I honestly don’t even know where to begin.

Very few people know about this as I don’t even think that I even shared this with my Momma LOL!

I know people say “it’s just hair, it’ll grow back”.

However, when you take the decision to chop your gorgeous long and healthy hair to embark on your natural hair journey, this truly hurts. BELIEVE ME!

Last year around this time, I decided to get some Kinky Twists at the BRAIDING CENTER in Gaithersburg, Maryland. It wasn’t my first time getting this protective style installed, as I had gotten my hair braided several times prior to my big chop.

The same lady who did them before is the same one who was going to do my Kinky Twists that day, after my big chop for the first time.

Long story short, got my hair done and to be honest, I was not really pleased with the end result.

I’ll admit: I’m super picky guys, EXTREMELY particular! And, that’s OK because that’s what makes me, ME.

So, I only kept them in for 2 weeks and just couldn’t take it.

Here’s when the bombshell revealed itself.

When I was done taking my hair out, I noticed that my shape was out of wack.

The hair in the crown area of my head and other areas was super short.

I know what you’re thinking: NO I did not cut the twists before taking them down. They were short in length and twists are usually easy to unravel when you’re taking them down.

This woman! THIS WOMAN!

This woman, pretty much gave me a cut as she was cleaning the twists after installing my protective style.

CAN YOU IMAGINE?!

I had worked hard on my hair, investing time and effort to make sure that it grew nicely (which it hard), gorgeous, healthy, nice length and THIS WOMAN had the nerve?!

SHEESH…I am just keeping it real with y’all man…

I was LIVID, PISSED, all the words you can imagine.

I called the owner of the shop, who was shocked as well and couldn’t believe it.

You don’t know how shattering this is until you go through it yourself.

In the AFTER photo (right), you’ll notice that the crown area is not as full as in the BEFORE photo (left).

SIGH…

I’ve thought several times about just STARTING OVER, getting a trim all over to adjust all of the lengths to make up for this mess.

People man…

I tell you!

Oh let me tell you, another thing. When I went home, I noticed that she parted my hair in medium sections to fit on a skinny braid. You could see exactly where my hair stopped and how it was coming out of the braid.

This is clearly and obviously why she had to butcher my hair, trying to hide her messy job.

The previous times she did my hair were GREAT, BOMB!

I really don’t know what happened this time.

Thankfully for her, I have not seen her since and she no longer works there, THANK GOD!

The piece of advice I can give you to avoid something like this from happening is to make sure that your braider is familiar with braiding natural hair. Or better yet, give them some guidance on how to section your actual hair in preparation for braiding.

I went to my hairstylist over the weekend and what we did to help the shape of my hair was trim the lower back area a little. It had become super long and made my hair look weird when I wore it down.

At least, we found a temporary resolution and my hair looks SO MUCH BETTER!

I do plan on re-shaping my hair but waiting to gain a bit more length so that the cut is not drastic.

So, that’s my story and I’m sure some of us have experienced setbacks in our Natural Hair Journeys so far.

It shall be well and YES it’ll grow back but doesn’t negate the fact that IT’S TRULY ANNOYING!

I’d love to hear from you: have you experienced a setback during your natural hair journey so far? It can be anything. If you don’t mind, kindly share below in the comments section.

Feel free.

We are here to support each other.

Thank you in advance for opening up and sharing your story with us.