You Get What You Pay For...sort of

All my life I've wanted straight hair. The kind that doesn't look like a tumble weed, or like the hair old barbie dolls get when they've been buried in the toy box for 10 years. When ceramic flat irons came out a few years ago, a friend said I should try one - it worked great for her. Well, I had never seen her hair anything but straight so I was sceptical. I told her that my hair would fight every attempt at straightening. Not only that, but the stylists I consulted all agreed that any attempt at straightening would utterly destroy my hair. To seal the conversation, I proclaimed that my once-a-year trip to the salon, where I sat for three hours while a very patient stylist blow dried my hair (mostly) straight, was really more than I had time for. Come to think of it, my once-a-year trip hadn't been taken for a couple of years, so I must be really busy!

A few months ago, I gave in and tried a flat iron. I was wandering around in a store that was closing and saw a flat iron that looked relatively harmless. It was a Remington and had ceramic plates with Teflon material over the top of those. Surely, they wouldn't damage my hair too much, I thought to myself. It was only $45.00 I could afford to experiment at that price. I bought it.

That day, I tried it for the first time. After washing my hair, I had to dry my hair completely and that took about 2 hours. Then I had to straighten sections of hair until I had all my hair relatively straight. That took about an hour. After that, I had to return to the spots that decided to curl after I had ironed them - another 15 minutes went buy. So, I spent a little more time at it than I would have at a salon - but I could do it myself.

I felt like a new person! No longer trapped by unruly curls and Big Hair Syndrome, I felt like life was good again. Wow, what an experience. For the first time in my life I looked in the mirror and saw sleek sophisticated hair. No more wild child look. It was fantastic.

The next day, I realized that I could go to sleep without braiding my hair and still wake up with almost no tangles! That was a surprise benefit. I wanted my hair straight ALL the time. After about a week, I noticed that the ends of my hair didn't look quite right when I just let it dry naturally. The curls weren't there and the last 3 inches of my hair looked a little like straw! Oh NO! I had ruined my hair. Those hair stylists were right after all! What had I done?!

I couldn't just give up on my wonderful straight hair. But I was going to have to exercise some restraint. There had to be a way I could have straight hair sometimes without ruining my hair. I should have purchased the best iron the first time. I immediately went to Amazon and checked on the prices of CHI irons. I had looked at them before - but they were so expensive. Just my luck, I found a 2" iron on sale from $175.00 down to $95.00 with free shipping. What a deal. I ordered it. Then, I went to a local beauty supply and found hair dryer that had all the options: Nano-Silver, Ionic Generator, Negative Ion Technology, Ceramic plus Tourmaline, Removable air intake grill, 1875 watts, Ceramic Heater, Ergonomic Design, Quiet Motor, Extremely Lightweight, Three temperature settings and Two speed settings. In addition, it came in a great color! I put it in the cart. I also picked up hair restorative shampoo and conditioner, leave-in treatment for curly hair, a spray to protect my hair while using the flat iron, CHI conditioning spray (to match the new iron), a protein conditioner for EXTREMELY damaged hair and a package of mints at the counter.

While I was checking out, I felt the need to explain that I had damaged my hair. The lady at the checkout gave me a look. I guess I didn't need to explain myself, because every single item I put on the counter had to do with hair repair. I felt like I was too incompetent to have hair. Now, my hair had to be rehabilitated. I had to admit that I was powerless over my flat iron and my hair had become unmanageable. The shame of it all. Somehow I would manage to repair my hair so I could continue to straighten it. There had to be a way!

I used every product faithfully. I checked the ends of my hair daily and couldn't see any improvement. I was traumatized. I couldn't cut three inches off my hair! It would take 6 years to grow it back! Maybe I overlooked some sign of improvement. Frustration set in. At this point my straight hair experiment cost approximately $300.00 (even at sale prices) with about $150.00 of that spent on hair repair products. All I could see were my damaged ends .

One day I looked at the bottle of olive oil in my pantry. I thought about the oil and how good it tastes and how good it is for me. Hmmm...good for the inside - good for the outside. Why not?! I saturated my hair with olive oil. It took about half a cup. Then I ran a nice hot bubble bath, dropped in a lavender bath tea and let the aroma of the lavender tea ease my hair stress. I soaked for about an hour. After that, I decided to leave the oil in for another 30 minutes.

I jumped in the shower and washed my hair. The difference was really amazing. The olive oil made my hair softer and the ends looked great! I wouldn't have to find a 12 step group to deal with my flat iron obsession after all. I had discovered a way to use the iron while saving the ends of my hair.

I still use the spray to protect my hair from the heat of the flat iron. I don't straighten my hair as often as I would like. But, I think about that $150.00 I spent on hair repair products and compare it to the fifty cents worth of olive oil that actually did the trick and I really wonder. Did I get what I paid for? Sort of. It took $150.00 for me to get frustrated enough to try the olive oil. If the expensive products would have worked better, I would still be spending a huge amount of money on hair care products. As it is, I use fifty cents of olive oil every few weeks. If I look at it that way, I'm actually saving about $60.00 a month on the products I'm not buying. Hmm...I wonder if I could save even more money by not buying something else...