Can a little dryness be a good thing?

[amaiaisabella]

I recently purchased a new shampoo, since most leave my hair thirsty for moisture, and make my split ends even more noticeable. I picked Freeman's Sea Kelp Moisture shampoo, and really like it since it adds shine and doesn't leave a film on my hair. No cones, but it does contain SLS. Anyway, I have noticed that the shampoo does not leave my hair "dry", but it doesn't add a ton of moisture either. However, this is good, because I have fine hair and can go more days between washings. Is this damaging, though? I still use a ton of conditioner (Kiss my Face's Whenever) and do not comb when wet. Can a little dryness be a good thing, or does the hair feel dry only because it has been stripped of the extra oils accumulated from days of not washing? I CWC every 4 days, and am looking to get to once a week.

[Tangles]

Well, I've always thought as long as you can run a comb through your hair easily you should be all right.

[freznow]

I've thought about this too. I'm still not sure. If I want my hair to feel moisturized and all that, it ends up looking REALLY stringy by the next day (a bane of fine, straight hair it seems)

On the other hand, if I allow my hair to be a bit dry, it takes a week before it starts getting stringy at all.

To me it seems that I've had more damage on the dry days, and damage spreads (One split rubs against another hair, and a new split has decided to be born >.<) so I'm thinking to aim for as moisturized as I can without getting so stringy that I can only wear it down for a few hours after my wash.

I guess there's a happy medium in the middle? I'm still trying to find it. I'm going to try some misting... But if you're happy with how moisturized it is right now, and it's not hard to detangle and stuff, I don't see why it should be a problem.

[MeMyselfandI]

I recently purchased a new shampoo, since most leave my hair thirsty for moisture, and make my split ends even more noticeable. I picked Freeman's Sea Kelp Moisture shampoo, and really like it since it adds shine and doesn't leave a film on my hair. No cones, but it does contain SLS. Anyway, I have noticed that the shampoo does not leave my hair "dry", but it doesn't add a ton of moisture either. However, this is good, because I have fine hair and can go more days between washings. Is this damaging, though? I still use a ton of conditioner (Kiss my Face's Whenever) and do not comb when wet. Can a little dryness be a good thing, or does the hair feel dry only because it has been stripped of the extra oils accumulated from days of not washing? I CWC every 4 days, and am looking to get to once a week.

Any hair that is so dry that it tangles is to dry.
I do not think you are describing dry hair, just hair that is not loaded with extra cones. Does your hair feel actually feel dry?

Since you are using the conditoner afterwards, I would not worry about the shampoo not leaving a lot of conditioner in it.

Does the shampoo have glycerin in it? (I find that glycerin adds shine, makes hair easier to untangle hair, but does not leave it feeling heavy.

I think it is better to use a shampoo that is good for your scalp, and conditoner that is good for the hair.

I found for my oily scalp, is that shampoos that strips oils from scalp get hair oilier faster.

[Katze]

Interesting that the finehairs seem to be agreeing here!

Your question is very much on my mind today because I washed my hair last night, oiled the ends while wet, and then went to bed in a towel like I normally do. This morning my hair is MUCH too greasy to wear down, and even getting an updo was hard because of the scalp cleavage. Yuk.

I really do prefer to have "dry" hair a couple times a month, which for me means washing and NOT conditioning. Very often, if I use conditioner every time, my hair doesn't really ever get clean. Although I condition from the ears down only, it's like the scalp hair doesn't get a chance to put that sebum anywhere. To me, "just" shampooing occasionally is "good" dryness and doesn't seem to affect the amount of splits I have at all.

However, there is also "bad" dryness; dull hair or hair that breaks, or hair that's staticky. When I first came to LHC I was used to not conditioning; my hair was bleached and heat-treated and all I knew was it being "dry". It took a lot of adjusting to get used to hair that had some of its own natural moisture on it! And sometimes I feel like I've gone too far; I'm washing my hair every 2-3 days now, when I used to stretch it to a week, because otherwise I get "scalp cleavage" and greasy stringy bangs.

This is all to say that we each need to find our own balance, within reason, and do what we think is best for our hair - getting it clean while maximizing its ability to moisturize itself.

[amaiaisabella]

Any hair that is so dry that it tangles is to dry.
I do not think you are describing dry hair, just hair that is not loaded with extra cones. Does your hair feel actually feel dry?


No, the hair doesn't feel dry (but for the last 2 inches, which are pretty damaged). I'm used to shampoos leaving a film over the hair, so the fact that this one doesn't makes me feel like it is "dry" because it is stripped of any film. Does that make sense?

[chrissy-b]

As long as your hair isn't so dry that it's breaking or tangling I think you'll be okay. You can always offset the drier days with a weekly deep moisture treatment or a heavy oiling before you wash. Or maybe just a little leave-in or coconut oil just on the very ends.