Are you using a heat protectant before styling your hair with hot tools? If not, you may be damaging your hair.
Hot styling tools are known to cause damage and breakage to your hair. Despite this fact, we continue using hot styling tools such as blow dryers and straighteners to style our hair. This is likely due to the efficacy, ease, and quickness of hot styling tools. While there are some alternative methods to styling hair without heat, they often require more time and a less polished look.
Thankfully, there is a way you can style your hair with hot styling tools and cause less damage. Less damage means healthier, shinier, stronger, and more beautiful hair.
So what’s the secret? Heat protectant products.
Heat protectant products are hair-care products that are applied before styling your hair with hot tools. They are often used on damp hair, before blow-drying or using curling irons, straighteners, or any other heat styling tools. These products can come in the form of a spray, serum, or mousse.
How do they work?
Heat protectant products act as a protective barrier between your hair and the heat imposed by styling tools. This protective shield prevents the heat from permeating the hair strand and damaging the fragile follicle.
While heat protectant products may not eliminate heat damage completely, they can greatly reduce the effects. Besides keeping your hair healthy and less damaged, the products are often infused with vitamins and oils which improve the texture and appearance of your hair.
Next time you style your hair, consider using a heat protectant product first.
Tag Archives: hair damage
Should you use a colored toning shampoo?
Anyone who’s colored their hair has witnessed first-hand the color change that occurs over time. You know how it goes, you leave the salon with your new color feeling amazing. Your hair is bright, dimensional, and perfect. Over the next few weeks your hair begins to change color. It might get brassy, show yellow or red hues, and dull. This can be due to washing, the environment, style tools, or the chemistry of your hair (fine, wavy hair loses color faster).
If this has happened to you, you may want to jump on the color shampoo train. Colored shampoos are shampoos that contain ingredients meant to counteract color change in dyed hair. The idea is to keep your hair looking as true-to-color as possible until your next hair coloring or toning appointment.
Colored shampoo comes in a few different options. Most popular is silver, blue, and purple. When you wash your hair with colored shampoo, the pigment is actually deposited into your hair. These colors counteract the colors you don’t want, keeping it true to your dyed color.
Colored shampoo is beneficial to blondes, graceful greys, redheads, and even brunettes. The tone-cancelling goodness may not be as evident in darker-tones but it’ll still prevent unwanted colors from peeking through.
If you aren’t sure which color shampoo is best for you, ask your hair stylist at your next appointment. They’ll be able to determine which color will best counteract the tones your hair is prone to turning.
Here’s how to style your hair with less heat damage
It’s no secret that hot styling tools are harmful to your hair. The heat can wreak havoc, causing damage to the hair’s follicle. Damaged hair means dullness and split-ends which lead to frizziness and breakage. No one wants that for their hair, but what’s a person to do?
Luckily, there are many ways to style your hair that don’t involve heat. So put the straightener, curling iron, and blow dryer down and get to styling your hair naturally and healthily.
Go wavy.
Depending on your natural hair, how you go about this style look will differ. If you’ve got naturally straight hair, you’ll need to add some product to give texture and dimension to your hair. Try some mousse, styling cream, or texturizing spray. There’s no rules here, just make sure it won’t weigh down your hair.
If you’ve got wavy or curly hair, you’ll just need to focus on the few way-ward pieces that have a mind of their own. You can do this by physically manipulating the hair with twists or bobby-pins. Add texturizing or hair spray so your look will last all day long.
Try your hand at a braid or braids.
Braids can be used as a style tool or by themselves. If you want to use them to as a tool, simply towel dry hair, detangle with a comb, and separate into sections braiding from the mid-shaft down to the ends.
If you want to use them as your look for the day, get creative! Our favorite (and easiest!) is a piece-y braid with one braid down the back started at either the top or middle. You can finish the hair down towards the end or wrap it in a bun for a different look. Pull pieces down around the face to give it a natural boho-look.
The most important thing to remember is there’s no limit or rules when it comes to styling your hair without heat. Don’t be afraid to try something different.
Is salt water good for your hair and skin?
With summer in full swing, we find ourselves spending more time at the pool and beach. With salt-water pools and naturally salty ocean water, you may be wondering if salt water is good for your hair and skin.
Skin
Salt water is full of vitamins and minerals. These nutrients are especially beneficial to those with skin conditions such as eczema and psoriasis.
Salt water has healing properties. Ever heard of taking a salt water bath? Or doing a soak in Epsom salt? Salt water helps to detoxify the skin, treat injuries, and reduce swelling.
Hair
The nutrients present in salt water work well at breaking down your hair’s natural oils. So if you’ve got overly oily hair, salt water can help keep your hair’s oil levels balanced.
Salt water opens up your hair’s cuticle which means damage for colored hair. Salt will cause your color to fade and look dull.
Salt water is dehydrating. Because of osmosis, salt water actually pulls water out of your hair’s strands. This will leave hair feeling dry and dehydrated.
In summary:
Pros – salt water is full of vitamins and minerals, has natural healing properties, helps balance out oily hair
Cons – its dehydrating and damages colored hair
What can you do?
Rinse hair with plain water before taking a dip in the ocean
Use a leave in conditioner before and after spending the day at the beach
Use hair products with SPF to protect your strands from harmful sun rays
How to keep oily hair in check
If you have naturally oily hair, then you are familiar with the oily hair struggle. Many individuals who suffer from oily hair have fine locks, which allows the oil to move quickly down the shaft from the scalp.
Our scalp produces oil naturally via the secretion glands under our scalp tissue. This oil moisturizes hair and keeps it soft, shiny, and healthy. Unfortunately, for some, the scalp overproduces oil causing unwanted oily hair.
While you can’t change your chemistry or genetics, you can change your habits and the products you use to help eliminate oily hair. Below are a few tips to keep your oil under control.
Don’t wash everyday – while this may seem counterintuitive, (if your hair is oily, you should wash it more, right?) washing your hair everyday could be causing your hair to overproduce oil. When you wash your hair it strips it of its natural nutrients. Doing this often could cause your hair to overproduce oil as a way to counteract the over-washing.
Stop touching your hair – touching or playing with your hair causes an increase in oil production.
Try conditioning your hair first – this technique, known as ‘reverse washing,’ allows your hair to reap the benefits of moisturizing, without the weight of residue left behind. Simply condition hair first, then finish with shampoo and a good rinse.
Make dry shampoo your best friend – using dry shampoo in powder form in between washes soaks up the oil in your hair and leaves behind a fresh smell. It’s a great tool to help you stretch the time between washes.
Turn down the heat – washing your hair with hot water can cause the scalp to overproduce oil. It also opens your hair’s cuticle and causes hair damage. Instead, use luke-warm water throughout the wash, and finish with a cold rinse.
Go au natural – your hair needs a break too. Don’t use hot styling tools every day. This can cause oily hair and hair damage.
Mix it up – try different hair styles in between washes. Maybe wear it down the first day, in curls the second, and in an up-do on the third. Oily hair actually helps make up-do’s look better and last longer.
8 things you should never do to your hair
There are some things that should just be plain avoided if you’re wanting to have healthy, strong, beautiful hair. Certain behaviors, products, and habits you do every day may be causing your hair to become damaged, dull, frizzy, and to stop growing.
Below is a list of 8 things you should avoid to keep your hair growing, healthy, strong, and beautiful.
- Sleeping in your hair products – sleeping in your hair gel, hairspray, or mousse can irritate the scalp and cause buildup. Buildup on the scalp means clogged pores and suffocated hair follicles. Make sure to wash or rinse the hair products out of your hair before bed.
- Hair ties – have you ever noticed fly-aways or hair breakage about halfway down the hair strand? This is caused by tight hair bands. When you wear your hair in a tight hair tie it causes delicate surface strands to break, leaving you with a frizzy, damaged ‘do. Try hair clips instead. You get the same look with less damage.
- Towel-drying hair with cotton towels – tying your hair up in a towel post-wash is a very common practice. But it may actually be causing hair damage. Cotton bath towels are rough on our locks. The fibers grip and pull on the hair, contributing to frizz and breakage. Your best bet – go for a microfiber towel instead. You’ll notice your hair will dry faster and look better.
- Hot styling tools on damp hair – hot styling tools like straighteners and curling irons should never be used on damp hair. After washing our hair, the cuticle is open. This means your hair is in an extremely fragile state. Applying hot tools on it will cause damage deep into the cuticle. This means dullness, frizz, breakage, and split ends. Practice patience and wait until your hair is dry.
- Direct, unprotected sun exposure – this one is extremely important for those with dyed hair. Not only will the sun change the color of your hair, it will contribute to dryness, which means brittle, straw-like feeling hair. Consider changing your products to ones with SPF in them. And if you plan on spending time in the sun, wear a hat to protect your locks and color.
- Sleeping with hair in a ponytail, bun, or tight braid – your hair needs rest to. Give it a break and refrain from tying it up tight in a ponytail, bun, or braid. As you move around in your sleep, your hair is being stretched and pulled. This tension, also known as traction alopecia, can cause breakage and hair loss over time.
- Weaves – weaves are another tension hair loss culprit. Weaves are sewn into the tightly braided natural hair. This tension lasts for an extended period of time and wreaks havoc on the hair follicles. With continued use, you will experience hair loss known as traction alopecia. For which, there is no cure or reversal method, only hair transplantation.
- Over-styling hair – our hair needs a break sometimes too. Constantly using hot styling tools and products on our hair can quickly cause damage, breakage, and dullness. Every few days let your hair go au natural to give it a break from styling and products.
Vitamin E for hair growth
Thanks to a recent study conducted by Tropical Life Sciences Research, we now have a new home remedy for minor hair loss.
According to the study, individuals in a double-blind study were given either vitamin E or a placebo to determine if vitamin E fights hair loss. The results showed that the individuals that were given vitamin E had a 35% increase in hair growth.
How does it work?
Vitamin E is an antioxidant. That means it has healing properties. Vitamin E can help prevent tissue damage as well as hair follicle damage. This in turn promotes healthy hair growth.
When vitamin E is applied to the scalp, it gets to work reducing inflammation and repairing tissue damage deep in the follicles.
How do you use it?
Vitamin E is sold in capsule form at most drug stores. These capsules are soft and can be punctured with a pin to release the gel from the inside.
This gel is safe to use as a topical skin or scalp treatment. It can be combined with olive, coconut, grapeseed, sesame, or carrot oil. Once the gel and oil are combined, apply the oil mixture onto clean hair. Massage into the scalp to promote blood circulation for added benefits.
To see desired results, you should apply vitamin E to your hair at least 2-3 times a week. You can also take the vitamin in its original capsule form to promote healthy skin and hair from the inside.
If you have noticed very minor hair loss, thinning, or just want to improve the texture and health of your hair, using vitamin E may help. Be sure to rule out any underlying medical conditions that may be causing the change in your hair.
If you have more aggressive hair loss, it is unlikely using vitamin E will show any real benefit. Once hair loss begins, it almost always continues to progress and worsen as time goes on. Therefore, if you wish to save your hair, it’s very important you begin preventative measures now.
Here at Modena, we specialize in the medical management of hair loss. Give us a call for a consultation today and discover your options.
How to prevent chlorine from damaging your hair
As the summer season approaches, many people find themselves spending more time in the pool to cool off. While swimming is fun, family-friendly, and a great work-out, it’s no secret it wreaks havoc on your hair.
This havoc is caused by the chlorine in the water. Chlorine is a chemical used to kill bacteria in the pool, keeping it clean and safe for use. Unfortunately, a side effect is that the harsh chemical irritates our skin, eyes, hair, and even clothes.
Chlorine harms your hair by stripping the natural oils from it which act as a protective barrier. This in turn causes hair to become dry and brittle.
Enduring a hot summer without the relief of a pool is not the life any of us want to live. So, what can you do to protect your hair from the damage cause by chlorine? Below is a list of easy ways to maintain your hair’s health while also enjoying your pool day.
- Apply hair product prior to taking a dip in the pool. Coating your locks with an oil-based product will not only add shine but will also hydrate your thirsty hair. More oil on the air means more protectant from the harmful chlorine.
- Rinse hair in the shower prior to swimming. Your hair can only absorb so much water (similar to a sponge). If your hair is wet prior to entering the pool, it will absorb less chlorine-filled pool water. This in turn means less damage.
- Apply a protective cap. While swim caps aren’t the most stylish of pool-side swimwear, they do offer protection.
- Try a specialty shampoo post-pool. Thanks to some crafty hair-care companies, there are now shampoos that can help rid your hair of chlorine deposits that like to stick around.
How to keep your hair healthy in and out of the shower
Did you know hair is weaker when its wet? It’s true. Water weakens the keratin (hair’s protein) causing the hair to be more fragile and prone to breakage.
Unfortunately, this is often when we’re roughest with our hair. Washing, scrubbing, towel drying, blow drying, hot tools, and the application of products all take their toll on our hair.
Thankfully, there are things you can do to protect your hair’s health in and out of the shower.
Washing – make sure you’re using a sulfate-free shampoo. Many of the cheaper shampoos contain sulfates which wreak havoc on our hair. Additionally, you should be gently massaging your scalp during each wash. This not only cleans hair effectively but stimulates blood flow to the follicles as well. Lastly, use luke-warm water when washing. Hot water damages the cuticle while cold damages the scalp. Luke-warm water is your best bet for healthy strands and follicles.
Conditioning – don’t skip it! Conditioner plays an important role in moisturizing your locks. If your hair isn’t moisturized your hair may overproduce oil causing buildup. No one wants that, so make sure to condition your hair after every wash.
Drying – vigorously rubbing our hair damages the fragile strands. Try gently patting dry instead. This will soak up any excess water. If blow-drying is a must that can’t be avoided, switch the heat setting to a warm or cool level. This will help to take the edge out of the harsh heat on your freshly washed hair.
Styling – use hot tools in moderation. Hot tools cause breakage. If you need to style your hair with hot tools, try applying a heat protecting serum first. Additionally, use a wide-tooth comb instead of fine brushes. Regarding styling and care products, always opt for organic. These products sit on our hair and scalp all day. Harsh chemicals cause build up and irritate the scalp.
Sun Damaged Hair
Did you know the sun can damage your hair similar to how it can damage your skin? It’s true. Those pesky UVA and UVB rays harm the outside layer of the hair strand known as the cuticle. Symptoms of sun damaged hair include dry brittle strands, split ends, frizziness, thinning, and discoloration.
When the sun shines on our hair it acts similarly to bleach. Anyone who’s familiar with the hair dye process knows that dyes and bleaches lift up our cuticle and break up the proteins to change the color. The sun’s rays can similarly damage our hair’s cuticle and proteins.
Those most at risk for sun damaged hair are going to be those with fine, curly, and light colored hair. This is because this type of hair lacks natural barriers like thickness, oils, and pigment.
Important things to keep in mind: hot styling tools, chlorine, and artificially lightened hair will make your hair more prone to sun damage. These things damage the cuticle and proteins of your hair as well. Doubling up on them and the sun can mean trouble for your locks.
So… short of missing out on all the fun, how do we enjoy the sun but also protect our precious heads of hair? Luckily, we have options.
- Apply a hair product with SPF
- Many hair products now contain SPF. Try switching to a shampoo that contains SPF as well as a sun styling spray. These work similar to sun block.
- Avoid peak sun times
- The sun is harshest from 10am-2pm everyday. Avoiding the harsh rays during this time will protect your skin and hair.
- Wear a hat
- One of the simplest ways to protect your hair – cover it up!
- Rinse hair with plain water after going in the pool or ocean
- Don’t let the chlorine and salt sit on your strands. This can prolong the damaging effects.
How often should you wash your hair?
There are a lot of differing opinions on this topic for both men and women. There are many factors that contribute to how often you should wash your hair. For example, if your hair is curly vs straight, long vs short, thin vs thick. Further, how often you sweat and what products you use can also play a role in how often you wash your hair.
There are benefits to washing your hair everyday as well as washing your hair less frequently. If you are using gels, hairsprays, and other products, washing your hair everyday can be beneficial. Letting these products sit on your scalp can cause irritation and dryness since they clog your pores.
If you sweat often or exercise daily, you may also want to wash your hair daily. Sweat contains lactic acid and DHT which can cause hair loss in some people.
If your hair is naturally oily, this would also be ideal for daily washing. Oils or ‘sebum’ can build up on the scalp and clog the pores. Sebum also contains DHT, the potential hair-loss causing hormone.
The type of hair you have (curly, long, thick, etc.) can determine how sebum moves through and builds up on your hair. Straight, thin hair often shows oil more significantly.
So now we know when we should wash our hair, but can washing it too frequently be bad for us?
Yes. The oils our hair secretes are our body’s way of naturally conditioning our hair. If we’re constantly stripping our hair of its natural oils it can dry out and appear frizzy and unhealthy.
Additionally, if we’re not using quality shampoos, we can be stripping our hair of its nutrients. Many cheap shampoos contain harsh chemicals such as sulfates. These chemicals are known to cause hair and scalp problems.
If you are experiencing any hair loss, considering investing in a good shampoo and washing more often. Ease up on the gels and products that can clog our pores and constrict the hair follicles. Here at Modena, we stand by prevention as the best way to fight hair loss. If you have begun noticing hair loss or thinning and would like to learn more about ways to protect your hair and prevent future hair loss, give us a call for a hair loss management consultation.
