I have not been on here in forever but figured I would post in case...

I just re-read some of my earlier posts and smiled a lot.
I really would not use wax ever again, nor would I recommend it.
My boyfriend has been dreading naturally for a few months shorter then I have been and his results have been awesome.
I think that the back-combing I did helped, but there are better alternatives to wax to give my hair some texture.

The repeat back-combing at the ends has resulted in me actually loosing hair... not huge chunks but small bristly end chunks that I was thinking I was going to have to cut off anyway.

Anyway almost a year later and I wouldn't change my process because I learned a lot, but wouldn't do the same thing on someone else.
The most effective things I did wear use wraps and beads to guide my hair. If I had done that from the beginning and skipped the two weeks of wax I wouldn't have had to soak them in hot water and blow-dry/paper towel them to make sure I had it all out.

Thank god I used this weird beeswax/conditioning wax that may have taken a lot of knots out with it but was very easy to wash out. It was more like leave-in conditioner then wax really, now that I look at the jar again. I am sure the black lady who said to try it was well-intentioned, but obviously had no idea how to dread white people hair. It was more counter-productive then anything else.

the hardest part about starting dreads was getting through all the useless information other people were giving me.