I admit: the last flatiron I bought was the Conair Straight Styles when I was fourteen. I tried to use it once, failed (it took two hours and my hair was a puffy mess), and never used it again (that flatiron later went to Goodwill after sitting in my parents house unused for five years). I had resigned myself for more than a decade that I simply could not straighten my thick, long, coarse, naturally curly hair on my own and reserved that mystical power to professionals, who made it look so easy. After about a year of product research, I found this flatiron, made especially for hard to straighten hair and was wet-to-dry capable. I finally took the plunge. Two days after I got it (and reading the user manual several times), I nervously sat on the floor of my bedroom, mirror in from of me, wet hair clipped on top of my head and went through, small section by small section, starting from the bottom of my head and working toward the top. I had the heat on the highest setting, and yes, I did have to pass through some sections twice because the hair was still damp. I probably shouldn’t have made my first attempt a wet-to-dry attempt, but I did. The sizzling of my wet hair on the hot plates wasn’t comforting, either. It took forty minutes, but it worked! My hair was straight for two days until I washed it again. After sleeping on it, I would heat the flatiron up again and smooth things out a little, but that took five minutes. (And I can’t stress enough how uncoordinated and stupid I am with hair appliances – I still don’t own a hairdryer.) On my second attempt, I decided to try it on already dry hair. It still worked well, but since I was spraying my hair so liberally with my heat protection product, my hair ended up becoming wet before straightening anyway. I make sure to wipe down the (cooled) plates after every use with a damp washcloth. I am hoping that if I take good care of this iron that I won’t have to replace it for a long time. But if/when the time comes, I would buy this again.