Baggying for moisture

Baggying is something that I have seen on many a blog for years now, and yet for some reason I just never paid any attention to it. Maybe it was because I wasn't sure when it would be appropriate to do it. As with most new fantastic products, they're probably great but if you use it at the wrong time, when your hair isn't ready, then you're not going to get the right results.

Baggying is when you put a shower cap or sealed plastic bag over your freshly moisturised but unsealed hair in order to keep the moisture in. I think it goes a little deeper than that actually, or at least for me any way.

I used to use mane n tail detangler religiously. At first I used to put way too much on because I was impatient, I eventually realised by accident (distracting phone call) that when you put it on and leave it to work - not immediately trying to comb or finger comb your hair - then the hair is actually much more agreeable, I didn't have to fight with it nearly as much and didn't have to use as much detangler.

The same applies to my standard leave in (water and conditioner mix in spray bottle with essential oils). My night process was to spray some the hair and scalp - I don't oil my scalp - and then finger comb, apply hair oil sealer and style for bed. This works fine at the beginning of my stretch, I don't need as much leave in or sealer. But at the end of the stretch, it just doesn't work, leaving me frustrated and running my hands through my hair too quickly, pulling out hair's from the fragile demarcation line. So I end up using more and more leave in, leaving me with wet hair, and then it's so wet you feel like it needs to dry a little before putting the oil on. As a night time routine, this gets really annoying as my hair is at this stage for about a month.

With baggying however I've found that giving my roots, scalp, and ends a nice light spray when I come home in the evening, putting the shower cap on while I cook, read, meditate; by the time it's time for my night time routine, you can feel the moisture is on the inside of the hair rather than just sitting on the outside. My tight and rough roots are flexible without feeling weak like that over moisturised feeling.

I don't have a lot of time in the evenings as I work pretty far away from home so the shower cap is only on for just under 2 hours. Even when I had a couple of evenings out this week, I still got the benefit from only keeping it on for 30 minutes while I showered and got ready for bed.
I am also using a small amount of protein every other night though - during the sealing process, I believe that keeps the balance.

Some people manage to baggy overnight, I have no idea how, after the 90 minute mark my scalp screams give me air! But if it works then it works, it's probably a little different if you have a lot of natural hair. I've also seen some worries that it would cause the hair to smell, I haven't had experience of that personally, smell as far as I know is caused by bacteria, the essential oils in my leave in and sealer put a stop to that pretty darn quick.

I'm really looking forward to seeing the growth in a couple of weeks when I relax again. I haven't worn my hair down once since February, but my friend had commented that it looked like it had grown. It probably just looked healthier / thicker as result of all the new growth and moisture that's in side the hair, but I do believe/hope that I have retained more hair this stretch. I won't be trimming again until the early Autumn. I went from 1 trim a year to 2 trims for the past 2 years and I really think that's part of the reason why I haven't seen much improvement, about an inch left me each time. I hardly ever have split ends but my hair does grow at different speeds all over my head so that would be the reason why it was levelled out quite so severely.

Pretty big breakthrough for me, it might have seemed obvious but sometimes you have to learn for yourself.