Hiya Karezone, to be really honest, I am so scared of trying to relax my own hair that I can't see myself doing it anytime in the near future. I go to UMBC, in Maryland, and all of my relatives, including my mom(who does my retouches for me)live in VA. I tried going to a salon once to get a professional retouch, and while the relaxer came out nice, she took it upon herself to cut about 4 inches off my hair under the pretense of "dusting the ends". That experience has made me very wary of going to salons, even though there are many nearby my school. I really do want to become better skilled at doing my own hair, which is one of the reasons why I joined this board, for all the great tips(Thanks ladies!)