Too many of us take our hair for granted. It’s part of our body, yet we don’t give it the same amount of care or attention as we do other parts. A great example is your skin. Most of you have a detailed skincare routine that you follow every day. Why? Because you know your skin faces lots of external factors that can damage it every day. You also don’t want it to get cracked, wrinkly, or suffer from any other skin conditions.
Despite this, you don’t necessarily do the same for your hair. You think you’re taking good care of it, but your hair is subjected to the same external factors as your skin. It bears the heat from the sun every day, it deals with wind and the elements – and that’s before we mention everything you do to it!
The simple fact is that we need to take better care of our hair if we want it to remain healthy. So, here’s a very simple guide you can follow for healthier hair forever.
What is ‘unhealthy’ hair?
Before we look at some tips to keep your hair healthy, what exactly do we mean by unhealthy hair? How does the hair on your head go from being healthy to unhealthy?
Mainly, these are the signs of unhealthy hair:
- Excessive hair loss
- Split ends
- Damaged looking hair
- Hair that’s really dry and strawlike
- Hair that’s excessively oily
- Dandruff
- Thinning hair
Healthy hair should look luxurious. It should be thick, feel really nice to touch, and have good volume and bounce. Loads of things can happen in your life to stop your hair from being its healthiest. As such, you suffer from self-esteem issues – which only get worse if you don’t address the problem.
With that in mind, let’s look at some ideas to promote healthier hair:
Don’t overwash your hair
Washing your hair every day isn’t necessary. It strips the hair of its natural oils, making it feel dry and look like straw. If your hair is really brittle and doesn’t even feel like hair, you’re probably washing it too much.
Aim for once every couple of days – if your hair is greasy, you should try to wash it once every two days. If your scalp is excessively dry, widen the gap so you don’t get rid of the essential oils in your scalp.
Wash your hair properly
Speaking of washing your hair, learn how to do it properly. This might sound stupid – surely everyone knows how to wash their hair?! But you’ll be amazed how many of us aren’t doing it correctly.
These are the steps you should follow:
- Choose a shampoo/conditioner for your hair type
- Ensure you thoroughly lather the shampoo and let it sink into your hair/scalp
- Rinse the shampoo completely so no suds are present
- Apply conditioner and let it sit before also rinsing it out
- Only use warm water to wash your hair, avoid turning it up too hot
Using the wrong products can mean you’re feeding your hair things that exacerbate problems. For example, if you have oily hair and you’re using shampoo for people with a dry scalp, you’re adding extra oil to your hair that makes things worse.
Likewise, if you’re not lathering the shampoo and getting it deep into your scalp, you aren’t washing away all the dirt, dead skin, and other stuff that clogs the hair follicles. Of course, failing to rinse thoroughly means you leave the product in your hair, leading to dandruff and other issues.
Never use hot water as the heat will damage your hair – more on this in a moment!
Get a regular haircut
It’s unwise to go months without a visit to the hairdresser. Seeing someone once every 8 weeks minimum is a good habit to get into.
Why? Because it lets you get a small trim to prevent pesky split ends. Split ends can look really bad and cause confidence issues – not to mention they ruin the strength of your hair and make it likely that strands will fall out.
Regular trims stop this and encourage your hair to grow healthily.
Protect your hair from heat
Heat and hair do not pair well together. And yet, we use so many heat-based things on our hair all the time. Whether it’s a blow dryer, straightener, or curling tongs, we’re applying so much heat to our follicles.
The problem with this is that heat damages your hair in multiple ways. It weakens the structure of your follicles by damaging keratin – an important protein for hair strength and elasticity. The result is hair that falls flat, lacks volume and just looks unhealthy. Plus, heat dries out your hair and can make it brittle and very rough to the touch.
Make it your mission to protect your hair from heat by avoiding heat treatments as much as possible. Let your hair dry naturally or turn the blow dryer down to its coldest setting. Look for heatless alternatives to curling your hair – and only pull out the straightener when you need to.
Avoid DIY dyeing
If you want to dye your hair, make sure you see a professional. Doing it at home will likely mean you use bad products full of terrible chemicals that weaken your hair and can promote hair loss.
Instead, go to a salon and avoid dyeing your full head of hair all the time. Instead, opt for highlights if you want a splash of color. As you can see from this honey highlights color guide, there are so many ways to change your hair with some highlights. It’s much better than slapping dye all over your head and completely changing its color.
So, if you do want to re-color your hair, go to a salon, get it done professionally, and opt for highlights instead.
Don’t use tight hairstyles too often
Pulling your hair into a tight hairstyle might look pretty, but it’s bad for its health. You put extra strain on the follicles, meaning they become weaker and can fall out. Over time, certain hairstyles that pull your hair back can lead to a receding hairline in many women.
Unless you’re going out, there’s no reason you can’t just keep your hair down in a relaxed style. If you do tie it up, try not to do it too tightly, too often.
These tips barely scratch the surface of haircare, but they cover some of the main talking points. If you want to take better care of your hair, follow this guidance and watch it become thicker, healthier, and more luxurious.
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