Hello everyone! Today I'll be talking about my experience with wigs versus natural hair. I'll be going over some of the pros and cons of natural hair and wigs in comparison to each other.
Maintainance
First things first: Maintaining your hair or wig. Both need to be brushed or combed out to prevent tangle, from the bottom up so as to avoid damage as well as even more tangles, as well as cleaned. Wigs require different cleaning products compared to natural hair due to some main diferences in the fibers from natural hair. For example, you would most likely not use fabric softener on your natural hair, but oftentimes it's recommended for maintaining wigs. Likewise, you wouldn't want to use regular shampoo on a wig as it's formulated to clean natural hair as well as your scalp of dirt, oil, and other buildup. Another diference between natural hair and wig maintainance is that hair grows back, but wig fibers do not. This means that oftentimes one has to be a lot more gentle when combing a wig out than with natural hair. I've found that, timewise, wigs can take as long or longer than natural hair to maintain depending on how long it is and how long it takes to dry it.
Color
Like natural hair, wigs can also be dyed. Unlike natural hair though, wigs should not be bleached, don't need root touchups, and typically are sold in a variety of colors. While dying natural hair typically involves bleach (to ensure more even coverage), hair dyes which have to sit and saturate the hair, and lots of careful maintainance to make the color last as long as possible, wigs are comparitively easy to dye. While I haven't had the opportunity to try for myself, I've seen one method for dying wigs where you essentially mix ink from sharpies with alchohol (or water? I'd have to find the vidoe again and I'm not sure it's still up) and spray your wig down to color it. If done properly, your wig shouldn't need to be dyed again. However, for best results, you have to start with a white or other light colored wig to have the color show. Since wigs can't be bleached, you can't exactly take a dark wig and lighten it up (at least to my knowledge)
Styling
Wig styling is VERY different from styling natural hair. The products can range from glue (which you should NEVER use on your natural hair) to regular styling products like hairspray or hair wax. One of the biggest diferences between wig and natural hair styling is that wig fibers tend to hold their shape. You can curl a wig and it'll stay curled unless you straighten it. While you can soften the curls by combing the wig to blend the curls, you can't take them out completely without using heat of some sort. Also, a lot of times a wig may be styled in such a way that it shouldn't be washed or gotten too wet unless a new style is wanted for it. With your natural hair, if you style it, it will likely lose shape over the course of a day and you'll need to redo it the next day unless you find a way to avoid having it mushed while you sleep.
As a final note, one of the best things about wigs is that you can change your hair every day and not have to worry about damaging your natural hair by coloring it constantly or cutting it and waiting for it to grow out. I've got a nice collection of wigs that I like to wear randomly, as well as some extentions and clip-on ponytails that I'm using until my hair grows out more and it's really nice being able to see how I look with different hair styles and colors without having to commit to them as I'd have to with my natural hair.
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