I first heard about the Curly Girl Method years ago, but never thought it would be an option for my medium wavy hair. Even calling my hair wavy always felt a little generous. No matter what waves my hair has, it’s almost always overshadowed by unsightly frizz, dry texture, and downright unmanageability. It definitely wasn’t curly. What I didn’t realize was that to the Curly Girl community, my hair woes simply meant possibilities.
My friend Susannah has been practicing the Curly Girl Method (the curly hair maintenance routine from Lorraine Massey’s Curly Girl: A Handbook) for three years and introduced me to the world of the Curly Girl Facebook Group. He gave it to me. Although she’s not as big of a believer as some people, meaning she sometimes uses hot tools for shampooing and styling, reading her testimonials convinced me I could give the Curly Girl Method a try. I did.
Susannah’s bouncy curls are the result of heredity and are the type of thing that looks perfect without thinking about anything else. But after seeing that her “before” hair actually didn’t look all that different from my wavy hair, I became optimistic about what this routine could do for me. Plus, by learning about these online communities, you can now, in resourceful millennial fashion, get all the information you need from an internet search instead of reading a book (sorry, Lorraine Massey).
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Curly Girl method and its followers
The Curly Girl Facebook group is like a dedicated book club centered around Curly Girl: The Handbook. There is no shame in posting without reading the book, but if you try to post without doing some research first, you may receive a polite reprimand. Research in this case means looking through files posted by group admins and using the search feature to avoid duplicate questions. The file contains an abbreviated version of the Curly Girl method and all the notes that come with it.
I must say that writing about it itself violates one of the group’s rules. It’s one of those “what happens here stays here” communities. I won’t list the specific groups I’m a member of, but a simple search for “Curly Girl Method” in Facebook groups yields over 100 results, and the largest groups yield hundreds of thousands of results. There are some things you can get. member. If you’d like to join these spaces, just ask (press the “Join” button to request access).
For curly girl experts, the Curly Girl Method involves understanding your hair’s porosity level, feeding your hair with the right amount of protein, and remembering a long list of sulfates and silicones to avoid at all costs. Included. Silicones can cause a waxy buildup that weighs down your hair and makes it less able to hold curls. The only thing I knew for sure about my hair was that blow-drying and brushing it increases its size by about 30%, so I was blown away by all of this new information and hair science.
Luckily, baby steps are encouraged, so we focused on the two aspects we think are the most important: co-washing and post-shower styling. Co-washing is an abbreviation for the most central element of the Curly Girl Method, which means ditching shampoo altogether and washing only with Curly Girl-approved conditioners. Curly Girl-approved conditioners are free of sulfates, drying alcohols, silicones, waxes, and non-natural oils. If you’re new to this method, there’s a good chance your current product is not CG safe and your eye isn’t trained to recognize the very specific list of ingredients that may or may not work. There are several online ingredient checkers, such as CurlsBot and Is It CG?, but they aren’t always completely up-to-date or reliable. That’s where having access to thousands of CG enthusiasts is extremely helpful.
What beginners like me want to know
“Is this safe?” This is the most popular post topic in the Curly Girl Method group, always supplemented with photos of product ingredient lists. Commenters are quick to point out that if a product doesn’t fit the list of Curly Girl Approved products, it’s loaded with sneaky silicones and questionable alcohol.
The next most common type of posts are probably complaints. These are posts where curly girls (also known as curly, or in my case wavy) don’t get the results they’re hoping for and have just had it done with their hair. They usually express feelings of disappointment and feeling like they’re about to throw in the microfiber towel. Commenters sometimes try to diagnose things like, “Did you last wash it?”, “How long has it been dry?”, “Looks like your hair needs to use a little more protein”, etc. Masu. Others offer a general reminder that “this is a marathon, not a sprint” and encourage you to keep going.
In my own curly girl journey, I had to figure out what to do with my hair after I got out of the shower. Believe it or not, there is a correct order for applying hair care products. There are also products designed for use before poop or before shampooing. Like everything else with this method, figuring out how to style your curls after they’ve been washed together takes some trial and error and requires you to learn a whole new vocabulary. Indeed, if you’ve ever used a diffuser on your curly hair, you’ve probably made one or all of the common mistakes. My research on styling options is just the tip of the iceberg and everyone will have their own routine, but these are the methods that have worked for me.
Steps of my curly girl method
Co-washing
After scrolling through Facebook groups to see who had hair most similar to mine and seeing what products they used, I finally chose a popular option: As I Am Coconut Co-Wash. did. Wash your hair in the shower as you would shampoo.
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“Squash to Condish”
Then use a second co-wash to “squeeze into the condish.” This part takes place at the end of the shower, with dripping wet hair turned upside down. It is said that “crunching” the conditioner in this way helps curls form and lock in moisture.
Apply the product
After rinsing off the conditioner and getting out of the shower, apply the gel. I haven’t touched this since I had an inappropriate hairstyle in middle school. I’ve found that it’s important to apply a generous amount of gel to your hair while it’s still wet.
air dry
Then, leave your hair to air dry. I quit using a hairdryer fairly early in my life, so this part wasn’t too difficult to get used to. The hard part is resisting the urge to touch your hair. This is because touching can interfere with curl formation and cause extra frizz. (Unfortunately, I won’t be taking a nap while I dry my hair.)
“Scrunch Out the Crunch”
Once your hair is dry and a gel cast (basically a crunchy film on top of your hair) has formed, use SOTC. Curly Girl Translation: Tighten your crunches. This is self-explanatory and prevents your hair texture from being audible. I gently massage my hair with my hands or a microfiber towel to loosen any clumps that may have formed during drying.
My review of the Curly Girl method
Morgan Knoll, Design: Olivia Barr
When Susannah first introduced me to the Curly Girl Method, she didn’t tell me exactly how my hair would react, but she told me that no matter what, you’d look different. ” he said.
I was excited about this. I’m a big proponent of adjusting your hair to accommodate lifestyle changes (yes, that includes breakup haircuts). Additionally, textured curls are a trending winter hairstyle. Having recently graduated from school and moved to a new city, I was overdue for a new hair experiment, but the process was a slow burn.
It didn’t take me long to learn about “transition hair.” Like many others, I started with hair that had been exposed to bleach, box color, heat products, and even a semester in a very polluted environment. I learned from my Facebook page that most people who start the Curly Girl Method come to the method with years of hair damage, which can take months to fully repair. . According to Lorraine Massey, this is especially a problem for women transitioning from full-coverage color to naturally gray hair. For the first few weeks, my hair was greasy, flat and never felt clean. I felt like I had extra curls, but I relied on my ponytail every day to distract me from the grease. I was nervous, but I knew this process was a marathon, not a sprint, so I kept going. Still, if you want an easy solution to your hair problems, the Curly Girl Method is the way to go.
After a few weeks, I started to get over the hump and noticed a change in my hair. I learned to scrub a little longer in the shower, about 5 to 7 minutes. And I felt like I was starting to figure out all the squishing and shrinking.
I’m not sure what category my hair falls into now, but it definitely looks different. If you follow all the right steps and take your time to dry your hair thoroughly, it will be less frizzy, healthier, and much more manageable. Before Curly Girl, I had no idea what my hair would look like every time I washed it. There were very few days when my hair was good. Now I feel like I have more control over my hair and texture. And not only are my waves looking more defined, I’m also starting to notice some curly hair.
It’s not as drastic a change as I thought when I started, but the improvement in my hair quality is enough to keep me going down this path. This is an ongoing experiment and we can’t wait to see what the future holds, including clarifying rinses, hair serums, and deep conditioning treatments. Curly highlights may also be an option.
But aside from the improved (but not perfect) texture and appearance of my hair, the most exciting change from the Curly Girl Method is my new attitude towards my hair. For example, when I want something to look great, I no longer reach for the hair straightener, but instead spend more time caring for and styling my waves.
