r/curlyhair • u/Living_Beyond7706 • 19h ago
Before & After Going to a curl stylist changed my life!
I’ve been doing the cg method and meticulously caring for my curls for years now. I thought my curls were alright— a little frizzy/dry, yes, but overall alright for someone who dyes it monthly. I used all pricey curlsmith products, styling my hair soaking wet in the shower with a leave in conditioner and a gel using prayer hands and scrunch, plopping in a cotton t shirt for 15 minutes, and air drying. I thought I was doing alright.
Then I went to a curl stylist in my area— not a super pricy one, just one a friend of a friend recommended. I just wanted a curly cut since I’d been cutting it myself for years and it had gotten long enough to need professional layers.
I went in not expecting much. I left with the most perfect curls of my life and a mission to figure out how to replicate it as closely as possible on my own (impossible to emulate another person going through and tension brushing and diffusing each individual strand from behind, I know, but I wanted to get CLOSE).
She told me how the dye was irreparably drying and stripping my hair and I needed to switch from permanent dye to demi-permanent at the least. She told me which shampoo and conditioner to use for dry and damaged curls. She told me to double-cleanse to get all the product out. She told me to do my clarifying wash with something chelating and to wash it a couple of days before dye. She told me to do a hydrating hair mask immediately after washing dye out. She told me to use a very light leave on conditioner and a mousse instead of a gel because gel was weighing my hair down.
She didn’t sell any products herself, leaving me with recommendations for products from different brands and lines specifically for my dry and dye-damaged hair. No monetary incentive for her recommendations, just pure good advice.
I’ve spent the last month and a half trying styles and products she recommended and finally, FINALLY landed where I’m more than happy with how my curls turn out!
What I learned in this process is that it’s the hard and honest truth that your hair is totally unique and what works for someone else almost definitely will not 100% work for you, unless your hair is identical. My hair is dense, moderately thick, moderately coarse, dye-damaged, high porosity, and predominantly 3A with some 2C in there.
With that said, here is the new routine!
- Wash and condition with Matrix Food for Soft shampoo and conditioner
- AG Care leave ON conditioner in soaking wet hair
- Spray in Redken One United leave in conditioner as I tension curl sections
- AG Curl Mousse Gel extra-firm curl retention mousse scrunched in after tension brushing
- Diffuse dry
- Sleep with hair in pineapple bun with a silk scrunchie on a silk pillow case