For practically my entire life, I've hated my hair. Stumbling across this article enticed me to watch Good Hair, and after viewing, while I can't entirely relate to the black experience, I can attest to the torture that is a chemical relaxer.I'm a German and Russian non-practicing Jew and my hair has always been thick and curly. But from kindergarten until 4th or 5th grade, my mom always blew dry my hair in the morning and it ended up straight. Elementary school was fine. But the hormones of junior high kicked in, and my mom stopped blow drying my hair and POOF. Boy, do I mean poof. I didn't know what to do with it, and while I grew up in NJ and there were other Jews around, they all had beautiful straight hair. The beauty parlor my mom and I went to was temporarily hosting a black salon part time as they looked for a new storefront to rent and I desperately wanted my hair straightened. My white hairdresser had a black hairdresser coach her through the entire process of relaxing my hair. It was frightening, smelled horrible, burned my scalp and didn't even end up straightening my hair. Half of it was straw and half of it stubbornly kept the kinky curl. From then up until a few years ago when an ex convinced me to wear it down, I kept my hair tied up tightly. I used to read beauty magazines and feel awful because there were never any models with curly hair (unless they were black) and there were never any "how to style curly hair" articles, either. Now I use the whole DevaCurl product line and finally have embraced my crazy hair. And you know what? Everyone stops me to tell me what wonderful hair I have. Moms in the mall, guys at the pharmacy, pretty much anyone. It never stops feeling good. Embrace the Jewfro ladies!
For practically my entire life, I've hated my hair. Stumbling across this article enticed me to watch Good Hair, and after viewing, while I can't entirely relate to the black experience, I can attest to the torture that is a chemical relaxer.I'm a German and Russian non-practicing Jew and my hair has always been thick and curly. But from kindergarten until 4th or 5th grade, my mom always blew dry my hair in the morning and it ended up straight. Elementary school was fine. But the hormones of junior high kicked in, and my mom stopped blow drying my hair and POOF. Boy, do I mean poof. I didn't know what to do with it, and while I grew up in NJ and there were other Jews around, they all had beautiful straight hair. The beauty parlor my mom and I went to was temporarily hosting a black salon part time as they looked for a new storefront to rent and I desperately wanted my hair straightened. My white hairdresser had a black hairdresser coach her through the entire process of relaxing my hair. It was frightening, smelled horrible, burned my scalp and didn't even end up straightening my hair. Half of it was straw and half of it stubbornly kept the kinky curl. From then up until a few years ago when an ex convinced me to wear it down, I kept my hair tied up tightly. I used to read beauty magazines and feel awful because there were never any models with curly hair (unless they were black) and there were never any "how to style curly hair" articles, either. Now I use the whole DevaCurl product line and finally have embraced my crazy hair. And you know what? Everyone stops me to tell me what wonderful hair I have. Moms in the mall, guys at the pharmacy, pretty much anyone. It never stops feeling good. Embrace the Jewfro ladies!