Queen Dee ~ Queen Of Kinks, Curls & Coils® (Neno Natural)

27/5/2014

1. What's your name and where are you from?

A weird or funny fact is I actually have two names. I guess my parents couldn’t choose which name they like best so I got stuck with two. Which is kinda cool in a way because at times I feel like I have two identities lol

I have what I call my “home” name (this is what I’m known as by my friends and family back home in Tanzania (it’s actually my middle name) and my first name which is my professional name (the name that I use on paper and I’m known by abroad).

My middle name is Doreen, my friends and family call me Dee. But Professionally I’m known as Caroline.

I’m originally from Tanzania, Southern California is my home away from home and I’m currently based in Stockholm, Sweden.

2. What is your hair type?

I consider my hair to be within the type 4 spectrum, mostly 4c with some 4b.

3. When did you go natural and what made you do it?

I didn’t really plan to go natural I just kind of transitioned into it because I was tired of doing relaxers. So I just stopped doing them and wore weaves a lot. The weaves were becoming an expensive habit, so I decided to learn how to deal with my own hair. That’s when I stumbled upon the natural hair community on YouTube this was some time towards the end of 2008. So I would say about 5 years now.

4. What was the most challenging thing about going natural?

I struggled with learning how to effectively care for my own hair since I had relied on other people for hair care my whole life. It also took me a while to be confident in styling and wearing my hair out in public because I had this false image or standard in my head of what “beautiful” hair is.

5. What is your weekly regimen?

I’m currently in the midst of experimenting with a new regimen but in the past I would deep condition and detangle my hair once a week.

6. What is your daily morning regimen?

I’m currently experimenting with co-washing and detangling my hair in the shower every morning.

7. What is your daily night time regimen?

I’m currently doing the GHE (Green House Effect) Method nightly where I would wet my hair, apply castor oil generously on my hair strands, put a bag over my hair and a satin scarf and leave it on over night. But as I mentioned earlier, I’m in the midst of experimenting with a few new things at the moment in addition to this.

8. Do you use heat on your hair at all?

I’m currently 9 months post big chop and haven’t used heat on this new growth and I’m not planning to anytime soon. Before I big chopped I used to blow dry or flat iron my hair twice a year at most.

9. Do you braid your hair? If so, how often do you do so in a year?

No I currently don’t. Even though after my weave episode that I mentioned above, I did wear my hair in braids for a while before I was confident enough in wearing my own hair out.

10 Wide-tooth comb or Denman brush?

Neither. Just my fingers and hands.

11. Is your hair normally loose or in a protective-do?

Before I big chopped I wore my hair in twisted updos and buns or updos when my hair was not in twists. My hair is currently in the TWA phase.

12. Have you ever had a hair tragedy? What was it? How did you recover from it?

Yes actually what caused me to big chop my hair last year was the amount of post pregnancy shedding that I had experienced shortly after giving birth to my son. I lost a lot of hair around my hairline and I’m still recovering from it by babying my edges and using Castor Oil to help regrow the area.

However, this was a blessing in disguise because now I’ve been forced to pay more attention to the needs of my hair I also must say I’ve learnt a lot more about my hair in the past 9 months than I did for the past 5 years that I was natural.

13. What's your biggest tip for maintaining healthy or long hair?

I would say two things the first is Moisture, Moisture, Moisture this is the key to fighting dry unmanageable hair. And moisture doesn’t only have to be spritzing with water, make sure your whole regimen involves ways to help you introduce and retain moisture into your hair shaft.

The second would be learn and listen to what your hair likes, dislikes and needs, this will help you eliminate things that hinder your hair growth & health and add things which are beneficial to your hair.

14. Where can we find you online? (blog, Facebook, Twitter, YouTube etc).

I’m everywhere lol