WELCOME TO LOVING ME
Empowering Girls in Foster Care and Juvenile Probation Systems to love themselves and their hair unconditionally.
OUR STORY
Loving Me is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization dedicated to empowering girls in the foster care system to love themselves and their hair unconditionally. Founded in 2015, by Temica M. Wofford, Loving Me was created to uplift the self-esteem of girls in foster care through culturally responsive hair care support. With nearly two decades of experience serving youth in Atlanta, Chicago, and Los Angeles, Temica recognized a critical gap in services—specifically, the neglect of proper hair care for Black youth. She observed how this unmet need negatively impacted self-esteem, school attendance, behavior, and social interactions, and in some cases, increased vulnerability to sexual exploitation. Loving Me was established to address these disparities and empower girls to feel confident, cared for, and proud of their hair.
Vision
We envision a world where every girl in foster care embraces her identity, feels confident in her appearance, and is equipped with the tools and support needed to thrive. By addressing the often-overlooked hair care needs of Black youth, we aim to reduce barriers to self-confidence, improve overall well-being, and protect vulnerable girls from negative outcomes by fostering a strong sense of self-worth.
" For Black girls hair care is not about vanity, its about sanity"
Temica Wofford
SERVICES
ADVOCACY
We are on a mission to change the system by ensuring that hair care is a basic need that no longer goes unmet for youth in the foster care system. If your hair care is not being made a priority we are here to help
EDUCATION
Knowing how to care for and maintain your hair is a vital life skill, that we want our youth to master. Loving me seeks to provide youth with hair care education sessions to give them the tools to and develop the skills to love what they see when they look
in the mirror
CONNECTION
Our goal is to provide youth with access to routine professional hair care services. Connecting youth with a licensed stylist will allow them to establish a hair care routine that helps them maintain healthy hair but most importantly healthy self esteem
OUR FOUNDER
Temica Wofford
Foster Care Activist
Temica Wofford currently serves as the child sexual exploitation specialist for La Rabida Children’s Hospital, Children’s Advocacy Center in Park Forest, Illinois. Temica brings a wealth of knowledge and experience having served youth in the foster care and juvenile probation systems for two decades in Atlanta, Chicago, and Los Angeles. Temica has made it her mission to change the child welfare system. In 2015, Temica launched Loving Me, a program designed to empower girls to love themselves and their hair unconditionally. Her goal is to provide hair care advocacy, education and access to texture appropriate products and routine professional hair care services. In 2018, she launched the Love Box: a hair kit containing texture appropriate products given to youth living in LA County group homes and juvenile probation camps; which has garnered corporate sponsorship's from ORS, Mielle Organics, Curls and WOW Skin Science. The Love Box has been given to over 2,000 youth to date. In 2019, with the support of the Children’s Law Center of California Temica created a committee Caring For The Whole Child with Los Angeles County DCFS, Dept of Juvenile Probation, Community Care Licensing and the Ombudsman office to ensure that the hair care and hygiene needs of youth would become a priority and not something they had to earn and require staff and foster parents to receive training on how to care for African American hair. Her love for hair started at the age of 4, when she began spending Christmas and Summer breaks in Kansas City, MO. working at her Grandmother's barber and beauty salon.