More About My Hair

[marcmagus]

[If this is too frequent/uninteresting, feel free to filter these posts out on the "hair" tag if your aggregator allows it. If it doesn't, complain to the manufacturers for giving you a crap product.]

I've spent much of the last couple of days reading around at CurlTalk and learning more about how curly hair works and how the whole CurlyGirl/no-poo thing works from a chemistry perspective.

One thing that kind of jumped out at me as I was reading was that most of the basic hair care regimens suggested sounded like they'd be less stress on my arms than all the brushing and combing I've been doing, so I'm going to start experimenting.

Yesterday I walked to CVS and got a cheap ($0.06 due to luck and a kind cashier) bottle of VO5 Free Me Freesia conditioner. This morning I washed my scalp and hair with it thoroughly, put a bit more in, rinsed with dilute vinegar, squeezed out most of the water, and gathered things up on top of my head with a T-shirt for a couple hours to dry out of the way while I went about my business.

I know I'm probably going to have to look into some sort of finishing product to hold things together and prevent the top from lifting off and frizzing, but two things dissuaded me from doing so yet. The main one was that I was kind of paralyzed by indecision looking at shelves and shelves of options (and the product mosephine kindly recommended wasn't carried). The second is that by only introducing one new product to my routine, I can kind of get a sense of what and how much it does on its own before adding something else in. Yay data.

So, this is what I've got, about half an hour after letting it out of the shirt. Not sure how I feel about it, but it's definitely . . . different.

My camera, having lost power when I unplugged it over the last couple of days, randomly decided to step the resolution up to 1024x768, so that's what you get.

Note this is no more than three hours after shaving. My facial hair is a source of much frustration, which has convinced me I don't want to go for a smooth bald shaved head, even though I think my skull might have interesting enough features to pull it off.

Comments

[tirerim]

Interesting -- the thing I notice most is that it seems to have a lot more curl/wave near your scalp, though it may be curlier at the bottom, too.

Regarding shaving, I know at least one person who tends to go bearded primarily because otherwise he has a perpetual five o'clock shadow, mostly due to thin/translucent skin.

[jazzfish]

My facial hair is a source of much frustration

If you find a solution to this I'd love to hear it. My choices seem to boil down to: grow a beard (itchy, warm, reduced chances of Making Out With Hot Chicks); shave with a blade (time-consuming, occasionally bloody, actual smoothness lasts only a few hours longer than with an electric); shave with an electric (current option, leaves me with five o'clock shadow at ten AM).

[marcmagus]

Ugh, I wish. My beard doesn't actually itch too badly (and when I've had it grown in has seemed "hot chick" neutral to positive), and with the beard my neck stubble becomes much less visibly apparent, so I can get away with shaving every few days instead of daily. So if you haven't tried growing in the beard for a month or so, you might find it's not so bad.

I go for a good shave with a good sharp blade. I get a bigger difference than you, though (electric leaves me with immediate stubble I can feel; blade I have immediate shadow, but I get until at least noon before it's tangible). Have you looked into technique and soap and brush for blade shaves? Might help.

[miintikwa]

It looks good!

WRT "anti-frizz" products, when you're ready to add something else in, Frizz-Ease is fantastic, but there's also a generic that has essentially the SAME ingredients. I use it, because my hair has gone from stick-straight to OMG!CURL in the last five-ten years, and I now have ultra-frizz if I don't use product. (Even using product, I get frizz by the end of the day, but the products help immensely.)

If the shampoo you're using doesn't work, try Ion's curly hair products. They're great. You can get them at Sally Beauty Supply.

[marcmagus]

I used to use Frizz Ease many many years ago and was never really happy with the way it worked on my hair. My hair's different now, so I might see different results, but Frizz Ease hair serum consists almost entirely of silicones (cyclomethicone and dimethiconol) which are incompatible with the "Curly Girl" no shampoo treatment method.

If you haven't read this stuff yourself, you might find it really interesting...want links?

[miintikwa]

I may have read it, but link me! I am curious to see what it says.

I did a lot of research and messing around while trying to find the "right" treatments for my hair (speaking of-- have you read about the coconut milk conditioning treatment?), and my hair actually does *better* with silicones. I tried a silicone free shampoo and conditioner for two weeks, and my hair was a WRECK at the end of it. I couldn't even run a comb through it. I know that the one site I read said things would get worse before they got better, but my hair was dry and breaking. So I went back to the silicones and my hair went back to being easily managed.

I find it fascinating the different results people have with this type of stuff! :)

[marcmagus]

As barometry pointed out, the CurlTalk forum is a great reference. Particularly some posts in the newbies forum.

I found the explanations at Live Curly, Live Free (that page and those which follow) particularly helpful, as it gets into the why of it all. I always feel better following advice when I have enough information that it makes sense in my head.

(The gist is that the combination of silicone sealants and sulfite detergents works, but in a kind of over-the-top way that leaves you really dependent on continuing to use them in alternation. Dropping them would give the "worse before better" effect [I was lucky; I dropped everything except the occasional acid wash a while ago, so I don't have to go through that]. Dropping only one would probably result in a mess (immediately if you dropped the silicone but not the sulfites, in a few weeks if you did it the other way around).)

[miintikwa]

Interesting! Thank you. I'll look at it. I've been thinking of going to the Ion curly shampoo-- I tried it a while back and it was amazing-- because I think it doesn't have the silicones. I'll have to check my current shampoo to see if it has them.

I switched, recently, from a protein-based shampoo and conditioning treatment to a moisture based one, and it's made a lot of difference, but the conditioning doesn't stick around. The day I wash my hair, it's great. Smooth and curly. The next day, it's a frizzy mess again. I'm still searching for something that will help for more than a day.