Three Year Progress Update - my journey to WL (with Pics)

hillytmj

Well-Known Member
My three year LHCF anniversary is this month, and I decided to give my annual progress report a few weeks early.

My healthy hair care journey began in 2006. My hair was overly bleached and flat-ironed. You can't tell from this pic but the ends were see-thru.


Jan. 2006.JPG
Jan. 2006


I met a good stylist who taught me the basics: weekly wash and dc, no heat, wide-tooth combing, vitamins and rollersets. She also did a dark brown semi-permanent color to strengthen my hair (after nearly 3 months of TLC). As it grew out, you couldn't tell because it matched my hair color. It was still NL but getting fuller. Our strategy was to cut an inch at each relaxer until all the damage was gone (so I didn't have to rock a short Halle-Berry cut).

May 2006.JPG
May 2006

All of my damaged hair (and the hair color) grew out by Nov. 2006. I thought I had it made, but I soon discovered that I had a scissor-happy stylist and she basically kept at NL until Nov. 2007 when a friend told me about LHCF. I started experimenting with rollersetting on my own, and it grew. I didn't get a trim until Aug. 2008 and then I officially joined LHCF at APL.

Freshly Relaxed 8-2-08.jpeg
LHCF starting pic - Aug. 2, 2008

I learned tons on LHCF and added washing my hair in sections, moisturizing and sealing and low-mani to my hair regimen. In only four months, I hit my initial goal of BSL.

Nov. 22, 2008.jpg
BSL - Nov. 2008

Since I hit BSL so quickly, I thought I might as well go for WL. Well, that journey took a while. I didn't officially hit it until Nov. 2010. A lot of that was due to me overtrimming in the search for "perfect ends." When I finally left it alone, in about 6 months I reached my goal. Here's some pics from along the way.

1-3-09 length check.jpg
Jan. 2009

Continued...
 
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Okay, more pics here...

Progress 2 - July 2009.jpg
1 year LHCF anniversary - July 2009

April 7, 2010 - Day after Relaxer photo.jpg
April 2010 -

I stopped taking pics in 2010 because I had gave myself a bad trim in May 2010. I got tired of obsessing about it and decided not to take any more pics until I reached my WL goal. I reached it in Nov. 2010.

1-6-11-WL-cropped.jpg
Jan. 6, 2011 - WL

TODAY - I'm still sticking with the journey. I was scared to cut it once I reached WL and it grew kinda wild. And my goal was to always have a cute long WL hair style, not just one-length hair.

I decided to get a professional trim in April: a layered look. Big mistake. It was cute that day but I discovered that she basically cut all of my hair one length in the back and left a small section long and untrimmed. This makes my hair look thin towards the ends, although it's perfectly healthy; it's just that the bulk of my hair is one length and a smaller section is longer. If I cut it even, I'll have to lose about 4 inches, so I'm patiently growing out the stupid layers. Lesson learned once again.

straight - bad layers growing out.jpg
My hair flat-ironed (with the jacked up layers)

My hair tousled (less -noticeable)
3 weeks post.jpg

Overall, I've had a great journey, and I hope I'm proof that you can start with a mess and end up reaching your hair goals. I prayed throughout this whole process, so I truly credit that the most. Best wishes to everyone and many, many thanks to LHCF.
 
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Wow! Awesome, awesome progress!

Good for you for taking control of your hair, you've done a great job! :clapping:
 
Okay, more pics here...

View attachment 119783
1 year LHCF anniversary - July 2009

View attachment 119785
April 2010 -

I stopped taking pics in 2010 because I had gave myself a bad trim in May 2010. I got tired of obsessing about it and decided not to take any more pics until I reached my WL goal.

View attachment 119787
Jan. 6, 2011 - WL

TODAY - I'm still sticking with the journey. I was scared to cut it once I reached WL and it grew kinda wild. And my goal was to always have a cute long WL hair style, not just one-length hair.

I decided to get a professional trim in April: a layered look. Big mistake. It was cute that day but I discovered that she basically cut all of my hair one length in the back and left a small section long and untrimmed. This makes my hair look thin towards the ends, although it's perfectly healthy; it's just that the bulk of my hair is one length and a smaller section is longer. If I cut it even, I'll have to lose about 4 inches, so I'm patiently growing out the stupid layers. Lesson learned once again.

View attachment 119789
My hair flat-ironed (with the jacked up layers)

My hair tousled (less -noticeable)
View attachment 119791

Overall, I've had a great journey, and I hope I'm proof that you can start with a mess and end up reaching your hair goals. I prayed throughout this whole process, so I truly credit that the most. Best wishes to everyone and many, many thanks to LHCF.

Great progress
 
beautiful hair and great progress. Your hair turned for the better when you learned how to manage it on your own. HHG
 
Progress threads like this give me hope of finally reaching WL.

Congrats! Beautiful hair!

Sent from my Comet
 
Amazing!! Congrats on your anniversary! I would be happy to have made just a quarter of your progress next march :)


Sent from my iPhone using LHCF
 
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