Hair Retention Challenge (HRC) Phase 2

March 2012

At the beginning of this year, I went on a 6months hair retention challenge where I was suppose to put my hair in extensions for about 3-4weeks and then leave it out for a maximum of 2weeks. Well, I'm a bit dissapointed to say that I only kept my hair in braids for 3months (in Jan, March and April). I forgot that I had gotten so used to leaving my hair out and never thought I would miss my hair so much. So, when winter ended, I said goodbye to the lazy braids and decided to enjoy my hair in the spring and summer rather than obsessing over length.

And boy did I enjoy my hair or what! I can say that I have worn my hair in about 100 styles in the last 4months! Infact, I retained the same length during my HRC as I did when I wasn't on it.

Protective styling have never worked for me and so I don't promote it as the only way to retain length. There are so many bloggers and vloggers who change up their hairstyles several times in a week and still manage to retain significant length.
My hair is always changing and so I can't "listen" to what it's trying to tell me. By changing, I mean a particular product applied to it today might do wonders on it and the opposite the following week. And so because of this, I have decided to go on another HRC to see how my hair behaves this time. Because my hair is constantly changing and evolving, I try to keep up with it by changing certain things in my regimen and technique, so I'll see if ST (short term) protective styling will work better this time around.

hair as of two months ago.

What will I be doing differently for HRC 2?
1. I will be keeping my hair in a stretched style for a period of 2 weeks where only my hair will be used to create the style. This means a lot of flat twists, cornrows and Irun kiko (Yoruba for African threading).
2. I will ensure I keep my hair moisturized by spritzing it with my hair juice about twice a week.
3. I will wash and deep condition my hair in sections every 2weeks when I take down the style. I think i'm going to skip my wash day products for the month of september and only use the Moroccan Rhassoul clay to see how my hair looks and feels afterwards.
4. I will restyle my hair within 2-3days of taking down a style

What I WILL NOT be doing
- I will not style my hair in twists unless to stretch it for the next style
- I will not style my hair wet because I notice my hair breaks A LOT during styling
- Changing my diet, exercise, products, or trying any crazy hair growth tricks like standing upside down every night. I am not crazy about growth as it's beyond my control, but what I can control is the length of hair that grows out of my scalp

How long will this last?
I plan to do this for 3months, which means until the end of October

Goal
My goal is to reach bra strap length (BSL) by the end of the year, so I hope I get close to it by then.

June 2013 (it's a bit longer now)

You're welcome to join this challenge with me if you like