Long healthy hair with no effort?

[queenovnight]

I was speaking with my sister, and we started talking about hair and how some women are able to grow their hair to extreme lengths without any real effort.


So! Do you know anyone like this, or are you like this yourself? For some reason, I find this fascinating!
No effort - I mean completely effortless. On LHC it seems the 'norm' to use oil on your head, but by my experience.. most people think it's a little weird to use 'food' on your hair. - The people I speak of don't use any treatments. No tea rinses, hair masks or special growth products. Nothin!


Examples:
My boyfriends mother has been maintaining TBL hair for most of her years, and does nothing but wash and go. Sometimes blow dries.
My ex's mother had fingertip length hair and also did nothing. Actually, she dyed her roots monthly and used heat.
My cousin had TBL hair and again.. no extra care.




No effort: Someone who does nothing to improve the health of their hair, but still has beautiful hair.
To clear this up, I'm talking about women and men who have beautiful hair, without paying attention to the health of their hair. (I don't know any other way to explain what im saying here.) This includes people that use heat, bleach, hair dye, using a basic brush, always wearing hair down, and so on, but still have long beautiful hair. - Also known as 'benign neglect' on the forum.

[Valkyriejae]

I was able to grow to TBL without any real effort (I used heat, rough brushing, sulphates and silicones which I have since discovered my hair hates...)
That said, it wasn't a very nice TBL, the damage was pretty obvious - splits and frizz and dull as all get-out.

[ravenreed]

I think some of us just have naturally resilient hair. I got to waist length doing everything wrong. I wore my hair down every day. I dyed monthly with box dyes, and I don't mean just my roots, full head application because red dyes fade so quickly. The only thing I didn't do was use heat. It was only at waist length that I ran into trouble and was cutting off as much hair as I was growing. Searching for ways to grow longer lead me to LHC.

[mouse2cat]

So I have really really easy hair. One of the reasons I have long hair is that it is easier than going in for regular cuts.

http://i.imgur.com/YYwp4bGl.jpg

I'm finally getting to a length where I have to do a little figuring out to keep it all healthy. I am trying to cut back on shampoo, but other than that I usually wear it up. so I spend approx 5 minutes getting it up in a bun of some kind and then proceed to forget about it for the rest of the day. I am probably the only person here who has long hair because she is lazy..

[neko_kawaii]

Mouse2cat, you are hardly alone in being here due to laziness. There are a surprising number of us who have long hair because we are basically lazy.

I grew to waist with no special treatment. My mother is at classic with no special treatment. I started to experiment with oils and deep treatments because I wanted to carve out some time for myself and I found I liked the results.

[BrendaLoan]

I think genetics are the main factor. I grew my hair close to TBL straightening it almost every day (after that, I bleached half of my hair TWICE to get the ombre look) shudder: but even then, there wasn't so much damage. After that, I decided to take care of my hair and found LHC.
With time I've come to the conclusion that, at least for my hair, less is more. So I wash it once a week, and I apply coconut oil the night before washing. I can say my hair is happy with no effort at all :o

[lapushka]

Well, nothing special here either, apart from washing with a particular method (see signature) and doing some styling, but nothing special is done to the hair apart from that.

[eadwine]

Same here.. managed to get to tailbone with it :)

[Rosa Harris]

Long healthy hair with no effort I go on and on about my son with his golden blond thigh length ringlets that are probably the extreem of the thread name!

1) he has no interest in long hair but his curls look better than a fro-head or bald head
2)he rarely detanges even allowing the curls to just sort of form dread like natural ringlets - he does nothing to encourage them. He sleeps on them. he does not spritz. they just stay - for weeks - that way.
3) he has no brush, comb and he does not finger comb unless something weird happens as it breaks up his ringlets and makes a fluff ball of frizz.
3)eventually - maybe once a month, or every two moths - he can never say - he will wash and detangle with sulfates and cones - makes him itch tho so he does ot care to.
4)he does not think much about it other than the girls at the college won't leave him alone about how he does it and then get way frustrated when he has no 'secrets' other than - just leave the stuff alone.
5) he has never trimmed once in 23 years. He has panic attacks - real ones - at the idea of scissors near his ears.

[eadwine]

I would love to see a picture of his hair.... you are making me (and I am sure others as well!) curious *grin*

[Nadine <3]

I think long hair is pretty effortless if you ask me...I mean once you find a routine that works for you it is easier than having short hair and styling it every morning. All I have to do is pull my sleep braid out and finger comb it if I'm wearing it down. If I'm wearing it up it take like...5 minutes to throw it up. Usually less than that when I use a stick. When my hair was short I washed it every morning, applied a butt tone of product and blow dried it with my head upside down. Even after all that...I still hated my hair lol

[BrendaLoan]

I would love to see a picture of his hair.... you are making me (and I am sure others as well!) curious *grin* :agree: Indeed

[blue_eyes]

I made it to waist length doing everything wrong :P Constantly dyed it black with permanent dye (all of it, not just the roots), blowdryed it, didn't pay much attention to products, never used oils, always wore it down & brushed it. I just stopped cutting it completely, so it grew quite long, but the ends were so dry/damaged that they'd constantly break off. I hope next time I reach WL my hair will actually be healthy.

[Lucky_Lucy]

mouse2cat - That BRAID! So thick <3 <3 That's great you have easy hair haha :D


I have this classmate, who has hip length golden hair and has had it for most of her life. She does nothing for her hair, and wears it loose all the time. Sometimes in a ponytail. Rarely in a braid. Never seen it in a bun. She might have split ends, but I guess she trims regularly. Last year she cut back to waist, and now it's back to hip. She is one of the reasons I decided it's time to have long hair :)))

[Johannah]

I would love to see a picture of his hair.... you are making me (and I am sure others as well!) curious *grin*

You're right about that!

[lazuliblue]

I think there's a lot of stuff that you can do in a quest for long hair, but that doesn't mean that everyone here does it! I suppose there are a lot of threads for all sorts of different things, henna, CO washing, SO washing, SMT (still not sure what that is!) so it can seem like everyone does everything suggested here for their hair. However, I think most of us just do a few of those things.

If you look at this thread you will see that a lot of the people with TBL+ hair actually have pretty simple routines: http://forums.longhaircommunity.com/showthread.php?t=119652

[florenonite]

I don't see why not. When you think about it, benign neglect, so often advocated here, is remarkably similar to how people who can't be bothered with regular salon trips end up with long hair. I got to below BSL a couple times in high school that way and, while my standards for hair health have probably increased, I don't remember it being ratty or tangly or anything like that. I never washed my hair until it needed it, because it took a long time to dry, and I wasn't standing around for half an hour blow-drying it. I didn't even brush it that often (read: I was lazy). Nor did I ever heat-style it (again, read: lazy). I also wore it up most of the time because it got in the way otherwise.

Of course, there's always that one girl who shampoos and straightens her waist-length bleach-blonde hair every day, leaving it loose to catch on handbags and handles, and it still seems to be in perfect condition. All I have to say about that is, well, genetics aren't fair ;)

[Rosa Harris]

I would love to see a picture of his hair.... you are making me (and I am sure others as well!) curious *grin*

I'm working on talking him into letting me get a back shot of him again. he got totally creeped after he ended up on a hair-****** site a few years ago - a friend found the pic doing an image search (or more likely submitted it as a joke on him) and he is hard line on no hair online pics. I might have some I can share from his FB that partially show it. I'll look.

[eadwine]

Do obscure the face and all that. I do not want someone's hair to be posted and the person be recognizable. You could put some bold text through the picture for instance, that would render it unusable for ******es but we would see enough to judge :D

Just an idea :)

[Rosa Harris]

ok he gave me permission to post this - I'm sorry he is super internet private and is an absolyte no on letting me get him from behind because he says that 'hair creepers troll that site you go to'

you can kinda see his tail

https://farm6.staticflickr.com/5476/13976001440_37083f2ede_n.jpg (https://flic.kr/p/ni1Ej5)mal2 (https://flic.kr/p/ni1Ej5) by rosarl13 (https://www.flickr.com/people/121893704@N04/), on Flickr

[eadwine]

Is he one of those kids who started out blonde and turned darker later on? :) My ex was one of those, white as a ghost hair and now really dark brown.

I can see his length indeed.. wow!

[Rosa Harris]

Actually the color is hard to describe - that lighting is bad - it starts off a chesnut brown with individual goldenbrass kinky hairs in it. It also has some wavy red red hairs and some golden-redish tinted natural sunbleached tipping starting about lower-mid back.

here is a pic when he was little - this is not the full length of it in the frint and I'd straitened out his ringlets so he did not look like shirley temple in his photo - the dork behind him is me
https://farm8.staticflickr.com/7415/14105886023_b581a12440_n.jpg (https://flic.kr/p/nuumtr)malhair (https://flic.kr/p/nuumtr) by rosarl13 (https://www.flickr.com/people/121893704@N04/), on Flickr

[eadwine]

Ahhh I thought you said he was a blonde.. (*scratches head* my memory is wonky haha, very much so!) cause I see no blond hair there :) Gorgeous hair for sure! :D

[Rosa Harris]

Ahhh I thought you said he was a blonde.. (*scratches head* my memory is wonky haha, very much so!) cause I see no blond hair there :) Gorgeous hair for sure! :D

I did say golden-blond. golden -orange ends? its a mix of red red scotch--Irish hair from his dad who's curlies turn a orange-red almost henna like color to the lengths and my Roma/Black/Dutch mix hair. LOL. It looks more chesnut drown inside but it gets a golden shine in the sunlight. My hair is dark so maybe its that is blond to me? dark blond? It's kinda and omber effect.. he loves the pool and outdoors in the summer so maybe its clorine that has something to do with that toward the ends?

I'm never sure what to call his hair color. The ends - the shadows hide it are golden - it shows in the pic when he was younger.

[eadwine]

I love different colors in a length :)

[meteor]

Unless you are in bad health or your hair is naturally fine, fragile and split-prone, hair can (and should) grow long effortlessly. Whether you like it or not, it just grows. Just don't cut it and don't damage it.
The problem is some people have damaging practices (heat, chemical, mechanical) and then expect to make up for that with some "miracle" treatment, ignoring the fact that damage is cumulative and can't be undone (only temporarily patch-repaired, at best).


As for me, I had classic-length hair effortlessly before I started getting bleached highlights. I was actually really rough on my hair (always skipping conditioner, rough wet brushing, always wore hair down or in tight ponytails) but it was resilient enough to stay in very good shape. But adding bleach to that damaging mix meant that I should have started treating it better, deep conditioning and avoiding mechanical damage. Well, I learned my lesson. I don't damage it anymore, and it's growing really effortlessly.

[Madora]

Your genes play a major role in whether your hair will grow to a great length or not.

Long hair will grow..but how healthy it is remains to be seen.

Personally, I don't put anything on my scalp/hair except my GM pink crème shampoo (diluted) once a month and a few drops of MO to detangle afterwards.

I use a pure bbb daily and have never had any problems having healthy, long hair.

[elsieivy]

I've grown my hair as far as hip while abusing it but while it was fairly long, it definitely wasn't healthy. I still don't do a lot for my hair but I try to wear it up and use gentle products on it at least.

[Tini'sNewHair]

All I do is wash and put up in protective styles BUT I do S&D and trim, I dont want splits. I did however used to use a lot of different oils etc. But these days, a simple routine is what works for me :)

[Anje]

All I really do is wear my hair contained and sleep in a sleep bonnet (which has the added benefit of keeping the cats out of my hair and keeping it from strangling me). I put some oils on it, but they're hardly necessary. I just shampoo & condition, or CO wash, when my hair is dirty otherwise. Nothing to it, and my hair is fairly fragile.

[Jumper]

Grew to waist doing nothing special to it. Could have grown longer I'm sure if my mom wouldn't have always been like "You Don't Want Hair Down To Your Butt." And chopping it back to waist all the time. Now I don't care what she thinks and I DO want hair down to my butt and have always wanted it.

I will say my hair looks way better with LHC tricks I've learned. Too soon to say if it will get any "healthier" but I hope I'll see a few less splits as I grow it longer.

[MadeiraD]

I had knee/almost knee when I was 14/15 and I never did anything special to it and always wore it down (hopefully I can get there again)

[woodswanderer]

I think I had my hair around hip when I joined LHC. No special treatment beyond no heat styling or hairspray. That was actually done out of general laziness though. I suppose there must be a genetic component, but I never knew anyone in my family to have long hair. That may have been more by their style choice than by lack of long hair genes. My grandmother kept her hair short all of my life, but she started growing it out when she was about 74 and it got to APL in decent looking shape. I don't know how long it might have got because she cut if off when she got cancer.

[Islandgrrl]

So I spend approx 5 minutes getting it up in a bun of some kind and then proceed to forget about it for the rest of the day. I am probably the only person here who has long hair because she is lazy..

I'm right there with you. I have long hair because it's easier and faster to deal with than short hair ever was. I'm basically too lazy to bother doing anything complicated with it. Maintenance is as minimal as possible. I've managed mid-thigh length by basically ignoring it as much as possible.

[queenovnight]

ok he gave me permission to post this - I'm sorry he is super internet private and is an absolyte no on letting me get him from behind because he says that 'hair creepers troll that site you go to'

you can kinda see his tail

https://farm6.staticflickr.com/5476/13976001440_37083f2ede_n.jpg (https://flic.kr/p/ni1Ej5)mal2 (https://flic.kr/p/ni1Ej5) by rosarl13 (https://www.flickr.com/people/121893704@N04/), on Flickr

LMAO on the 'hair creeps"

Great hair he has btw!

[MINAKO]

My best friend in highschool was like this, classic length, super shiny 1b Mii hair. Never bothered with using anything but normal shampoo, ripped a cheap brush through it once or twice a day, always wore it down. There was really nothing to it for her. Once she did cut it to collar bone lenght and it was back to hip in no time without trimms or any special attention. It could have been in a better condition probably, but still looked great.

[momschicklets]

Well I'm really *hoping* I can grow long healthy hair without any effort because...well...I'm sort of lazy! I read with interest how others oil their hair, chelate, wear protective updos, sleep in special styles, etc., but I haven't been able to bring myself to do those things. I'm careful about using heat on my hair and I never rip a brush through it, but I'm just sort of hoping my hair will grow nice anyway without doing much else. Perhaps my approach would be different if I were trying to grow to a super length, but I've had BSL before when I was a teenager and I paid absolutely no attention to it at the time. Hopefully *fingers crossed* I can get back to that goal with mostly benign neglect.

[Anabell]

For the most of the time it is the things that you don't do. You can put some extra effort but the most important thing is leave it alone and let it be. Most of the women put a lot of effort in to their hair. They dye it, style it, wash it frequently, cut it into a new hairstyle and etc. Long hair care is all about let it be. Less washing less products. You put it up in the morning and that it.

I was able to grow my hair past TBL after I had dye it red (the whole head) three times, once a year for three years. And before that I was go to the hair dresser twice a year or so to cut in a new layers (she didn't touch the longest layes though cause I told her I grow it out.) and blow dry it at the end.
I wear it down every day for the most of the time. I have to admit the condition was bad, lots of splits and so. But it grow this long without any good care and with damage things I do to it. So I guess that if I does nothing (good or bad) to my hair it would grow longer and better in this period of time in a better condition, without any effort.
You also don't know what the real condition of one's hair. You can't see splits or white dots from a distance.

[mary*rose]

Long healthy hair with no effort I go on and on about my son with his golden blond thigh length ringlets that are probably the extreem of the thread name!

1) he has no interest in long hair but his curls look better than a fro-head or bald head
2)he rarely detanges even allowing the curls to just sort of form dread like natural ringlets - he does nothing to encourage them. He sleeps on them. he does not spritz. they just stay - for weeks - that way.
3) he has no brush, comb and he does not finger comb unless something weird happens as it breaks up his ringlets and makes a fluff ball of frizz.
3)eventually - maybe once a month, or every two moths - he can never say - he will wash and detangle with sulfates and cones - makes him itch tho so he does ot care to.
4)he does not think much about it other than the girls at the college won't leave him alone about how he does it and then get way frustrated when he has no 'secrets' other than - just leave the stuff alone.
5) he has never trimmed once in 23 years. He has panic attacks - real ones - at the idea of scissors near his ears.

Haha I remember in high school hearing about this kid who had beautiful, incredibly thick, long, black eyelashes - naturally. Girls would go CRAZY and constantly compliment him on them until he came in one day with them hacked off...

My SO has beautiful curls, but he works for them. He must be lucky to have such naturally beautiful hair.

[mary*rose]

I am probably the only person here who has long hair because she is lazy..

Haha nooo...you're not x)

[soothsayer]

My mother could probably grow her hair to her hips by just not cutting it. She has coarse hair, so she sometimes uses oils and nice things, but mostly she likes to straighten or curl it more with heat. She wouldn't let it get really long, though; she'd get sick of her thick curls and chop it back to APL with lots of layers. I do think that genes have a lot to do with it. I might try to find my terminal length at some point just given my family's hair history of thick, fast-growing hair.

[lapushka]

Unless you are in bad health or your hair is naturally fine, fragile and split-prone, hair can (and should) grow long effortlessly. Whether you like it or not, it just grows. Just don't cut it and don't damage it.
The problem is some people have damaging practices (heat, chemical, mechanical) and then expect to make up for that with some "miracle" treatment, ignoring the fact that damage is cumulative and can't be undone (only temporarily patch-repaired, at best).

Exactly! Unless you're doing damaging things to it (dye, bleach especially), and or having it trimmed regularly, it should just do what it naturally does: grow long.

[Quasiquixotic]

I've had hair like this in the past. I've grown hair to BSL or waist 4 times from chin or shorter from when I was 16 to 32 when I had my last big chop. I'm working on time 5 now. I never really thought about my hair or did anything special to it. However by nature I prefer to wear my hair up and I am super lazy so I've never "styled" my hair on a regular basis, thus I rarely used heat. I do brush my hair wet :/

This time I'm drinking the LHC koolaid so deep conditioning treatments, Shea moisture hair products, I'm trying to stop brushing my hair wet, benign neglect, micro trims or no trims, catnip, yada yada. So my hair should be awesome, thanks LHC :hifive:

[trolleypup]

So I have really really easy hair. One of the reasons I have long hair is that it is easier than going in for regular cuts.

I am probably the only person here who has long hair because she is lazy..
I think there are more of us than you think!

[Lindenare]

When I was 14, my hair was at tailbone-ish and still growing. I mostly wore it down, sometimes in a ponytail, very occasionally in a braid. I blowdried more often than I do now and brushed much more roughly. I cut it back to shoulder length after that summer because I didn't have the patience to deal with my hair after some chlorine damage, which resulted in my hair starting to tangle nearly every day and the ends beginning to split (I'd never had to deal with either problem before). When I had the chop, the hairdresser told me that my hair was very healthy, and I really didn't believe that, as it was the most damaged my hair ever was. Now, I realize that it probably was healthy when compared with hair that is regularly bleached, heat treated, etc.

[vindo]

Optimal health, optimal nutrients and/ or a younger age (better health at a younger age) can result into very carefree hair.

I grew my hair to just hip length with daily shampoo, I also had some highlights, semi permanent dye, I brushed it 20 times a day with a wire brush, I slept with it down, wore it down always, no oils, no masks, no conditioner. It was in pretty good health. At some point the ends got a little dry, but nothing major. No splits.

And then it just so happened that the next dye application broke my hair off and I stopped torturing it ^^

Nowadays I don't dye, I oil and do everything right, but my health had it's ups and downs and my hair isn't what it used to be.

[Dessi]

I was able to grow to hip with no care at all and using blowdrayer (everytime I wash my hair), heat sometimes and wearing it down EVERY single day. But it was super damaged so I'm glad I chopped to MBL and now I'm back at hip with healthy, thicker hair. Here's a picture:
http://prikachi.com/images/231/7322231J.jpg
But yeah, some people don't do anything and have long, healthy hair. Pretty obvious I'm not one of them. :D

[VJG]

I was able to grow to hip with no care at all and using blowdrayer (everytime I wash my hair), heat sometimes and wearing it down EVERY single day. But it was super damaged so I'm glad I chopped to MBL and now I'm back at hip with healthy, thicker hair. Here's a picture:
http://prikachi.com/images/231/7322231J.jpg
But yeah, some people don't do anything and have long, healthy hair. Pretty obvious I'm not one of them. :D

Wow, you've got a lovely head of hair now! While this is such an impressive transformation, it actually looked nicer than many people's hair does at that length.

[GoldenSilk]

So I have really really easy hair. One of the reasons I have long hair is that it is easier than going in for regular cuts.
..
I am probably the only person here who has long hair because she is lazy..

Nah, that was one of my biggest reasons too!

Actually, I even save money, if I don't buy too many hairtoys. I had to get my hair trimmed every month to keep it at shoulder. My conditioner and oil cost way less than trims, and now it's long enough that I can easily self-trim.

I got almost to classic when I was a teenager, neglecting my hair quite a bit. I didn't use heat, or tons of cones. (Too cheap and lazy.) I washed it every other day with regular shampoo and conditioner, and ripped cheap brushes through it multiple times a day. I wore it in a tight ponytail or tight beebutt bun the second day or during marching band practice. I never protected it from the sun or from catching it in things. I remember I always used to get it caught in the rivets of the school desk seats. :rolleyes: I got it trimmed, but it would get longer whenever I didn't have time to go to the hairstylist.

This time around, I think it's in better condition, but not really in proportion with how much nicer I treat it. A lot of it is old damage due to health issues and not realizing I had hard water buildup for a year. I'm hoping I'll see even more shine and fewer tangles over time. I have a feeling my new routine would still count as benign neglect by many people's standards. :)

[Dessi]

Wow, you've got a lovely head of hair now! While this is such an impressive transformation, it actually looked nicer than many people's hair does at that length.
Thank you for your kind words :flower:

[Dreams_in_Pink]

I'll ask you to define "effort" here; because we all know that benign neglect is the best hair growing tip ever. I think anyone who uses moderate amount of shampoo and condish every week and wears it in a protective updo every day can grow long hair effortlessly. The problem we have is, we're trying hard to make it fuller, stronger, softer or change its color. There are also some of us who actually wear their hair down from time to time (guilty here) so it gets more damage.

[SleepyTangles]

One of my best friends grew her hair from a bleached bob to "ombrè" hip in 3 years (all the new growth is her natural blonette). No apparent effort: she just wash and condition, maybe using a smidge of oil on the bleached bottom. She doesn't keep it up every time, and she brushes it with a plastic, ball-tipped brush without starting from the bottom.

If it was my hair, it would be wrecked beyond words. But hers is perfect: the only damaged part is the dyed bottom (that was damaged even when it was a bob, so not surprising at all...). Her hair is also very beautiful: always shiny, never greasy, silky. Despite being 1a and F, she has a craaazy amount of hair and lot of volume too.

I think that most manes aren't so resilient. Mine doen't need crazy products, but it surely needs constant attention to avoid mechanical damage, friction and pulling.

[Schnee]

If somebody asks me why I've got long hair, I usually say because I'm to lazy and cheap to maintain a short style! ;)

I definitly got longhair with no effort really. I use very little product, just wash, condition, brush and put it up. Use some leave-in or oils at need.

[chen bao jun]

I don't know what you mean by 'no effort' either.
People always tell me that they 'do nothing' with their hair, usually they are actually doing more than me.
My hair will never be 'no effort' because I am a tightly curly with high density hair but since I am on this board I am doing less than I ever did before and it is longer than it has ever been. My hair needs 'some' protection to grow past my shoulder blades. I can basically do whatever I want and have APL-ish hair worn loose(I've had hair that long most of my life, chemically straightening AND blowdrying on high heat AND flat ironing on very high heat AND curling ironing almost every day)--and it even looks healthy to other people when I do all that, and hairdressers think it is healthy in that state. However, I stopped all that and it feels so much better and is now slightly longer than the longest I've ever had (brastrap, curly, as a child).
what I do now is lots of SMTS, co-wash with my hair in two or three braids, detangle with leave in and mostly keep it up, as well as S & D my single strand knots (I don't get splits much--at least not yet). I braid it every night to avoid tangles.
That seems like very little work to me, but people tell me that its a lot, I guess it depends on your definition of
'a lot'. One friend that keeps telling me that dyes her blonde and has a perm, but I guess she doesn't think that's a lot of thing to do to her hair because in between treatments, she jsut washes and lets it airdry.
To each their own.

[queenovnight]

I thought I made that clear in my post. Whoops!

No effort: Someone who does nothing to improve the health of their hair, but still has beautiful hair.

[florenonite]

I thought I made that clear in my post. Whoops!

No effort: Someone who does nothing to improve the health of their hair, but still has beautiful hair.

I think at the very least you have to comb and/or wash your hair (I know there are people here who are NW, but it usually entails a fair bit of preening).

Unless you mean not doing anything beyond what the 'average' person does, ie. shampoo, condition, blow-dry, flat-iron and/or colour?

[mira-chan]

I wash mine once a week, I do oil, but that's mostly to get scalp crud off. I don't get splits until classic length or longer. I hardly comb it, just put it up or braid it and forget it. I spend less than 5 min on it a day, except wash day when it's 5 min to oil and put up, then 10 min to wash and then however long it takes to air dry, mostly when I'm sleeping.

I got to tailbone in my teens repeatedly with just wash and condition once a week and wearing in a ponytail only.

[Crumpet]

I agree with what a few others have said here: the main damage to hair is what one does to it, not what one does NOT do to it. Laziness often leads to lovely hair. I was lazy about getting highlights and whatnot, so I unintentionally began taking better care of my hair. Now the effort I put into my hair is primarily to combat sad ends that were tortured with bleach and with hard water (I didn't realize that hard water was bad on hair. Oops!). I think that when that is over, I'll have super-low maintanance hair. At the moment though its pretty easy -- I don't do much to it.

What irks me is that I see lots of girls where I live with hip-length bleach-blonde, straightened hair left down....and it actually looks healthy. That is truly remarkable!

[dollyfish]

My hair is kind of like this.

It's way better when I pay attention to it (aka minimal pony tails, no ripping brushes through, no ripping out knots, minimal heat, etc) but if I don't put in any effort (straighten frequently, rip through tangles, chemicals and dyes) and just don't cut my hair it will still grow long. It will just be slightly more frizzy and coarse than soft and shiny. This is because my hair is super thick (so I can rip it out often) and each strand is very thick and strong. I almost never get split ends. I think I can count the number of split ends I've found via S&D on two hands. My hair will be relatively healthy and long as long as I just... refrain from cutting. Even after multiple bleachings, my hair never turns to straw. It will lose its wave and become more Hermione-esq with abuse, but it never gets all that bad.

But I can make my hair really healthy, and much more beautiful, if I pay attention.

(My real bane is cutting my hair impulsively. Right now it's chin-length. I can't believe I used to have WL hair and then I gave it all up... ugh)

[HeavenlyTresses]

It seems that for some women the more "effort" they put into gaining beautiful hair seems to be doing more damage than good. I'm with the other members in just leaving it alone to let it grow. I wash and condition every other day and very lightly oil for detangling but that's pretty much it. I don't take special vitamins, I'm not on a special diet and I don't have a secret lab in my bathroom for concocting potions for magical growth :magic: And it's mostly because.....I'm lazy :)