There are a few things no one tells you about pregnancy. For example, if you’re a brown woman, there’s a good chance that in your eighth month, your stomach will turn completely black. Like burnt toast. I named mine Le Belly Noir. It was horrifying. No one tells you that your hair will break off around your hairline when you’re baby”s about four months. My post-Bobina delivery “bangs” were not a choice. No one tells you about the shedding. My hair was crazy long at this point — way past my bra strap (pregnancy hormones) — and it was all over my house. In the cereal box, Lina’s sock drawer, the drying rack. Heinous. And I don’t know if this is happened to anyone else, but my daughter is five years old and my hair still hasn’t bounced back from the shedding. It’s sooo much thinner now that it was pre-pregnancy. Even though it’s natural, it feels really limp (which seems so wrong). And since my blowout spirit animals are the massively coiffured Shahs of Sunset women, this will not do. I need it to be BIG.
That first pic was taken thirty-five years ago. Can you believe this woman? Btw, she’s wearing her 16 in Clip-In Extension in the second one. So natural and lush.
In November, I went to the launch of Christie Brinkley’s line of Hair2Wear wigs and clip-in extensions (I hadn’t started up SYB again, so I couldn’t rave about it). It was a breakfast event, and Brinkley herself swanned around the room, passing out her 16 in Clip-in Extensions while a room full of starstruck beauty chicks nervously picked at their pecan-encrusted French Toast. I eyed it suspiciously. I’ve never worn a clip-in, and only tried a weave once (migraine suffers CANNOT do the cornrows. And as gorgeous as great weaves are, I just need to get to my scalp).
Anyway, it was one ear-to-ear track with a tiny comb on each end and one in the middle. The hair was bouncy and gorgeous — and bizarrely exactly the golden-streaked copper shade of my new dye job. I shrugged, and without even looking in the mirror, I lifted up a layer of my hair at the crown, clipped it in, and let the top layer drop. The room gasped. Two bloggers took my picture. When I looked in the mirror my jaw dropped. I think North West was born at that precise moment. Friends, my hair was laid. Laid, laid, laid. Never looked better. And it was so damned easy — no mirror! No brush!
Before.
After. Can you believe it? Again, no mirror. FYI, my shade is Dark Brown with Copper Highlights.
Long story short, I live for it. I love the versatility. I love that I can wake up, clip this thing in when I want to slay — and all with no commitment. So good if you’re in-between cuts, or growing out your hair, or just need a boost of volume or length. So good!
xxoo,
T. Trilliams