Isabella’s hair story is the most devasting one I know. A photo toxic reaction caused by a relaxer made the aspiring young model loose more than just her hair. 

When Going-Natural.com broke Isabella’s story back in 05 it was all over the hair forums. Many people had a hard time believing that a relaxer, which is in fact a beauty product, could cause so much damage.

Years later Chris Rock’s Good Hair demonstrated on the big screen how hazardous relaxers are by showing how an aluminum soda can dissolved in a relaxer and how the cream burnt a hole through raw chicken meat. Still, I never posted this story to scare people from using relaxers but merely to make us aware.

73% of Black women suffer from what Dr. Jeffrey J. Miller, dermatologist at the Milton S. Hershey Medical Center in Hershey, calls relaxer induced alopecia. Despite the fact that we Black women spend more on hair care than any other people, we suffer disproportionately from hair and scalp issues, more than any other people. You don’t need to be an Einstein to see that the math doesn’t add up. I myself was part of the problem but now hoping to become part of the solution.

I am not saying that we can solve the issue right here, right now but the least we can do because this is our hair, these are our heads and we need to take responsibility, is to have a dialog as to why we think it’s normal for us to damage our hair often beyond repair.
I personally relaxed my hair for 14 years and stopped only because I just couldn’t take the damage anymore and was afraid to go bald. I couldn’t stand weaves so going bald and depend on weaves was not an option for me. Still it took at least three times hair broken to my scalp before I gave up the perm. Why you ask? Three reasons:

1) The hairdressers convinced me that my hair was going to be fine, every time.
2) I didn’t know what else to do with my hair and I had already worn an afro when I was a kid.
3) There were no examples of styles of natural hair

Please comment and tell me: Why did you continue to relax your hair after it was broken/damaged?

 An interview with Isabella Broekhuizen. Isabella also has a book out Because I wasn’t worth it.