Relaxer Update

Hi ladies. I’m back with my relaxer update. I relaxed my hair last week but I’ve been having writer’s block or should I say lazy block *covers face*. Are there any other bloggers who experience this? Well, I decided to cast away all forms of laziness and put up this post. Btw, the presidential inauguration is going on right now at Eagle’s square Abuja. I’m going to watch it as soon as I’ve put up this post – make sure you do too!

This relaxer session is no different than my last read post here except for a few glitches but before I go into all that here’s how it went;

I had prepped my hair for my relaxer session by washing it a week before. Contrary to popular beliefs that our hair should be extremely dirty before relaxing, it is good to relax with a clean scalp by washing your hair a week or 2 before your relaxer session.
Detangled my hair properly with my fingers to avoid matting.
Applied Olive oil to all of my hair both new growth and previously relaxed hair.
Using the half and half method by Jen of Just Grow Already, sectioned my hair into two and made 1 – inch twists in each section.
Based my scalp, edges and nape with Vaseline. Should have based the top of my ears but I forgot. Luckily, relaxer didn’t get to my ears.
Covered the front half with 2 plastic caps and hair clips (which by the way didn’t stop water from entering it).
Starting from the middle, I applied the already mixed relaxer (relaxer + activator + olive oil) to my back half. Application and smoothing took 10 minutes. I used ORS Olive oil No-Lye relaxer Normal strength.

Rinsed out the relaxer with warm water and clarified 5 times; 4 using Dark and Lovely Neutralizing shampoo from my previous kit and the 5^th (fifth) using Olive oil creamy Aloe shampoo that came in the kit. I wanted be sure there was no single trace of relaxer left.
Applied Organics Hair Mayonnaise for 5 minutes and rinsed with cool water.
Relaxed my front half using the same process although application and smoothing took 18 minutes because the sections were not exactly equal.
Once I was done with both halves, I neutralized the whole hair again using Olive Creamy Aloe Shampoo.
Deep conditioned with Organics Hair Mayonnaise, ORS Replenishing conditioner (came in the kit) and Motions Moisture plus conditioner for 30 minutes with my new heat cap.

Rinsed with cool water and let my hair air dry.
Applied my leave-ins; Mega Profective leave-in strengthener and Elasta QP Olive Oil and mango butter when my hair was 70% dry.

In the evening, I applied the Olive oil incredibly rich oil Moisturizing hair lotion that came in the kit and my Organics Smoother and Polisher Serum before using my hair straightener.

Without further ado, here’s my length check;

I gained an inch from my last relaxer session in January and I’m super pleased. I was so sure that after my setback while taking out my crochet braids (I accidentally chopped off my ends) I would not have retained length at all. I guess all the TLC and hard work I gave my hair paid off.

Also, I was so sure I had relaxed my hair bone straight till I rinsed out the relaxer. Lol!! I’m glad I’m still texlaxed even though I still have quite a lot of bone straight ends.

My edges are growing...yaaaaaay!!!

Pro’s of this texlax Session

I retained length. *yaaaaaay*
I’m almost at armpit length. *whoops*

Con’s

My hair was itchy before I relaxed and despite my attempts to not itch I did and it resulted in scalp burns. I literally cried because my scalp hurt like crazy as soon as I applied the relaxer. I should have known better. I’ve been babying my scalp by applying olive oil to the burns and basically leaving my hair alone.
Even though I was finally able to get my hair clips and attempt using Jen's Half and Half method again, water still entered into the upper half of my hair and I had to wait for it to dry before applying the relaxer. I definitely have to find my own method now. How do you ladies use this method without getting water into the upper half?

Moving forward I may consider stretching for only 16 weeks as my hair didn’t react nicely to this stretch. Well that’s it ladies!

Any recent texlaxed or relaxed sessions? I’d love to hear all about it.

Have a blessed weekend and congratulations Nigerians on our new President.