Friday 27 December 2013

An Interesting Observation....



I helped a friend take out her 6 weeks old full head sew in recently. Her hair had been cornrowed all back and then the weave sewn across the kind of cornrow-sewing combo that makes it hard to get to your scalp. One thing I noticed as I was undoing the cornrows was that there was hardly any matting at all, the only little matting I noticed and it was so small was at the nape, her hair and scalp were very very oily as in my hands were super oily I had to keep wiping them with a paper towel. So I asked her how often she oiled her scalp or sprayed her roots while she had the weave installed because it was so oily. She said she never oiled it all and had not washed her hair in the six weeks her installation was in either, that was the oil from when she greased her scalp before the installation. I asked her what grease she used; lo and behold it was petroleum jelly! My friend is not on any hair regimen that I know of she gets everything done at the salon the most she does is tie a scarf at night, style in the morning and once in a while grease her scalp. Washing, deep conditioning and all that other good stuff, she gets done at the salon. She is natural by the way and wears long term protective styles most of the time.
 
Sorry I don't have photos of my friend's hair after take down I was not quite thinking of doing a "petroleum jelly" blog post at that particular moment. The idea hit me much much later the next day.
Petroleum jelly has a bad reputation in the hair world due to the fact that it just sits on your hair and really does nothing at all for your tresses in terms of nourishment.  I have mentioned on this blog before that I have no problem using products that contain petroleum jelly as part of the ingredients especially as a styling product or pre poo. While it is true that petroleum jelly and it’s by products just sit on your hair and have no nourishing benefits, they can serve some other purposes that are beneficial to hair. These are my observations based on what I noticed during the weave take down;
  • Because the petroleum jelly just sat on her hair it prevented her hair from matting which could have led to breakage during takedown. The little matting she had at the lower nape was as a result of shower water getting into that section even with a shower cap on.
  • This is a person who never oiled her scalp or sprayed her roots once when the weave was in, so the petroleum jelly by sitting on her scalp ensured that her hair and scalp were never dry the entire six weeks. Her hair may not have been "moisturised" but it stayed breakage free on take down due to the greasiness that provided plenty of slip.
  • Undoing the cornrows was so much easier thanks to the greasiness of her hair the braids just slid through my fingers.
  • Detangling her coarse natural hair which was more like combing through to be honest after take down and before washing was a breeze once again thanks to the greasiness less hassle during detangling equals less breakage and more length retention.No tangles, no knots and very limited matting at the lower nape area.


To be honest as much as petroleum jelly and petroleum jelly based products have a bad reputation in the hair world it stayed winning in this instance by doing more good than harm to my friend’s hair.

6 comments:

  1. Interesting, I am thinking about doing braids as a protective style during workouts and potentially swimming in the spring. May have to keep this in mind.

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    1. I would try it too but only if I got a style that mean't I couldn't easily access my scalp like those net sew in's where a net covers your braids and the weave tracks are sewn over the net.

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  2. Very interesting, although I don't think I could cope not washing my hair so such a long period of time haha!

    Mixed Hair

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    1. Me too I would probably scratch my scalp off due to itchiness!

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  3. This is very interest indeed, but had similar thoughts with Chantelle, not washing the hair and scalp for more than 2 weeks would be something. I find when I 'moisturise' my hair with an oil a few days before I unbraid it and just keep it moisturised throughout the time I have a long term PS my hair doesn't matt or tangle terribly.

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    1. It sure is. I agree with Chantelle as well. I use a similar unbraiding technique that you do too and also have no problems with matting and tangling. That being said I honestly think that people who can not be bothered to take care of their hair while it is in a long term protective style or at all can actually benefit from using grease on their scalp pre braiding if what I observed while undoing my friend's hair is anything to go by.

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