Curly-haired girls- How often do you brush their hair?

animeme

Sun, Sep 22 2013, 9:15 pm

And how? Do you have tips on products, techniques?

Almost every time I brush my lower-elementary age dd's hair, she cries. We do conditioner in the shower, and we used to always do conditioner to leave in afterwords for brushing, but she has a build-up issue. We have done better since starting brushing from the bottom all around and then moving up, instead of doing bottom up for each section around the head.

She just has so much hair. The sprays can't get to all of it- the leave -in conditioner barely gets to all of it. If we're lucky we do it once a week, but it takes ages.

What do you do?

Mimisinger

Sun, Sep 22 2013, 9:45 pm

Curly hair is easy once you know how to do it. Firstly, you ONLY brush it when it's wet, straight after the bath/shower, and, while inside. Any other times will just frizz it up and make a rat's nest.

In the shower, use shampoo. Then, use good conditioner - I only use pantene. It makes your hair the softest. Then, while the conditioner is still in it, brush it with a rectangular paddle brush (google it to see what kind I mean). Brush all of the knots out.

Rinse the conditioner out. Get out of shower. Brush hair again and towel dry. Add gel, I use garnier fructis - just put about a quarter sized dollop of gel in your palm, rub them together to spread it around and run through her hair. Put extra if she has a lot of hair. Let air dry. In the morning before school (if she didn't shower then), just either spray hair with water or if you don't have one, wet hands and run over hair to smooth it out and define curls.

DO NOT EVER comb or brush hair when dry. EVER. It's horrible.

*I was a curly haired girl with a mother who didn't know how to handle it and was teased for years until I figured out how to do it on my own. * Good luck!

asp40

Sun, Sep 22 2013, 9:50 pm

Daily. And we always braided hair after a shower and before bed. Then in the morning it was not a rat's nest. If you cannot get it brushed daily, then at least pull it back. I cannot tell you how many girls I see walking around that have not had their hair brushed in weeks.

animeme

Sun, Sep 22 2013, 10:00 pm

Thanks. I do only brush it when wet, after the shower, with a paddle brush. Then we put it back in a pony for sleep. She doesn't shower every night, though, and lately she's been telling me that sleeping with her hair pulled back is annoying.

In the shower is an interesting idea. I will try that.

Mimisinger, re. the gel. She always goes to bed with wet hair. Would that be an issue? Staying up until it dries is not an option, nor is showering earlier. Also, if I spray her hair every morning, what do I do on Shabbos? And does this give the hair a wet look all day? We are not looking for that. Thanks.

turca

Sun, Sep 22 2013, 10:00 pm

The secret to soft and nice curls is a good leave in products that is going to hold the curls together while keep volume under control. And once a week do a moisturizing treatment ( if she lets u). That s what my mom did to my hair until I grew into my teenage years and I got crazy over blow drying. There are toons of good products . It depends how much u wanna spend and how they work on her hair. ( I have loose curls ,with all the hair covering , it got pretty straight )

Mimisinger

Sun, Sep 22 2013, 11:08 pm

animeme wrote:

Re. gel at night, I always put gel in my hair at night. Just leave it out of a pony. That would kill my hair too. It will also pull it out with the holder. Just put gel on like I told you. Not too much, just enough to lightly coat the hair. As for spraying hair or wetting your hands and wiping it on your hair. It is a very mall amount of water. You'll look dry within minutes. It basically just reactivated the gel and gets it to work and tame the frizz. As for shabbos, good question, ask your Rav.

Dolly Welsh

Sun, Sep 22 2013, 11:49 pm

You might de-knot with a wide-tooth plastic comb. There is no law it ever has to feel a brush. You start from the bottom underneath, and go slowly to the surface.

Try to keep the hair short. For femininity, add a bow or soft headband. Or tiny stud earrings if that's your custom.

No rubber bands or elastics. Only plastic clips.

When you go to bed with wet hair, you lay a towel on top of the pillow.

Nobody should cry. Who wants to cry? Don't do anything that is making somebody cry. For what? You wouldn't go to a hairdresser who made you cry.

Mirabelle

Sun, Sep 22 2013, 11:54 pm

My girls all have curly hair and I let them grow it long...I don't like short hair on little girls, not my thing.

We use the "It's a Ten" products and they work GREAT. They were given to me to try by an African American hair stylist and they really work!

(I have straight hair, so it took me a long time to find the right products for my girls)

Rutabaga

Mon, Sep 23 2013, 12:59 am

I was a frizzy-headed kid because my mother had no idea how to deal with my hair. B"H for my curly-haired best friend in HS who taught me how to handle it. Now I have no problem dealing with DD's hair, except for her grumbling when I'm trying to work out a particularly troublesome knot.

I never brush curly hair - I only use a comb. Definitely only comb when wet and well conditioned. You need to do this at least every other day or it will get impossible. Work a small amount of gel into the newly combed hair to keep it tamed. I use Curly-Q for DD and Matrix Biolage Gelee for myself.

A tip from the aforementioned best friend: buy a cheap plastic spray bottle and fill it with water with just a drop of leave-in conditioner. Lightly spray hair in the morning and scrunch the curls to rejuvenate them. If there is a really obvious tangle, you can use a hair pick to deal with it while leaving the rest of the hair alone.

FranticFrummie

Mon, Sep 23 2013, 1:03 am

Here's some starters:

http://www.tightlycurly.com/welcome
http://www.wikihow.com/Follow-.....-Hair
http://www.naturallycurly.com

A lot of the advice is for African American hair or biracial hair, but the techniques are still applicable. Try out a few different ways, and see what works best for you.

mummy-bh

Mon, Sep 23 2013, 2:33 am

Most of my daughters have curly hair.

In particular, I have a teenage daughter with very long, very thick curls. She washes it every morning and brushes it at some point during the washing. She uses special products. Her curls are always well defined - woe to any of her siblings that attempt to touch her hair!!

I have a couple of younger daughters with thinner, but still very curly hair. They are always nagging to use their older sisters products, but I don't want them using gunk on their hair whilst they're still small. The procedure for caring for their hairs is as follows:

I wash the hair and use a generous amount of conditioner. I then spread the conditioner using first my fingers, then a wide-toothed comb (At this point I check for lice). I wash out the conditioner , making sure not to muss the hair but rather keep running my fingers through.
After the child is out of the shower and in pajamas, I use a special hair shpritz. I used to buy L'oreal kids spray-in conditioner for kids, but now I make my own (one tablespoon approx of my older daughters conditioner, fill the bottle with water, shake). Spray liberally over the hair, whilst brushing. I use a paddle brush, but older dd uses a curly-haired brush. This is the ONLY time I brush the hair. Then I allow the hair to air dry. The curls are still well defined the next morning.

mummy-bh

Mon, Sep 23 2013, 2:39 am

Mimisinger wrote:

animeme wrote:

one of my little girls actually went up to our Rav in shul on shabbos morning to ask him. She was five at the time. He asked her to describe the spray and when she uses it, and told her it was assur.

FranticFrummie

Mon, Sep 23 2013, 2:41 am

mummy-bh wrote:

If lice is a problem in your schools, add a few drops of tea tree oil and lavender. Lice HATE that! The smell evaporates pretty quickly, as far as people can tell, but it still keeps the creepy crawlers away.

Heyaaa

Mon, Sep 23 2013, 6:03 am

I have curly hair. What style are you going for? Does she want the entire thing to look curly or does she want the ponytail to be curly while the rest appears straight?

If she wants the second option, I would recommend bangs and putting the hair in a pony with a good, non-sticky gel as soon as she gets out of the shower.

For the authentic curly look:
1) I used finesse mousse. It eliminates the frizz yet the hair is left smooth and the hair does not appear to have any product in it. And it smells nice.

2)I would brush my hair in the shower but not after my shower. After the shower I would run my fingers through to separate it a little but if I would use the brush (maybe because it dried in layers that way), my hair would somehow dry more frizzy.

3) I know it's been said but don't ever brush dry curly hair.

4) Don't use a shampoo+conditioner in one. Use them separately.

Chana Miriam S

Mon, Sep 23 2013, 10:19 am

I am a straight girl who has a curly girl. We finally learned to follow the deva curl system, including products and hairdressing. Dd washes her hair only with their conditioner and leaves some in as product. She does not brush but works out knots in the shower while wet and then does the upside down scrunch thing to get water out. She does not brush or comb or style her hair after getting the bulk of the wAter out. She will arrange it gently but then does not touch until she is dry. She has gorgeous long curls- pretty tight- sort of a cross between corkscrews and Botticelli curls.

granolamom

Mon, Sep 23 2013, 12:40 pm

I have thick curly hair. it was horrible until I learned how to manage it and now its gorgeous and I have to cover it. oh well.
but anyway, I never brush it. I comb it once a month only for mikva. otherwise I do what chanamiriam's dd does.
a bit of conditioner in the shower, work through tangles with fingers or wide toothed pick.
upside down drying thing, wrapping hair in a soft t-shirt, terrycloth makes my hair frizz. google 'plunking' or 'plopping' or just google 'curlygirl tips' and you'll find it.
and touch it as little as possible after that.
the trick with curly is not to separate the hairs that are in a curl together. that makes it frizzy and pouf-y. also, not to dry out the hair. products with alcohol and sulfates are drying. products with silicones leave build up which then need to be washed out with harsh shampoos.
lemon juice (or vinegar if you can stand the smell) as a rinse seals the cuticle of the hair and tightens the curl too.
I dont recommend short hairstyles for curly hair unless you like the shirley temple look. or the triangle-head look if its not layered. long layers look best, imo.
finding a hairstylist who knows how to shape curly hair is worth the money, ime.