When I was in Jr. High, I begged my Mom for a perm. All of my friends had one, my family was pressuring her to perm my hair, and I fell in line with everyone else. My mother did not wear a relaxer, but my family proceeded to tell her that I did not have "good hair" like her and that I needed a perm. My mother was determined not to ruin my hair. She taught me that my natural hair is beautiful.

Anyway she never did take me to get a relaxer. I tricked my father into taking me to a salon though, and guess what? I went bald. All of my thick kinky hair had been overprocessed and it fell out. Now, all of the girls that had talked about me for having nappy hair were now talking about me for being bald.

Well, when my hair grew back, I continued to have it processed because I wanted to fit in. I will admit, there are some fly permed styles and all, but they were never me. In high school I dreamed of having an afro or dreads, but I just wanted to fit in. I watched as girls cut off their relaxers and were ridiculed for wearing afros. I envied them. I always wanted to go natural again.

When I went away to college and I was away from the family pressure, I decided to let it go. It was hard, but seeing more natural hair in the media has made it more acceptable everywhere. I am not trying to cop the style of Erykah or Lauryn or Jill or anyone else, I'm just glad that if not forever, today black women can embrace the natural texture of their hair. If it takes a bit of a fad to make it happen, so be it. I am hopeful though that most of us that have gone natural will have done it because they have decided to embrace their coils, kinks, and curls.

The real tragedy of it all is that I worry everyday about my career because it is still somewhat taboo for women in certain social arenas to wear an afro. I worry that my twists, afro puffs and blow outs might not fit into the world I'll enter when I finish law school. That's what concerns me. I don't want to have to sue everybody that thinks my hair isn't conventional. The more sistahs out there go natural, the more acceptable it will become and brothas and white men won't have the option of bitchin about not liking it. It seems to me that the only people out there truly complalining about the whole natural hair "fad" are the black men that don't want to be seen with a nappy-headed woman. I've heard that shit tooo many times. "What happened to your hair?" "You would be so fly if you..." or the line from my ex-boyfriend, "Your hair would be really long if you relaxed it huh?"

But I know that many just see it as a hairstyle.