the collective experiences of all dreadheads..learn from eachothers mistakes

hey
just thought it would be a great idea if we all shared our stories with experiences and mistakes lessons learned
including what we did this time (or this tike and previos times) including how long each set lasted and why they were lost...and finaly what we'd do different if we started over


ok to start
i started my 1st set with just the knowledge that dreads happen if u dont comb
and by the time they were 2 months old i loved em
but noone told me to seperate so they congoed like crazy forminmg a pillow behind my neck asnd 2 horns on top (with a few other dreads loose)
i still loved em and cried when they were cut which was to go to school for computer programming and they demanded a short cleancut look
they had lasted maybe a year
2nd set started the same, but ripping apart any areas that wanted to congo
the reswas nearly 250 thin dreads and a few thicker ones
i totaly loved this set however did make a few mistakes
1 started with like ivory soap i dont think it hurt alot but id do it different next time if there was 1
another mistake was when in an oregon bhospitol after being o the road for 6 months i let the drs diagnodse me with lice when i just had bad dandruff (way too long between washinmgs) they diagnosed this from across the room just by seeing me itchy
after weeks of tortutre that permenantly fucked up my scalp till it was a bloody mess a brave nurse came close enough to look for bugs and repoprted seeing white things but in shape nothing like eggs
so i let these dr's make a total mess of my scalp thats permenatnly fucked just vcausethey were descriminating thinking locks=dirty buggy hair

other thenthat i wouldnt change a thing..i dont really like the palmeolled into perfect smoothness look much i love the very organic nature of mine and how none are even remotely simular to any others
if there was anything id change maybe i woulda let some of the really thin ones get lil thicker much earlier on
but wouldnt wanna go very thick, no thicker then my thickest which is maybe an inch
this sets lasted 18 1/2 years and plan on keepin em 60 or more longer..till i die i hope

(please no bashing other peoples methoids we are all here to learn from mistakes not to beat eachother up for making mistakes)

 

My first set were done by a woman in Manchester in 2005 who told me not to use wax but to use liquid latex. Not having the T'internet or any dready friends they eventually turned to rubber. Got my second set Jan 19th '08 and they'll stay with me 'til I die

 

the latex thing seems like such big mistake i think it would be good if you talkk lil bit more about this
everything you went through
oh and maybe even talk alittle about how she was able to convince you thsat rubber in yolur hair was the way to go

i think the greattest benifit of this thread could be in uncovering all the ways we were convinced these mistakes were the way to go

 

Will do.

Charged me £80 in all. She did the method of back combing then rip and twist. She said that maintenence wise I need to put latex on my hair to hold the dreads together because, wax was really bad and just made your head greasy.

kept going back for re dos the staffing of the place was terrible, the woman was usually the only hairdresser there. Funnily enough her piercer collegue was dreaded and used bits of latex for his dreads saying it was amazing. Now at the time I was living in a hostel, no internet to really have a good read up. So I knew NOTHING about dreads only that wax was bad and I shouldn't wash for 8 weeks to let my dreads settle.

My dreads kept falling out and I was convinced this was not supposed to happen, that once you had dreads, you had dreads. So I put more and more Latex on as the months went by.

Eventually my dreads turned to rubber and the latex got on EVERYTHING. Bedding, clothing, walls, bath, you name it. It was horrible. I went back to get her to help me and she couldn't do anything apart from redo my roots with more latex. I cut them off to shoulder length and tried to grow it out but I looked horrible so I combed them out.

To this day I am really angry about the whole situation. If I had help, then my dreads would be over 3 years old. I've still got my old dreads. Sometimes, my cats find one and find great delight running through the flat with excitement of their dready prize.

 

About 18 months ago I decided i'd let my hair dread, it was pretty short but i backcombed what I had and just let it grow and rubbed the tips into the palm of my head every so often so the ends balled up and thats really it.

No wax etc... Im really happy with the progress and i will probably keep them for the rest of my life, or at least thats what i want.

Everywhere I turned, people tried to get me to use wax, luckily I found this place and I didnt. Wax really isnt needed.

 

patience. patience. patience. I cannot stress that enough. I though, oh ya I will have all the patience I need. 2 months in was ready to give up. Thanks to some well placed guidance I'm just chillin out now.

And happy to report, I have some loopy's forming in the back and near my right ear!

 

damn hellodreadhead
im amazed that shed say wax is bad...then say latex is better
im sorry im stupified by that logic
shure wax maybe greasier then latex...but then again...latex is latex

part of why wax is so bad is cause its so hard to get out
but how do u get latex out?
sure as rubber it wont get dirt stuck in it lioke wax because it hardens

or wait u saisd it stayed luiquid and got all oveer the walls?

im kinda baffled at the logic behind that


ok keep em comming more stories more mistakes more lessons learned
i think this is the best way to teach..i mean suree we can say wax is bad dont wax but without seeing the problems it caused and the heartbreak u can easily assume its just a buncha purists bashing a proiduct
(and im not spefcificaly simgling out waxhere just using as an example..i hope we can cover every possible mistake so others dont gotta make em)

 

yumyum
this is off topic but that quote in your sig that u attribute to jah rastafadri..isnt that actualy a quote from marcus garvey?
i could be wrong..but i thought it was

 

back combed on october 23, 2008 by my good friend in college, it took 6 hours. didnt get finished, the next day i finished 3 on top of my head, the next day i spent 4 hours crocheting and then put wax in, waxed about once a week for the first 3 weeks i will say. did some reading on this forum, stuck my head in some boiling water, the wax floated out and i continued crocheting until about a month into the journey. then i gave up with trying to make them obsessively neat and let them be, almost 4 months later, im a happy camper

 

would u call crochetting a mistake? would u do it again next time around if there is a next time?

 

honestly, the way i did it, no...i wouldnt call it a mistake, my roots are tight and healthy and strong, and it made my hair look a lot more presentable for the early stages of dreading...i dont know if i would do it again only because i think if i did do it again i would give the au natural style a shot just to see how many dreads my hair would make on its own. but i dont regret crocheting at all

 

a year and something ago i got my dreads backcombed and twist and ripped. I once put a bit wax in them so they would hold and "crocheted" with a needle and string, but kept doing it sparingly till I stopped at around 9-10 months.

 

First 'set' - 2006
Backcombed, didn't wash them for 2 weeks, didn't know ANYTHING about them & then BAM the rain washed them out!

Second 'set' - 2007
Backcombed reasonably well, continued to back comb for 3 days(every day) & apply dax wax, then somehow my mum did a guilt trip and convinced me to wash/brush them out for the holiday(she said she would help re-backcomb after holiday but never did )

Current 'set' - Jan 12th 2008 to Now
Properly sectioned off & backcombed, but I kept backcombing once a week & applying copious amounts of beeswax to them from Jan - July After then realising what it was doing to my hair, I let them go and started washing them (for the first time), getting out the majority of the wax and letting them go was the best decision of my life!

Please wash your dreadies, they lock up quicker
Don't use wax (I used 1/5 of the recommended amount & it still fucked up mine)
Don't backcomb more than once, I hindered the progress by 6 months because I was breaking all the natural progress!
Love your dreads & your dreads will love you

 

My friend did the rip&twist very lightly for me. She also lightly waxed 3 of them,but then I told her to stop as I wanted to see how they got on w/out wax. tbh, there is no difference that I can see between the ones which were waxed and not. She only used the tiniest bit of beeswax, by melting a smidgen on straightening irons and smoothing it on.
They were sticky for the first night but then felt OK the next day. I didn't wash them for a month (as I was told) and was reading up all sorts of 'wash through a nylon crap'. In the end I'd just had enough and dunked a big bowl of the deep cleanse solution over my head. It felt so good to finally get them wet but after my scalp felt a bit dry.
So I went to Lush, got two shampoo bars and wash when I feel like it. I loveeeee washing my hair now and they don't even take that long to dry! I just squeeze as much water as I can out of them.
Other than washing and doing them up w/ wraps I let them be and they are forming beautifully w/ lots of lovely loops. My roots seem to be dreading up perfectly, they are so hard and together. I barely have to rip them either. I've done it once or twice but doesn't seem to need it these days.
Also, I've seem a lot of people on these forums complain about loose hairs. If some hairs come out of a dread, I just plait it. It looks pretty, keeps them tidy and what I've found is in a couple of weeks they dread into the dread next to it! It's so easy and keeps them looking tidy. I plaited the baby hairs that were too short to dread and they meshed into the dreads around my face looking realli pretty and the baby hairs around the back of my head
hope this helps some people^.^sorry if it's total blablalelallle!x x x

 

How tight are yours now Luxie? They're always so swooshy in your pics that I've sort of assumed they're really loose, but I guess they can't be from what you've said. Also, how old are they now?

 

First attempt.. 2007
My friend backcombed & waxed them, the next day i washed them out (i hated them) and then went to my blokes and his mom re-did them. She braided/plaited the roots, then backcombed & waxed the rest. They stayed for 8 months, until me, my mom and my sister spent 6 1/2 hours combing them out

Second attempt.. 2008
Same friend, same process.. they stayed for 6 months. I spent 3 days combing them out. I waxed them to shit and back and they were terrible. I dont think i ever liked them.

Third attempt.. 2009
Theyre currently 4 days old. Backcombed, no wax.

 

Lux and Alex..you guys were using pure beeswax? Just asking, that stuff is like nearly impossible to work with isnt it?

 

they are realli together just flexiable. at the root they are good n'tight but at the ends and some in the middle are still quite loose. I think they're swooshy because their long and suite thin.

 

yess.it's not impossible,you just melt it and put it on.

 

What Luxie said
Impossible to use unless you melt it, impossible to remove!