Protect your Delicate, Natural Coils by Avoiding Excessive Heat: Stretched 4C hair using Flexi-Rods

Excessive heat will damage your hair. You'll see something called "heat damage" on your hair, and you don't want that. No you don't. If you want healthy, coily, kinky hair whithout a damaged texture you do not want heat damage.

Heat damage is when your hair will no longer curl in its natural formation. It falls in a flat, lifeless defeat that will throw off the pattern of your coily hair, therefore creating knots instead of kinks. The result can look something like a bird's nest. You don't want heat damage.

For the first 3 years of wearing my natural hair, I did not use heat at all. As a result, my hair was long, thick, and an even length and volume, and looked nothing like I had ever seen before -- it was beautiful. When I straightened it for the first time with heat, my hair was longer and fuller than ever. It hung down my back about 5 inches away from bra-strap length. I was doing good.

So I wanted to keep up my no-heat routine. That's worked well for me. I only straightened my hair with heat once a year, and I never blow dried. My method was to twist, let dry, and then twist out.

As my hair got longer over the years, I wanted to experiment more, but I still didn't want heat damage. I saw a flexi-rod tutorial online and thought I'd give it a try, and it actually worked out well on my hair. Flexi-rods actually stretched out my hair enough to give it a look as though I had blown it out with a hairdryer and curled it, when in actuality I just rolled up my damp kinky hair and climbed in bed. The next day it was as though I'd put heat to my hair without the harmful effects of adding heat.

I prepared my hair the night before. To see what I did, click here.

1. Take your hair out of Flexi-Rods.
2. Undo your twist.
3. Repeat steps 1 through 2 on every Flexi-Rod.
4. Style hair as desired.

This process took about 5 minutes in the morning.