Retail, Natural hair and TWA.

[hnntrr]

This is more of an " how do I deal with this situation" problem. As some of you may know I bc'd this past march to natural hair.

I suspect I have 3c/4a coarse lo po hair and have been treating it as such with good results thus far.

I would like to start wearing my natural hair out.

I know I shouldn't care what people think about my hair and part of me doesn't. However, I live and work in Boston which.. Where I work in particular I am the only black girl working there at this time. Maybe even the first this establishment in particular has had in awhile.

Thus far I have been wigging and wearing braids for the past 2 months I have been working there. So them not understanding black hair has resulted in them thinking that my wig is my natural born hair. In attempts to kind of buffer the fact that I will be wearing my hair out I have been dropping hints that I going to cut my hair soon (aka taking these braids out) Even so, they see me as having straight hair not curly hair and when I did try to explain that my hair is actually curly and I just "straighten it" (I told someone I was wearing a wig and she was so shocked).

Basically how to I proceed in which I don't get a bunch of questions a bunch of how does ur hair do that a bunch of oh you have kinky hair comments and such? I really would like to start wearing my hair put especially since weather up here is pretty conducive to me wearing it out (it's pretty contasntly humid and now that fall is approaching my hair won't dry out..the last two times I wore my hair out my hair stayed nice and moisturized.

Sorry this is so long. Haha. But yeah what can I do? What kind of styles can I wear in a TWA that look professional? How do I deal with the questions and prodding and poking for the first few weeks...then how I explain extensions and such when I choose to wig and braid again?

 

[DarkJoy]

Ahhh I have had this problem my whole life and been working in highly crisp and professional sites maybe 20 years. This job now was really racially undiverse--I'm the first BW EVER.

After 4 years of either relaxed, weave or braids, I busted out with my TWA They were SHOCKED. SHOCKED I tell you. Took one WW 2 weeks to calm down and stop asking dumb questions.

When they asked, and they asked--a LOT (it's only the WW, mind you, the men may look and comment it looks nice and what not)--I just told them I cut it. *shrug* Keep it simple and they accept.

When I wear crochet braids, I just say extensions when they first asked (they wear weave too so just nod and keep it moving).

Now, I switch between the crochet and natural fro and no one bats an eye as they are used to them now.

Honestly, what I found with white people, is they generally accept black hair pretty quickly. In many cases, they are suprised at the 'straightness' we put on it and seem more relaxed when we wear it natural. It's an interesting phenomon and I won't try to explain it.

But darling, trust, you are worried about it more than they will trip off of it. I sure did. They'll get over it and move on.

 

[LdyKamz]

It's your hair. You don't have to explain anything. Yeah, maybe there will be questions. You can smile politely and answer the questions if you feel like it. But focusing too much on it is going to keep the attention on it IMO. Most times people aren't even thinking about us.

I was nervous too when I first started wearing my hair out and I work in corporate America. But I think that was because I wasn't in the right frame of my mind yet. Meaning I was worried about what people would think and say instead of if I actually liked my hair or not. Once I got over that it was smooth sailing. Most people at work told me how much they loved it and how good it looked on me. I smiled, said thank you and kept it moving. There was one annoying person who asked me questions daily for a week and when she said how do you get it like that? I asked her how she got her hair the way she wore it? She told me that's just the way it is and I smiled knowingly at her and said "same for me"

I've seen a lot of your posts and I'm glad you are comfortable enough to start wearing your hair out. Try to remember that we are usually the ones who make a big deal out of something when no one else even cares.

 

[Ogoma]

^^^I agree with KammyGirl. Your comfort level with your hair is all you should be concerned with. I big chopped on Thursday, had Friday off, and showed up to work on Monday. The only comments I got were "you cut your hair" and/or "it looks nice". I answered yes and thank you and kept it moving.

Always polite and friendly, but sending a clear message my hair is not going to be an ongoing topic of discussion and I was not signing up to teach black hair 101 . At work, I want the focus to always be on the quality of my work and didn't want to get caught up in hair lessons when I could be talking about something more beneficial to my career.

In short, your coworkers will follow your lead. If you seem uncomfortable, they will be uncomfortable. I understand your apprehension. I am sure a lot of us can relate and I am sure many will tell you it turned out better than they thought it would.

 

[naturalmanenyc]

I agree with the other posters that your non-Black colleagues will not make such a big deal about your hair as you think. They will ask if you cut your hair and probably leave it at that until you straighten it. Then they will want to know how it got straight although it's not as if White people don't have curly hair and straighten it every so often. Our hair shrinks 50% or maybe more so it's unusual at first to a lot of people, even Black people. I still have colleagues who ask if I cut my hair when I wear a wash & go, Black colleagues too.

I transitioned to natural for two years from 2007 - 2009 and I wore a lot of different hairstyles during that time. I eventually started to use wigs and even wore different color wigs 3 times in the same work week. It would have gone unnoticed if we didn't have a lot of meetings that week (I normally work from home). A White, male colleague commented that my hair looked great that day, it looked great the day before and he was sure it would look great tomorrow. I had worn a different wig the day prior and then switched to a wig with highlights for that meeting and the next day back to a wig with no highlights. He was the only person to make a big deal about my hair in all the years I've been natural. He was new at the time (gone now for unrelated reasons) and I guess it amused him to see my different hairstyles so often.

I had at least 30 wigs at one point. Some are pictured here: http://goingnaturaltransitioningtonaturalhair.com/wearing-wigs-tips-tricks/

The longest style that I had was crochet braids for 8-9 weeks. Otherwise, my hairstyle changes often.