Evolution—that has been the newly-found word that I have been attempting to embrace and embody as of late. Changing, growing, and re-learning--I have "gone natural"--whatever that means. A few short months ago I decided that I owed it to myself to go back and rectify all that I was taught to believe, all that has been infiltrated in my mind as beauty, appropriate, and luxurious. I have re-taught, re-learned, and re-loved myself and strands, in a more natural and wholesome way and decided to share a portion of my personal hair journey to all, in a simple effort for us to really take a stark analysis of self and merely question our socialized mindsets including but certainly not limited to our standards of beauty.

For quite some time now, I began to internally toy with the idea of going natural and for many reasons, I was simply not ready to do it. I was not ready for the ignorant comments that were inevitably going to flood my way (like my father asking me if I was now a boy with my low cut); I was not ready for the attention and second stares; I was not ready for my insecurities to be flagrant when looking in the mirror. Ultimately, I was simply not ready to be unable to hide behind neither a bang nor a swoop.
What pushed me over the edge in finalizing my decision was frankly quite simple though; it was a little lump, a tender (“unharmful”) cyst on my scalp that began to irritate me regularly. Although I had this cyst for quite some time now, I started to notice how it would enlarge every time I would put a relaxer and/or color in my hair.  Even while the doctors continuously assured me, "it's nothing...don't bother it, unless it bothers you; you can remove it, but it isn't necessary"-- I always thought  of my mother who had the same cysts on her scalp around my age and ended up being diagnosed with a “cancer of no primary source “in 2003 and eventually succumbed to that very same cancer a few short months later--in other words, the doctors had no idea where this disease originated, all they knew was that by the time they had caught it, it had already spread uncontrollably to various parts of her body.

For years I always asked myself questions like: if she were diagnosed today, perhaps she would still be alive, with me being a bit older and finding better treatment for her. Did she get the cancer from warming her coffee everyday in the microwave? Was it the perm? Fumes from commuting everyday to the polluted New York City? Was it the constant acetone from removing her nail polish? So many questions were/are left lingering over the years. At times when trying to verbally express these inquiries, they often seem unreasonable or far fetched to most, but when you’ve got doctors who callously tell you, "sorry, there is nothing we can do for your mother and we have no idea where it originated...", those very doctors become a little less reliable in their assurance when they told me, "it's JUST a cyst, it's nothing..." Everything has a connection to me, and God forbid my child has to one day go through what I went through with my mother, I want to rid them of at least one question..."was it mom's perm that did this to her?" In an amazingly written book that I just completed, entitled  “Thank God I’m Natural” by Chris-Tia E. Donaldson (that I recommend all sisters read, natural or not), there is a line that resonated with me the most, when she says, “We often go to extreme lengths to protect our children from the solutions and chemical cocktails so dangerously lurking under the kitchen sink—yet we turn around and apply these same toxic agents to their hair and scalps without ever questioning the impact on their health and safety.”

It was not until that I decided to go for “The Big Chop” that I realized how unnatural it felt to simply go “natural”; the most appropriate yet ridiculous questions flooded my mind like, how am I supposed to wear my hair for a job interview, will I now attract a new demographic of men, should I purchase a wig, and will folks think I’m a lesbian!? It became amazing and rather telling of both myself and our culture to see how much of a mental and emotional process it was to simply wear unprocessed hair. The idea of rocking our strands the same way they grow out of our heads as Black women has become so foreign for too many of us which can be problematic in itself if we do not take a real evaluation of ourselves.

In the Haitian-American culture especially, the first time a child often gets a perm, is for their First Holy Communion. In most cases, that tender age is about 8 years old. As a 21 year old now, in retrospect, ultimately, I have not seen my hair in its natural state in over a decade and physiologically that can take a tremendous toll on an individual—usually an unconscious one.

The short buzzed hair style that I am currently adoring is one that is prevalent not only in the Caribbean but all over Africa as well, yet it is one of the most shocking of hairstyles to wear as a Black Woman living in the states, an Afro-Caribbean woman at that.

Recently, I hosted an African Film Screening Festival at my home college of The City College of New York which showcased films from Kenya to Senegal, and during those films, my eyes kept constantly gravitating and fixating on all the little African girls that wore their hair shaven just like mine—it was in those precise moments that I came to see what beautiful was and the culture that I was rooted in.
It's more than a new doo, and new apparel. It's much deeper than that; it's a beautiful new way of thinking. A reversing of old teachings. A progression forward and stark new analysis of self. Outwardly I've changed, inwardly too. It's seeing coils and kinks, browns, and dark hues and understanding for the very first time what perfection is.  Just as these new kinks—I am well aware that I have much more growing to do and it’s a beautiful thing to marvel at the very genuine and healthy place we are both in right now...
Do what feels natural.

Article by: Sophia S. Vilceus
Image credit: hairstylesdesign.com