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And as of the end of May 2026, 8 months nearly to the day from the Big Chop, I'm officially back to the length I was able to achieve and maintain during Natural Hair Movement v.1 in the 2010's. It's not a surprise why it's the length I could maintain, particularly when I mostly wore my hair down in wash-and-go's... this is about the point where ends meet clothing fabric, and I lose all retention thanks to friction. My ends are far thicker and more even this time around. I hav

It's been the customary two days since my last hair wash and hot chebe butter treatment, which is when I used up the last of my customary coffee & rosemary infused olive & papaya scalp oil. Have I had a full 48 hours to do something that takes maybe a half-hour of hands-on work? Yep. Did I do it? Nope. So, I got out of the bath with a freshly scrubbed scalp, stood there butt naked and dripping wet, and concocted something to put on my scalp based on what was in the linen cabi

Call me naive, but when I figured out about how fast my hair was growing last fall, I figured it would just gain an inch, inch and a half each month and, you know… grow. Accumulate length. All of that. I didn’t realize different parts would grow at different times, and some months would focus more on density than length, and all that jazz 😅😅 I feel like I’ve been stuck at the same general length forever, but the sides especially have been growing pretty rapidly, the back ju

I generally stretch my hair by sleeping with it in two cornrows before doing my length check pictures. But today was wash & chebe day, so my curls are out and down right now. This is at about 80% air dried, and my sleep bonnet hasn't absorbed the extra butter yet, so it's pretty drenched in product even if it's otherwise dry: I'd say 3A when my hair is heavy like this. It gets bigger and rounder and the curls get tighter the drier and lighter it gets, but not dramatically. Bu

So far, the trend seems to be that I spend most of the month thinking that my hair isn't growing at all, and then in the last week of the month realizing that my hair has grown significantly enough that I'm going to have to start modifying my routine to accommodate the new growth 😅😅 I've been washing and oiling my scalp with my hair loose this whole time, sectioning it on the fly. I'm about to the point where I'll want to section out and twist my hair before getting into th

If recent forays into my genealogy have taught me anything, it's that I'm descended from multiple continents worth of ancient royal lines, no matter which branch of the family tree you shake, both sides. Me? I'm a disabled Michigander with no money to my name. I have decided that location, time period, and circumstances be damned, I'm just as much of an ancient queen as my ancestresses, and I'm going to act like it. See, I studied archaeology in college, I know what the quali

I snapped this pic right before taking it down for my bath, hence the robe. I had tied it some six hours prior. No pins or rubber bands, just a couple of knots and some tucking. And I don't have an occipital ridge, it's hard for me to wear the circle kind of headbands without a hairstyle to hold it in place at the nape of my neck. Veiling in public started today. I took off my sleep bonnet and started to style my hair to go out to the grocery store, and then I was like "no, t

I've obviously had a lot of time to think about all of the things recently, and one thing that's been on my mind is how to keep my hair protected from the environment while I'm outside, especially for long amounts of time like camping trips. I typically used to put my hair into two cornrows, and just not touch it while I was in the woods if possible, and if not to just brush it out and re-braid it. This was also before I started wearing bonnets to bed, so I wasn't really awar

February was kind of tough, health-wise. I ended the intro post saying that I was transitioning from healing leg to growing hair, but I definitely had more leg to heal 😅😅 Not to mention two weeks of Fool's Spring gave me a preview of migraine season, and I wasn't about to get into scalp massages when I have inflamed dura mater right underneath. Or get into showering in general when I'm in that much pain 😅😅 I think I managed four full wash days and chebe treatments for the

The Challenge! How much hair can I grow between today, February 1, 2026, and February 1, 2027? What we're starting with! U-shaped layers from jaw to shoulder length when stretched. What we're working with! Very fine, highly porous, 3B-C curls with significant shrinkage when they're not stretched. Hair status: Virgin. Never been colored, chemically processed, or heat styled in any way. I stretch it with cornrows. The Growth Method: Internal: Approximately 1 gallon of water

I have AuDHD and the very literal thinking that goes with it, and even I am confused by how many people are getting incredibly literal about hair growth, to the point where they're dismissing products and techniques that work because they're not for "hair growth" specifically, but for "length retention." Let's start with the basics. Hair grows from the scalp. To grow your hair, you need: Proper nutrition and hydration. Particularly note your iron levels, anemia will not only

I took this picture last night, right before putting my bonnet on. This is slightly damp hair, dry enough I knew it would finish drying in the bonnet, after a good wash, scalp oiling, chebe butter application, and steam treatment, plus 4 hours of air drying. I didn’t clump the curls after the steam treatment, but you can still see I have the entire range of the C pattern on my head. Also, I have significant shrinkage, when this is stretched it’s perfectly sitting at shoulder

I'm talking 3B/C, very fine, highly porous, medium volume hair that has always been too fragile to grow much past my shoulders. I've been in the Natural Hair Care movement since the very beginning (all the way back in 2014...), I grew out my grey hair four years ago, I do not heat style, only steam treat, and I started a caffeinated scalp cleanse & oiling growth journey and chebe length retention journey in August 2025... right before my hip went bed. I'm also a research & FA

If you joined the Natural Hair movement 10 years or so ago when it was first getting started, you likely read Lorraine Massey's "Curly Girl: A Handbook." It was one of the first books written on the subject, and while the "Curly Girl Method" isn't quite it anymore, it started a lot of curly haired people on their journey to healthier hair, and she taught you how to do it all - including skip the salon and cut your hair at home, because if you're a curly haired person of a cer

Look, I'm not trying to get up here and mixed-splain traditional African hair care, but natural hair influencers, and hair growth influencers in general seem to have glommed on to two very puzzling "facts" recently - water is bad for your hair, and oils and butters dry your hair out. Chebe is getting a lot of blame for causing thinning hair nowadays, too, getting caught up in the oil and butter discourse. You know, that mix that's been used to grow hair successfully in Chad f

I just spent the last 3 hours making the personal care products I do make - namely coffee-infused scalp oil, chebe butter, and deodorant. And my phone was on the charger and not taking photos or video 😅😅 That’s okay, I’ll give you recipes instead, probably more useful! Why do I make these three products, specifically? Cost and ingredient control, mostly. Wild Growth Hair & Scalp Oil is what got me on the scalp oil train to begin with, it’s a wonderful product… but $10 for 4

Left was taken 9/28/25, Right was taken today, 12/12/25. Both show my hair stretched but not straightened, and freshly cut using the Manes by Mell Pigtail Cut. I took about 4” off in September, and 1” off today. That’s just 2 1/2 months of growth 🥳🥳🥳 Introducing my hair: 3a/b, ringlet curls about the diameter of a boba straw (it took me a minute to think of a comparison that wasn’t “middle-sized vaginal dialator,” guys), highly, HIGHLY porous, medium thickness but super f