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Lather. Rinse. Repeat. My Love Affair With Expensive Hair Products

I have an addiction.  I am not an alcoholic, a gamer nor even a compulsive shopper.  My great demise can be found in the Target pharmacy section or in specialty stores.

No, you freak!  I'm not into prescription or even over the counter drugs!  Narcotics are for amateurs!  I, my dearest friends, am addicted to hair products.  Correction:  expensive hair products.

Sadly for me, this poses a bit of a problem as Habibi and I are not exactly what you might call "well off."  We are, indeed, very blessed to be able to maintain a comfortable living while sharing our means with others, but you might call us "lower" middle class.  If we were on the Titanic, we'd be just on the cusp of being locked in the basement of the sinking ship.  (However, this would not bother me entirely because I might be too busy naming and making friends with the rats.)  Anyway, my point is that it is hard to get your "fix" when you are on a budget.  Only the rich can afford to be real addicts.

Furthermore, my ability to indulge is to be further diminished come the end of the year.  You see, Habibi will be stepping down from his current job at that time.  As I only work part-time and his earnings are our major source of income, I may have to start shopping with the common folk.  Alas, this is but one of the many problems faced by those who dwell in the suburbs.


To illustrate my point, let me start by giving you a description of what I am up against:  I almost inherited my European-Native American mother's beautiful loose curls.  She has the hair women of all ethnicities covet.  However, despite the fact that I got her curls, I also inherited my father's dense, coarse, Middle Eastern hair (minus my sister's adorable ringlets, credit to Dad) that tends to get greasy at the roots and dry at the ends, leaving me with a dangerous hybrid of smooth crown, bushy strands, oily-dry, not-quite-curly-not-quite-straight wires on my head.  What to do?  Drugstore brands simply do not suffice.  Behold, the crux of my existence.

Then one day, after years of chemicals, crappy products and wasted energy, along came Moroccan Oil, a gem of a product.  My formerly impossible to blow-dry hair was transformed (yes, transformed!) by the oil product, which enables drying in approximately five minutes and renders my hair smoothie smooth!  Joys abounding, we must alert the president!  Soon thereafter, I stumbled upon the amazing shampoos and conditioners of J Beverly Hills, Joico, YesToCarrots (and other veggies), with a side of Enjoy.  Most of these brands are available only at beauty supply stores and are my one and only personal indulgence (aside from red wine and unsweetened vanilla almond milk, but that is a subject for another day).  Yes, I finally felt that I could buy the beauty that came so naturally to all of my gorgeous, predominantly Anglo friends with their shiny, sleek hair and perfectly tousled waves.  I still have to work at it harder than they do, but at least it is kind of attainable. :)

Now, before you accuse me of being a commercial...  Well, go ahead and say it because I really have no comeback to that accusation.

Any one of us would jump at the opportunity to spend our resources on something that made us feel good about ourselves.  Whether it is something as shallow as my hair product addiction or something as valuable as an education, we naturally gravitate towards the things that make us feel good.  Am I so different with my hair?  Maybe not, but it doesn't make it any less weird.  When I go to the store, I cannot help myself.  It doesn't matter if I just bought shampoo made by the most heavenly of angels, I still have to peruse the merchandise!  Case in point:  I have two half-used liters of one of my favorite brands in the shower right now, two mostly-used 12 oz bottles of the same product, three travel size containers of a second brand (used twice), two travel size containers of a third (used once), countless containers of unfinished product that I tried and didn't like (that Habibi then inherits) and I just bought two more 12 oz bottles of a favorite today.  Am I sick?  I'm sick.

So, here is my addictive pattern:

Lather.
Go to the store.  Find a brand that doesn't test on animals.  (Never sacrifice this step.)  Smell it.  Justify spending money on it.  Try it.  Like it.  Try more.  Get tired of it before it is all used.  Go to the store and do the same with several other brands.  Accumulate half-used bottles of shampoo/conditioner (that inevitably take over your entire bathroom) which you will eventually use, because every time you get tired of one, you return to a former purchase.

Rinse.
Get so annoyed with yourself that you vow to be wiser (after you finish using what you have, of course - to do otherwise would be foolish) about spending money on something so petty and vain...unless there is a really good coupon for it.  This phase typically doesn't last more than 24 hours.

Repeat.
Do it all again.

I can't wait until tomorrow.  I'm going to use my new shampoo.

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