How old were you when you got your first perm?

About how old were you when you got your first perm?

  • Straight out the womb!

    Votes: 3 0.6%
  • 1-5 years old

    Votes: 54 11.0%
  • 5-8 years old

    Votes: 82 16.6%
  • 8-12 years old

    Votes: 155 31.4%
  • 12-15 years old

    Votes: 120 24.3%
  • 15-20 years old

    Votes: 59 12.0%
  • Over 20 years old

    Votes: 14 2.8%
  • Never had a perm

    Votes: 6 1.2%

  • Total voters
    493

ilah

Active Member
I think I was about 9-10. My mom didn't want to do it but I whined and whined about it and finaly she gave in (to shut me up I suppose) - Looking back I should have waited a few more years. Oh well.
 

Neith

New Member
Probably around 9. Mother couldn't keep up with braiding my hair because she has some arthritis.
 

jamoca5

New Member
I was 12 years old, right before school picture day for me. I didn't want to have the same kiddie hair I had when I was little for JUNIOR HIGH (haha I so didn't understand priorities back then).

I try to look through my pictures from the younger years, but I still have no clue what my hair type was(is?). My mom says that my hair has always been kinda wavy, but I don't know. I guess I have to wait until more new growth comes in...
 

Newtogrow

New Member
I was between 15 and 16 when I first permed. I don't have any memory of my first experience. I remember usually doing my perms myself.
 

AMAKA127

Well-Known Member
I was about 8 years old when I got my first perm ... I always consider going natural but then i remember my childhood and how my mother use to torture me with my extremely thick and course hair and i always reconsider....

How do some of you natural ladies deal with this issue?
 

pringe

New Member
i honestly can't really remember the exact age. I know i have few pics before, so I think i must have been around 9 or 10 when it started. I know i had a dry curl (drier than a Jheri curl) lol when i was in the 3rd and 4th grade and I know by the 6th grade I definitely had a perm so I'm figuring 5th grade was the winner!
 

pringe

New Member
And to answer AMAKA,

I really didnt deal with my hair much when i was younger and it was natural. I remember it being short, hard to grow or so it appeared but i do remember that it had a little wave to it when u put it into 2 canerows.

Honestly right now my regimen is just moisturizing and protein and for styling just doing the flyest styles i can for 2 weeks so I feel like my hair looks great! I've been on missions to find fly braided and twisted styles and so far I've been getting lots of compliments from men and women, the men can't keep their dam hands out of my hair and my hair is thriving under its new regimen! HTH
 

BlackMasterPiece

Well-Known Member
I was about 8 years old when I got my first perm ... I always consider going natural but then i remember my childhood and how my mother use to torture me with my extremely thick and course hair and i always reconsider....

How do some of you natural ladies deal with this issue?
When we were little our mothers didnt have the benefit of the internet, they didnt have the benefit of all the vast knowlege we all now enjoy about natural hair. They didnt understand that by simply wetting the hair and saturating it with conditioner and oil, combs could have glided thru our hair rather then broken......they just didn't know.

Dont hesitate to go natural just because of torture sessions you endured when your mother styled your hair.......think about it this way, if you went to a styist that did your hair horribly, cut too much burned off patches and left your hair limp would you then swear off all stylists because of that?

Bad hair styling experiences are not a reflection on the managability of your hair, it means the wrong technique is being implemented. If you decide to go natural, you'll have this site which is a treasuretrove of techniques and info, take it from a course-haired coily, combing our hair doesnt have to hurt at all and styling our coily hair can be like being let loose in a candy-store full of choices:yep:
 

Mz.MoMo5235

Well-Known Member
i was like 13. i was soooo excited to have straight hair!!! but because i had sooooo much hair (i had hair down to my butt! i miss it) it took forever for my moms friend to work it through all my hair that my scalp started to burn so we rinsed and the relaxer really only took on my roots lol and i cried.

what made it worse is that we didnt realise that was the reason the relaxer didnt take so after that we started to buy supers and i used supers every yr until i was like 20. then i went back to little kid regular relaxers... then i just stopped :D AND THAT CREAMY CRACK WILL NEVER GET ME AGAIN!
 

Lovestyr

New Member
I believe that I was 10 when I got my first relaxer...I do still remeber the pain and fear of that white stuff on my head...lol:spinning:
 

BlackHairDiva

Well-Known Member
If afrosheen counts as a relaxer...about 5 years old.My mom had no clue how to use it , plus the instruction where in english . Mom's french. SO she would just slap that cream on our hair and Brush it! with those plastic Goody brushes...you know the ones with the white teeth. When that would break she would use an afro pick...and pick it out. Mom has 3a/3b hair...Our 4A/4b hair seemed "hard" ...she later discovered it was not hard...just thick. Poor mom.When I started reading in here how to take care of my hair and did more Deep Cond, she was in shocked how my hair became easy to manage. She kept telling ," If I would have known all y'all needed was a good conditioner. I would have never slapped them chemical in y'all hair."
 
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