February 10th: The Creamy Crack

As women we KILL ourselves to fit an impossible standard of beauty. As a woman who falls guilty to the same standards, I was shocked to find that a popular product used during my childhood could possibly be a source of uterine fibroids. I'm 100% natural now. I've natural for a year, and I love my natural, kinky texture.

Chemical relaxers or “ creamy crack” as they are playfully called, are a lotion/ creamy based hair styling substance composed of Sodium Hydroxide. This chemical has many negative effects. It is is used to break down the natural bond in hair and turn curly/coarse hair into straight and silky hair. The crack refers to the addiction women feel when their hair straight and the length we will go to ensure our hair is straight

Relaxers are advised to be applied by a professional, but I like many other young African women have had my living room and kitchen turn into a hair salon and have them applied at home.

The effects of this creamy crack include but are not limited to follicle damage, thinning and permanent hair loss! ( Why did I do this again?) These are all facts I knew but as I became more involved in science I started doing more research myself and I realized that relaxers or perms are doing more damage than I thought.Hydroxide does more than straighten you hair. It can burn the scalp and enter your blood stream.

Sounds beautiful right?

Hydroxide does more than straighten you hair. It can burn the scalp and enter your blood stream. Sounds beautiful right?

So I stumble across an article posted on the internet saying that there is correlation between Uterine fibroids and Relaxers. Uterine Fibroids are reported highly in the African American female population. Read more about Fibroids here.. http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmedhealth/PMH0001912/

Uterine Fibroid
Between 1997-2009, A Black Women’s Health study, was composed and they studied women in 17 states including, New York, California and Georgia. Scientists found higher levels of Fibroid diagnoses in women who used relaxers frequently.

Like all research, biases must be taken into consideration. Polling black, women who already high cases of Fibroid diagnoses’ can skew results and how do you explain fibroids in White women, who have never used a relaxer?

It is your job to ensure that products that you use are not killing you!