I don’t know if it’s just me, but I could watch Youtube videos all day on natural diy hairstyles. The trouble is, once you try them you quickly see that it’s not as easy as it looks. Add the humidity of Singapore to the equation and working out five days a week and I can firmly say that I have never actually achieved one of these styles. Ok maybe once or twice, but I don’t even want to tell you how much product had to be used to secure it. So after having failed over and over again, and settled for a bun or headband for the thousandth time, I finally decided it was time for something more drastic. I had been building a pretty large Pinterest board for some time with pictures of the most beautiful Sisterlocks, but I didn’t know how or when I was going to make this happen. (This is not easy when you live in Asia.) I even signed up for the class to become a certified Sisterlock consultant, only to have it cancelled. So after all of my wedding planning was done and I had some time to research and plan it out, I pulled the trigger.  I made an appointment for shortly after I arrived home for the Christmas holiday. It took 26 hours in total, broken up over two days, but I am now officially “Sisterlocked”.

Getting Started

I had to do a lot of research before going through with this. For starters you’re supposed to do a tester lock. I didn’t have the luxury of time to do this step, so I found a consultant located in California near my family and did the consultation over email essentially. I then had to find a consultant in Asia that could do the first 6 months of retightening for me. The only consultant I could find and who actually was responsive enough to set everything up with me over email was located in Okinawa, Japan. I relied heavily on the Sisterlock website for suggestions and the listings of consultants. Sisterlocks can be self maintained, but it’s suggested that you have passed the 6-month mark first and have them in good condition before looking into self-retightening.  

My first few Sisterlocks.

I think I may win the award for the biggest sacrifice ever made to get your hair done. I’ve flown twice now to Okinawa to get it retightened and will have to learn to maintain them myself earlier than I originally planned because my consultant is gasp…moving back to the United States. My most recent visit will be my last and I now have to hold it together until I fly to London in June. Thankfully there are a ton of consultants in London, including some who are R-certified and teach retightening.

How’s it going so far?

Well, it is certainly a process and you learn a lot about yourself and your hair. As thick and unruly as my hair can be, I thought it would lock easily. Turns out it’s not the perfect hair type for locks. I went through all of that and it’s still frizzy and unravels on its own quite a bit. In fact I have a few sisterlocks in the front of my scalp that unravel completely in between retigtenings. And I still have a ton of shrinkage. My hair is quite long, but you can’t tell. So far I haven’t gotten the confidence to really wear it out. I can’t wet it much and as a result it just seems a bit thin to me and lacking in texture. In fact if you follow my social media you may have noticed very few pictures of me because, well, I’m still adjusting and becoming comfortable with my new look. Even when I had to throw it in a bun previously I could still slick it down and have a more refined look, but in these early stages I haven’t been able to showcase my hair as much as I would have liked. And in three full months I haven’t used a single product aside from shampoo. I am anxiously awaiting the day I can use conditioner, but I am also finding that my hair is not as dry as I thought it would be. I can’t speak for my scalp though. It has a mind of its own and seems to be purging every product I’ve ever used.

This has been my go to style as I wait for it to grow and thicken.

I can say that I’m enjoying the process and I enjoyed getting to see Okinawa and a bit of the military life here. But I’m happy to not have to travel just to get my hair done anymore. Stay tuned for more updates.

After a wash. I’m going to have to embrace the frizz.