Loc'ing It Up

I've taken that leap by deciding to Loc my hair. For years people have suggested I loc my hair, but I never wanted to do it because someone told me I should. 

Set the scene I'm 11 years old and my hair is breaking brushes. My aunt is frustrated with doing my hair all the time. She suggest dreads. DREADS!? My eyes grow big with fear. They're so permanent! She tells me, "You can always cut them out." CUT!? My dream is to have long, glorious hair not to cut anything. So I say no. She shrugs and ends up cutting my hair anyway. A low cut. On my birthday *faints*

What do you call them?

Dreads? 
Locs?
Dreadlocks?
Does it matter?...
Like many before me, I thought dreads was the correct term for locs. That negative cogitation made me assume locs were dreadFUL. And I was not a fan. As a kid I thought permanent (serious commitment issues) As a teen I thought stoner, ugly, a St. Louis boy thing. As an adult I've thought it's a trend. It's really been the last few years that I've thought dreads aren't so negative. It's your hair locing up. Locs Ooooo they're locs not dreads. People want to associate it with something negative, but it's not.

Whatever you call them it seems to be a matter of opinion less so facts. Facts are they were originally called Dreadlocks from the Jamaican culture that was the translation. However dreads are seen as messy and unkempt while locs are supposed to be more sophisticated and a connection to roots. -_- 

Semi-freeform is my way of letting my hair do what it wants so it can be free WHILE being able to style it so I'm not just out here looking just any type of way. 

Ways to Loc

As with anything I do I had to do my research. I'm no locing expert. I'm just sharing my journey on locing. I could be doing it wrong for you and your own journey. Okay, now that that's out there.

You have free form locs, sisterlocks, traditional locs, and bradelocz.

Free form is the original locing method. Sister locks are ultra tiny, traditional locs are usually strated by a beautician with all the parts, and bradelocz are started with braids. (I don't know much about this one to be honest)

When deciding to loc up my hair. I was trying to decide if I wanted to do it with the traditional twisted locs or to free form. My decision came to a mix of the two. Now for this to make sense I have to mention I was natural before. I was a free natural. Meaning often times I let my hair do it's own thing with little styling or manipulation often looking like I was locing my hair anyway. Since that was the case and I never really know how I want to style my hair I discovered locs could fix that issue.

My Journey
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I officially started locs in September so it hasn't been that long. I started from twist. I opted to do it myself and let them do what they were going to do. I do want thicker locs so I combined smaller twist to give it a bigger look. I only have about 50 or 60 locs in my head. It's hard to count. They are all pretty much budding at this point which is great. I did have trouble getting some of them to hold after doing my monthly wash. To fix that I braided some of them at the ends and that seems to keep the ones that are taking longer to loc together. I also had to fix some of the pieces that seemed to be pulling strands awkwardly by ripping my hair and conjoining the strands with their appropriate loc.

ripping- pulling hair from a loc
conjoining- putting hair together

This is only the fourth month, but I love my hair. It's starting to realize that I'm serious about letting it loc. I was a lazy natural often letting my hair semi loc in twist before combing it out so my hair was used to that system.

If you're considering locing I hope this gave you some insight. If you're just curious I hope this answered some things for you. If  your just here to read and support... Thanks I like that in you. 

Laters!