How come dreadlocks grow faster than free natural hair?

Hey everyone,

Hope your week's been great! The topic I want to discuss today is something that came to mind after I saw an acquaintance's hair. She's had locs for a while and I hadn't seen her for quite some time, and when I recently saw her, it struck me that her hair length seemed to have doubled! I remember the question crossed my mind - "How did her hair grow so bloody fast?"
Source
And then it struck me that I routinely see people with waist length loc'd hair, even in Nigeria, and I came to the conclusion that there's something different about locs, so I asked my friend Google. Well, it turns out that dreadlocks are actually not different from free natural hair, but 2 things come into play...


  1. NO manipulation! Think about it. Those of us with free natural hair are constantly manipulating our hair by detangling (fingers, combs and brushes alike), styling (twists, braids, updos, weaves, etc), and more. With manipulation comes breakage. Of course, there are ways to minimize breakage such as finger detangling and protective styling. However, people with locs hardly have to deal with any manipulation. Therefore, their odds of experiencing breakage is a LOT LESS than people with free hair.
  2. SHED hair. Hair sheds on ALL types of head, simple and short. BUT the difference with loc'd hair is that the shed hair has nowhere to fall to. Instead it stays matted up with the dreadlocks, and seemingly adds to length and thickness! 
So there, you have it. It makes sense now and it's such an easy explanation. So for all those who want to achieve floor length hair, now you know what you can do to speed up the process :p.

Would you switch to locs simply for length purposes? Let me know what you think. The first person to comment and leave their email, wins a N500 airtime recharge as usual (Nigerian networks).

Have a lovely weekend,

22 comments

  1. oooh nooooo!!!! I wuld not even switch my hair for dread loc or anything ,honestly I think dreads in general look dirty. gorettimay@gmail.com

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    Replies
    1. dats my opinion anyway...

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    2. Hi. While you're entitled to your opinion, I think it's important to be sensitive and kind. A lot of our readers have locs and I imagine they would have been miffed by your comment.

      We, as naturalistas, already get unkind comments (some of which we've blogged about here) and it's not fair to perpetrate the same negativity towards others. A simple "it's not for me, or I don't really like how they look" would have sufficed.

      Delete
    3. Hi Anonymous, I have been locked for 2.5 years, I work with a Fortune 500 company and I like to tell people like you (I've met quite a few like you, unfortunately) that I interviewed for my current job when my locs were about 6 months old, everyone knows that's when it looks most unkempt, and I got the job, obviously, my interviewer did not think I looked "dirty" and/or had learnt to understand, (as I wish the whole world would) that it's what's inside that counts.
      I have to travel a lot for work, and everywhere I have been, every single place, people LOVE my hair, both black and white, even when I haven't relocked in a while and think it looks rough. But for some reason, here at home, I get too many reactions like yours, people are perfectly fine with artificial dreadlocks, but can't stand it when they realise it's my real hair.
      It is your opinion, I'm glad the world is not filled with people with opinions like yours.
      I'm not even sure why I'm responding to you though.
      Sim

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    4. Wow! That's so rude. You should have some consideration for others.

      Delete
  2. Would love to try the locs but won't your natural hair matt up and make loosening the locs hard? I dey fear for my hair o. I had faux locs from feb to july last year and when I took down the dreads my hair had matted up to the point where detangling became almost impossible and that led to my BC. So thinking about having locs installed just make my heart skip.
    Anurika
    aumeizu@yahoo.com

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Yes, locs means your hair is matted up. That's why if you're thinking about locs, you have to think long and hard, as it is usually permanent, save for doing a BC like you had to do. I find that even keeping my hair in simple twists for longer than a week or two makes it sooooo much harder to detangle.

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  3. wow, now I understand why ma hair grows faster in loc than wen it wasn't loced.

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  4. Thanks for d information, its rili helpful nd educating ogechigodwin@gmail.com

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  5. Also I dnt tink I wud lyk 2 grow d dreads jst 4 length. Cus am nt a Fan of locs ogechigodwin@gmail.com

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  6. Also I dnt tink I wud lyk 2 grow d dreads jst 4 length. Cus am nt a Fan of locs ogechigodwin@gmail.com

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  7. Yes,ofcourse! I'd switch to locs for length retention! Thanks for this info!

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  8. I might switch to locs, but not simply for length purposes. To try something different. To have what I perceive as low maintenance hair. I was thinking when my natural gets really really long in years to come I might loc it. Esp as I'll be tired of dealing with d lion's mane that I'm sure will b my hair. But my mum might disown me tho. She thinks dreadlocks is mad ppl's hair lol. I just roll my eyes

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  9. Locs? Not now. Length or no length.

    Maybe later but I would love to try it..

    http://ebunoluwole.com

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  10. i do not think i would ever go for locs......but who knows? (never say never) adesanyaopemipo@gmail.com mtn

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  11. i do not think i would ever go for locs......but who knows? (never say never) adesanyaopemipo@gmail.com mtn

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  12. Though I love locs on some people, it is not my kettle of fish. Not even length can be a strong motivator for me. serenataphy@gmail.com

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  13. Nah! I Dont think am that crazy about length that much that I would permanently loc up my hair.
    I love all that manipulation that the unloc hair brings.

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  14. Exactly. The second point is the most important. All the average of 70-100 strands that we shed everyday has nowhere to fall, so it makes the hair look longer and fuller than it actually is.

    When I was on dread locks, when my hair was reaching mid length, my hands could not go round it. It was just too full, considering the fact that my ordinary hair is already so full on a normal day.

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  15. Can I say been there done that? got a T-shirt :p

    I would loc my hair again in the future still :)

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  16. I'm in the middle of something like this now because I wanted my hair to grow fast than its been growing. I'm over a year natural now and received so much growth in my first year but felt at a stand-still going into this second year. I wear mini twists held together by water, coconut oil and leave in. I assumed I would be able to redo these twists every 2 weeks but my hair is growing so fast now I have to semi re-twist every 4 days and my hair is so much more moisturized now. I have minor issues with detangling and I don't plan on locc'ing. But leaving the hair alone and keeping it moisturized, at least in my case, is showing amazing growth, particularly in places that were thinner than others.

    ReplyDelete

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