How the Brazilian Blowout Changed My Life

Because it totally did. Change my life, I mean. Not in any deep, emotional way - I never had an epiphany or anything - it just totally changed my life.

Any girl with frizzy, curly hair (and no, I'm not talking about small waves, or thin curly hair, I mean massive amounts of tangly frizzy ringlets that look haggard and won't straighten out for anything) needs to have one of these done immediately. I've written a blog post about this in the past, but since I purged that blog I thought it appropriate to do an update on here. It's been a little over two years since I've been regularly getting the Brazilian Blowout (BB) and my hair has never been better (or longer). The BB allows me to essentially wash-and-go, meaning less heat damage and less to chop off come trim time.

Pre-BB, my life revolved completely around my hair. On a trip to Europe in 2009, I couldn't white water raft in Austria with my group because if our boat capsized (which everyone's did), I wouldn't be near an outlet to re-straighten my hair. If that's not sad, I don't know what is. On average, my shoulder length, thick hair would take about 2.5 hours to straighten. If date night fell on a hair straighten night, I skipped the date and stayed in with a blow dryer and flat iron. If it rained at school I would go to any length to stay out of the rain and avoid the inevitable frizz, even if it meant missing a class altogether. This seems silly, but when you're spending 2.5 hours on your hair three times a week (I'm not an every day washer and you shouldn't be either), you too go to any length to avoid messing it up. Trust me.

Since the BB, I've been able to completely enjoy things. I can walk in the mist or the rain without a care - I can go to the beach without my hair becoming an afro. Not that I'd ever do that, because I hate the beach, but you get the idea.

There's zillions of identical treatments out there these days, each catering to a different clientele. I've stuck with the BB for the last few years and have had nothing but wonderful results.

Before (Here's my hair air dried pre-BB):

And here's after (also air-dried):

Note: Some people are genuinely freaked out by the thought of formaldehyde. Sure, it's a carcinogen in excess amounts. As is too much sun exposure, not enough sun exposure (look it up), cigarette smoke, normal city pollution, and infinite amount of other things. There are plenty of products out there sans formaldehyde that will give you a similar result, so if it's something that really bothers you, you have other options.