Is washing oiled hair with water good? can anyone suggest chemical free product?

[Long_hair_monk]

I am a man with hair reaching my mid back (approximately 2 feet long). I oil my hair every alternate day with olive oil or sesame oil and massage head. I wash hair everyday with water and shampoo them only on Sunday. Once in a week. I have dry hair and hence after using shampoo they lose natural oils.

My questions are
01) Is it ok to wash oiled hair without using shampoo every day just with warm water?
02) Is it ok to oil hair alternate day without washing out oil from scalp?
03) is there any chemical free product to wash hair everyday? which will not dry hair?

Your answers will help me a lot.

Thanks is advance.
Long Hair Monk

[Johannah]

There's nothing wrong with oiling your hair every other day and WO in between, but IMO you can't wash out oils with just warm water, or at least not completely. Depending on how your hair reacts on these things, it might cause build up as well which makes your hair look tangly and dry. If I use oil on my hair, I like to use CO to wash it out. It does removes oils, but isn't as hard as a shampoo with sulfates and you won't get build-up as fast. It's also an extra condish in bewteen so it definitely won't dry out your hair. Maybe this is something to try?

[Long_hair_monk]

Johannah, thanks
CO - conditioner?

[meliel]

To answer questions number 2 and 3... I sometimes oil my hair (mixture of coconut oil, olive oil and castor oil) and focus mostly on the ends, and this I can keep in my hair for a few days if I put my hair up in a bun. I hate the way greasy hair looks, but it surprisingly doesn't look greasy if I have it neatly put back into a bun. I wash it out after 2 or 3 days and never have any problem. I wash out the oil with a shampoo that is made specifically for dry hair (this is what I use: Alverde Nutri-Care-Shampoo Mandel Argan (http://www.dm.de/de_homepage/alverde_home/alverde_produkte/produkte_haarpflegeundstyling/produkte_dekorativekosmetik_shampoo/225040/alverde-nutri-care-shampoo-mandel-argan.html), depending on where you live you can find this or something similar), and I find it works really well and does not put me off of washing my hair everyday if I wanted to. I don't generally wash my hair everyday but there are some odd weeks where I do, and I never have an issue with dry hair. As long as the shampoo is as moisturising as possible, and you use moisturising conditioner afterwards, you won't have many issues.

[Anje]

There's no particular reason you should have to wash your hair daily, if your scalp isn't getting terribly greasy in that time. Some schools of thought even say that wetting hair too frequently weakens it over time.

Ignoring the "chemical free" thing (everything is chemicals, and most natural products are far more chemically complex than commercial stuff), there are certainly some natural products you can use to get oils out. Some people have luck with egg washes, if there isn't much oil. Soap nuts work very well. Shikakai and various other plant pastes like mung bean powder will easily remove oils, but they require some preparation. You have tons of options.

[Aderyn]

Ignoring the "chemical free" thing (everything is chemicals, and most natural products are far more chemically complex than commercial stuff), there are certainly some natural products you can use to get oils out. Some people have luck with egg washes, if there isn't much oil. Soap nuts work very well. Shikakai and various other plant pastes like mung bean powder will easily remove oils, but they require some preparation. You have tons of options.

This.

Some other recommendations I have are CO washing, mudwash, or diluting your normal shampoo in water (whether it be a more natural shampoo or not). You can also try brushing with a BBB to distribute oils, though it'd be better to use your sebum as the thing to be distributed instead.

[Panth]

I am a man with hair reaching my mid back (approximately 2 feet long). I oil my hair every alternate day with olive oil or sesame oil and massage head. I wash hair everyday with water and shampoo them only on Sunday. Once in a week. I have dry hair and hence after using shampoo they lose natural oils.

My questions are
01) Is it ok to wash oiled hair without using shampoo every day just with warm water?
02) Is it ok to oil hair alternate day without washing out oil from scalp?
03) is there any chemical free product to wash hair everyday? which will not dry hair?

Your answers will help me a lot.

Thanks is advance.
Long Hair Monk

1) Just warm water will absolutely not get out all (possibly even any) of the oil. Thus, you will quite quickly suffer from build-up and the various negative effects of that (likely - tangles, lankness, oily/greasy/"otter in an oil slick" look, stickiness, etc.). You need something to get the oil off, especially if you're going to use oil that often.

2) It's totally ok to wash hair every other day (or less than that). As for whether it's ok to do that whilst also following the oil routine you suggest... probably no. It'll depend on quite how heavily you're oiling, but basically you're going to get build-up and fairly quickly. The other problem is putting oil on the scalp. For some people this is fine, but for others leaving oil on the scalp for any length of time (or even putting oil on the scalp at all) causes shedding. Also, if you have (or have a tendency to get) seborrheic dermatitis you should absolutely not leave oil on your scalp for any length of time - the malassezia yeast that is often the cause eats fatty acids (oils, including sebum but also applied oils) and leaving oil on the scalp will just fuel yeast growth and make the situation worse.

3) See what Anje said. "Natural" doesn't mean better for you, nor does it mean that it'll work well. If you're concerned about ingredients, perhaps it would be best to educate yourself so that you can read and understand ingredients lists - you'll then have a much better idea of whether something is good for you and your hair, irrespective of whether it's advertised as "natural" or not. A good place to start learning is here (http://www.thenaturalhavenbloom.com/).

[stephy190]

I am a man with hair reaching my mid back (approximately 2 feet long). I oil my hair every alternate day with olive oil or sesame oil and massage head. I wash hair everyday with water and shampoo them only on Sunday. Once in a week. I have dry hair and hence after using shampoo they lose natural oils.

My questions are
01) Is it ok to wash oiled hair without using shampoo every day just with warm water?
02) Is it ok to oil hair alternate day without washing out oil from scalp?
03) is there any chemical free product to wash hair everyday? which will not dry hair?

Your answers will help me a lot.

Thanks is advance.
Long Hair Monk

Hmm its best not to keep oil in your hair for too long as it will clog your pores and prevent growth and isn't good for the scalp to leave it there.. To clean all the oil out of your hair you need to shampoo it out.. oil and water don't mix, a barrier is formed between the water and oil so the water just runs past it not washing it away. You could try a sulphate free shampoo, it won't strip the oils away but will still clean the hair. Good luck and I hope I helped in some way :) x

[lilin]

As others have said, water alone won't do much for you, and unless you have very soft water, will probably even add to the build-up. Even just getting out normal sebum is hard with water alone -- ask anyone who's tried WO. All the extra oil means, really, there's not a ton of point to trying to clean it with just water.

This can certainly cause issues for some people's scalps. I only oil my ends for that reason. Your scalp makes its own oil, and if you're prone to scalp problems, as is mentioned above, this might just be adding more fuel to the fire -- a doctor visit is a better idea. Oil might just be food for any kind of imbalance on your scalp, not to mention it does go "off" after a while.

I get skin problems from SLS and SLES shampoos, and I like making stuff, so I've landed on soap nuts, which do the cleaning job I want them to do. But because of their chemical make-up as a nonionic cleanser, they're a gentler cleanser than most commercial shampoos, which are anionic. They don't have as much ability to strip the scalp, and they can't denature proteins like anionic cleansers can.

But as others said, whether natural is better depends on what it is. In terms of allergies, synthetic is actually often preferable -- something your body has no experience with is unlikely to cause allergies, whereas something natural and common is more likely to. Of course, harsh synthetics can also cause problems (like my skin irritation from SLS). But not all synthetics are harsh. There are synthetic nonionic cleansers that are just as gentle as the natural ones I use, for example.

I like natural mostly because I can do it myself and have control of the number of ingredients I put on my head. But then again, I'm not allergy prone, and I enjoy the process of tinkering. It's not effort-free to ditch commercial products, and if you don't like making stuff, it can quickly become a drag.

But for a natural cleanser that can probably deal with a fair amount of oil, I think soap nuts are probably one of the more likely ones to work. They're stronger than many other natural cleansers.

Overall, I don't think there's a need to oil that much, especially on your scalp, and if you're gonna try to wash it out, you're gonna need an actual cleanser. Water's not gonna cut it.

It's really a trade-off. If you're going to oil that much, you're going to need a stronger cleanser to get it all out. No way around it. The less stuff you put on your hair, the gentler you can afford for your cleansers to be while still doing their job, and the less often you have to clean your hair, hair being more fragile when wet. So would you rather use a strong cleanser and lots of oil and have to wash it more to avoid build-up and potential scalp problems, or less oil and a gentler one while washing less?

[Long_hair_monk]

Thanks Meliel

Thanks Anje

Thanks Lilin

Thanks Stephy190

Thanks Panth

[lapushka]

Johannah, thanks
CO - conditioner?

Here's a link to the CO (conditioner only) washing (http://forums.longhaircommunity.com/showthread.php?t=2898) thread.

[kdaniels8811]

Check out shampoo bars or herbal washing methods for more natural alternatives.

[animetor7]

Maybe you could save the scalp massage with oil for right before you're going to wash? I oil every day and only wash twice a week with shampoo bars, BUT I only use a tiny amount and except for the last night before a wash I only oil the ends of my hair where it is dry, the rest I just let my natural sebum take care of oiling. ;)