It's my pleasure. I know what it's like to have to figure stuff out on my own, so it bothers me to see someone else doing it. Thanks for answering my bazillion questions. I know that it seems like a lot, but the more that's revealed, the more equipped we are at pinpointing the issue. Vegan eh. So, the plot thickens.
Alrighty, while I research vegan products, I'm going to beg your indulgence in answering a bazillion more questions while adding a few suggestions.
First, a few supplementary questions: Have you ever tried adding an oil to your DC to give it some oomph? Do you DC with or without heat? Do you have a lot of shrinkage when your hair is wet? When was the last time you had a protein treatment? How does your hair behave while straightened?
If it's easier and less damaging for you to detangle on dry hair that's been coated with product, by all means do that. There's no law that says you must detangle on wet hair. Do what's best for your particular hair needs. IME, my hair was at it most tangled under certain conditions: (1) it needed a trim; (2) it needed a dose of protein; (3) the products I used sucked; (4) my leave-in conditioner was too heavy and emollient, which caused my hair to overly clump and stick together. My hair has always been tangle prone and I just had to live with it because nothing I did seem to have an impact. I mitigated the damage somewhat by keeping my hair ridiculously stretched, in that, I found one or two hairstyles that caused the least amount of tangling. I parted my hair in the center and kept it in two braids. Sometimes, I loosed them, fluffed, slapped on a headband and wore it as a braid-out. Most often, I wore the braids pinned on the sides with two cute, sparkly clips. It looked like this:
I also added heavy sealing to my ends to further facilitate keeping my hair untangled. Heavy sealing is applying a butter or grease/grease-like product to the ends of your hair, which serves to keep them straighter and less tangled, For me, the best products for heavy sealing were greases, especially Oyin Berry Pomade. I smoothed it on the ends of my braids and it kept the hair tangle-free all week. I also never braid my hair all the way down to the end because doing so inevitably causes knots while unbraiding for some reason. However, my biggest epiphany came earlier this year when I stumbled upon a product and a technique that turned things around tremendously. I ditched (or rather temporarily pushed aside) my thick, highly emollient, creamy leave-in conditioners and moisturizers in favor of a slippery, slimy, much lighter one. That new leave-in keeps my hair soft, moisturized and tangle free for days. Even if I apply more product mid-week, it remains tangle free. That product, BTW, is called Jane Carter Untangle Me. I said all of that as a lead-in to another suggestion - you may have to find one or two go-to hairstyles that will keep the tangling to a minimum. You might also benefit from using heavy, highly emollient products that will add some weight to your hair and keep the tangles at bay. I'm assuming that the constant braiding and unbraiding can't be helping matters much. So, let's try and figure out some alternate solutions and tweak a few things to see if they'll have an impact.
FWIW, the Giovanni Direct LI kinda...sucks. I used it years ago and revisited it again about two years ago, and it produced the same results every time - dry, crispy hair. That stuff is just not good, IMO. I also used to use the Giovanni SAS conditioner, and could only get good results after adding an oil to it (either castor or almond) before sitting under a dryer.
I'll come back in a bit after I've researched for some vegan products/vendors.
