Palm Rolling

Again, as with anything I post regarding dreadlocks, this is based upon my experiences from growing my own and helping several others grow their dreads. Palm rolling is another controversial topic in the dread community. some say its pointless, and the biggest argument from this camp is that you merely press and flatten hairs against the dreads when you palm roll, meaning the affects only last moments before the hairs become visibly messy again. The majority of dread heads swear by it and see palm rolling as an essential part of maintaining dreads. Palm rolling is when you take a single dread between your palms (imagine the usual Christian prayer stance), and roll the dread back and forth, slowly moving from as close to the root as you can get down to the tip and back up, varying the pressure.

 It may seem very simple but it does take a little getting used to before you can do this yourself. I found that once you know how to angle your head so your dreads fall towards the floor but coming away from your head. It is far easier if your dreads are longer than around shoulder length, as they fall away from the head better when leaning to do this. You will notice a warming sensation to your palms when doing this, obviously heat generating from the friction being caused. My dreads vary in length and thickness, for the shorter and thinner ones I find it far easier and more affective to finger roll, take a dread between your thumb and first finger and again roll back and forth moving up and down the dread, but it's harder to mover up the dread when finger rolling. It is common for your scalp to become mildly irritated after a good palm roll sesh, thanks to the pulling and sly tugging at the roots whilst rolling, so don't worry, and palm rolling has caused barley minimal hair breakage if any at all. What I have found from palm rolling is your dreads will be straight and even if you roll often. The pressure and the slow up and down movement helps flatten out any kinks, folds, bumps, etc... I highly recommend allot of palm rolling after crochet hook sessions. The crochet hook can gather quite allot of hair into the same area of a dread giving them those random bulges that are so much more compact and hard to squeeze, palm rolling during and straight after crochet hook maintenance can reduce this. The dreads to the back of my head are harder to get to and have far more kinks and bulges as I don't tend to palm roll these as often as the dredies on the side and top of my head. It really comes down to the look your going for, if any. Some people, myself included, like the look of the odd kink or bend, its almost a personal characteristic for that single dread. Others like the uniform dread look where each individual dread is the same length and thickness and the placement of the dreads is perfect. Some even take action to cause their dreads to form uneven and wobbly looking. The use of and how frequent you palm roll need to be considered if you are aiming for a specific style. As most other dreadlock maintenance revolves around the pulling in, tucking away, generally hiding loose hairs, and palm rolling does not people may think its pointless, but i beg to differ. If nothing else palm rolling, like anything else hands on with your dreads, only strengthens the bond between you and them. Feeling and seeing first hand the affects of what your doing to them, be it good or bad, is something that all proper dread heads can appreciate. My advice.... Get rolling.