It was tough, but a decision had to be made. I bounced around the idea of going natural, but remembered how many evenings I would come home, after a long day of work, dreading how my hair would look in the morning. I could get away with some frizz if I didn’t have a meeting, but if I had an appointment, or an interview, I wanted to look as professional and polished as possible.

Before anyone jumps on me and says, “Why do you have to wear your hair straight to look ‘professional and polished’?” keep in mind that I don’t make the rules, just try to abide by them. Let’s not forget that I have a student loan to pay and regardless to race, ethnicity or nationality, if you walk into an office with unkempt hair, or nails, or aren’t totally put together, you don’t get the job. If you get the job and don’t follow “protocol” you don’t get the promotion.

Moving right along, I decided to relax my hair MYSELF. My post-surgery hair is much easier due to getting about a half foot lopped off, but I noticed the other day, when it was warm for five minutes, that I started to frizz. I am in the process of moving, so I don’t have the time to drive 4 or 5 hours to get my hair done, then drive another 4 or 5 hours, so I decided to do it myself.

*DISCLAIMER – I do not recommend relaxing at home. A qualified stylists if the best bet for good results.*

With that notice out of the way, I’ll proceed with my steps:

Tools

1. Scalp protector (vaseline will due).

2. I cannot recall who recommended it, but I bought a Sprush (a spatula used to apply color/relaxers), which I absolutely LOVE!

3. Butterfly clips to hold quadrants in place.

4. Mizani regular strength relaxer.

5. Mizani neutralizer.

6. NOTE: I do not use gloves. Since I’m not a professional stylist and don’t handle these types of products on a regular basis, I don’t feel I’m in harm. Besides, If it’s safe enough to be on my scalp, I cannot imagine it causing eminent danger by using my hands, right? Right.

Procedure

1. Applied scalp protector to every inch of scalp. I covered ears, behind ears, nape of neck, around the hairline thoroughly.

2. After letting the protector sit on scalp for a while (minimum of 10 minutes), I parted hair into quadrants, leaving one of the back sections down. I was careful to roll the ends of the quadrants up, to ensure that they didn’t get my way as I worked.

3. While most people start from the crown of the head, working their way back, the start at the crown again and work forward, toward the forehead, I do it a little differently.I realized that I blotched my last relaxer, because I deviated from my normal routine. While I’d prefer to be able to start at the crown of the head, it’s easier for me to start at the nape of the neck. However, I don’t start at the very base of the neck, I go up about two inches and work my way up to the crown.

   This has always given me great results, maximum coverage and completely straight hair.With that said, I worked both back quandrants – from bottom to top. Then worked from the crown to the front, but I did NOT apply the relaxer to my hairline until I had worked the relaxer in each quadrant again.Although, I used the Sprush to apply the relaxer to my hair, I used a fine tooth comb to “work” the relaxer. I don’t comb the hair, but use the comb to lift the hair and make sure that my curl is coming out.

4. I finish the relaxer application by applying it to my hairline, but I’m always gentle working the front.

   *DISCLAIMER - If you’re still reading this post, I’m assuming that you’re possibly contemplating doing your relaxer at home, so I have to tell you that you should proceed with caution!!*

5. After completing covering my roots with Mizani and working each section completely, I leave the relaxer on for about 5 or ten minutes (until it begins to burn a little). I don’t use a timer, so I cannot tell you how long I work it, but I will say that my regular stylist in NYC never, ever began to rinse my relaxer out any sooner than 30 minutes. Yeah, yeah, I know the directions say, 13-18 minutes, but Dominicanas get the hair straaaaaight. I have to add that I never had hair problems either, no breakage, or damage, so I followed suit.

6. Rinse time – I rinsed my hair for about 10-15 minutes before even using my neutralizing shampoo. You don’t want your water to get cold while your rinsing, so I don’t turn the hot water on all the way, to ensure that if the water starts to get cold, there’s still some warm water available (hope this makes sense). I then shampoo with Mizani neutralizing shampoo 4 or five times, getting a good lather and washing around the ears, nape of neck and hairling very well.

7. Ok, so after this is done I used “Alter Ego Impact Ego” again and LOVE, LOVE, LOVED IT!!! (Dany, me has oido?).

8. Now, this is something I never thought I’d use, but I found it the other day, while packing for my move. I ran across a big, giant bottle of Sebastian laminates clear, and a bottle of jazzing gold, or some kind of golden color, that a friend gave me. I like the shine that temp colors give, but hate the fact that it always left manchas on my cloths when I sweat, so I stopped using it. I just felt like a little change, so I mixed the clear with the golden color and left that on for 20 minutes.

Now, truth be told, I don’t see any difference in my hair color, but I definitely like the shine. I could see lacio, y brillo as soon as I pulled my rolos out.

I have to admit that this was so much better than driving half way around the world to get my hair done and I was able to condition my hair just the way I like it. I didn’t have to worry about the next cliente waiting for a dryer, or how long I was going to be on the turnpike.

Anyway, I have to get back to packing, so this is going to be a really sloppy post and I may be MIA for a couple of weeks, but I’ll get back to posting as soon as I’m situated in the civilized world (can’t wait to get out of el campo).