they can go to jail otherwise. it's extremely ignorant to assume that people with aids should stop living life so "their shit can get out of the gene pool".
and for the record, discrimination against people with hiv/aids in canada is treated pretty much like racial discrimination, perhaps not in the mind of the common person but to the courts in lawsuits etc., it's not something you can just say "fuck you" to.
it's the whole "you have aids you're diseased scum stop your life and don't touch anything i touch" mentality that drives a lot of the ignorance in the world about this disease and so many others. i'm not stupid for speaking up for people who by no fault of their own have contracted a terrible disease that we're all still trying to understand.
and yeah, it's got to be stopped but i doubt we'll see it in our lifetime. until people start using protection and speak openly with their partners about their previous partners, not to mention proper sterilization in any situation involving fluids/blood, even sharing common objects (you have a cut, they have a cut)... telling people with aids to not have sex is not going to fix the problem, it's spread in so many ways. THATS a very naive/generally stupid thing to say, in my opinion.
sorry to go off, i'm just really not someone to let people push others around. it's not okay, never has been, never will be.

because this is totally derailing this thread i won't reply to any more posts about this, and i'm not trying to get the last word. it's pretty plain to see that there are people out there who will never open their minds to a lot of things, i don't see how i'll change yours about aids on a forum for dreadlocks.

 

You don't understand. Would I be friends with someone with AIDs? Sure, if I would be friends with them otherwise. If I had AIDs, would I be SO irresponsible as to have sex and possibly children? NO, and I would be furious at anyone with AIDs who had sex with anyone NOT already HIV positive.

 

I don't really have sex at all right now, and I definitely wouldn't if I had any disease even curable ones. I've had WAY too many condoms break on me in the past to believe that they are actually a way to have safe sex. 100% safe sex isn't possible and I don't like any lower odds than that when it comes to someone that could give me something that will kill me. Sorry if that makes me a nazi lol

 

fair enough, to both of you. the way you put that before was a lot harsher than i think you actually meant to be. end discussion?

 

Since this wasn't really adressed...

Don't cut your dreads apart! If you keep on top of separating them, it shouldn't break the hair too much when you rip them. It just pulls the loose hairs away from the dreads that are eating them.

It helps to have somebody do this for you every once in a while, if you can, just to keep them from growing together too much.