Both dry and oily at once?

[SparrowWings]

There are two main questions here. 1) Am I seeing things correctly? 2) What is the best way to fix, or at least work with, it?

With those in mind, here is my best explanation of what is happening.

I wash my hair (my scalp, really) once a week with shampoo/conditioner 2-in-1. Post-wash, my scalp is clean, not itchy, not flaky (aside from perhaps a few lingering flakes from pre-wash that come out with the first combing). Hair around my scalp is likewise clean, a little too much so (overly fluffy, not quite to the point of being frizzy). By the next day, overly fluffy is gone, and all is well. Possibly I'll do a quick bit of scritching before combing and putting it up for the day. Repeat for the next day. No product used at any point post-washing.

By day 4, my scalp has a good chance of being just slightly itchy, but scritching resolves that. My scalp hair (first 2-4 inches?) also is starting to look stringy (not entirely dirty, but definitely not clean, but with fine hair, anything makes it looks stringy), especially if pulled against its natural direction. From looking at comments in the WO and NW/SO threads, the itchy and the stringy are signs of needing preening because of collected sebum. Yet there is not enough of anything on each strand to move it down, and combing winds up with my hand and comb covered with a layer of the driest-possible pinprick white flakes -- more of them if I scritch first, fewer/none if I don't, and I can blow them off in a little cloud. Combing a second time does not produce more of them. And scritching leaves my fingertips completely dry, too. So my scalp is clearly not oily.

Where, then, is the oil (or whatever it is) coming from to make my hair look stringy? How is the flaky presumed-sebum supposed to travel down my hair if it's so dry that it just blows off? Or is it not really sebum? I'm not particularly interested in going WO or NW/SO (though stretching washes even longer would be grand!), but I'm very curious about how there can be such an extreme difference in moisture levels between scalp and hair, when scalp is supposed to be what drives the moisture level for the hair, at least right near the roots. And since it doesn't seem to be my scalp that is over-producing oil, what are some approaches to keep my hair from looking stringy so fast?

To complicate things further, by day 7 and time for the next wash, if I've been scritching daily, my scalp is only just barely thinking about having the tiniest bit of oil on it, and the itchiness has either not increased, or only slightly. My hair is looking a bit greasier, but not really feeling worse. Yet if I don't scritch much or at all during the week, I'm fighting dandruff, my scalp gets a definite gunky buildup, is very itchy, and makes me start wondering if I really do have SD or other scalp condition, because if I scritch at that point, the gunk comes off in clumps and my scalp is sore and sometime red underneath and it's generally not so pleasant. My hair looks awful even when going its natural direction, feels greasy, and there's no way to hide it even with an up-do. If my scalp and sebum are as dry as all that, why does scritching make such a pronounced difference by the end of the week, between almost not needing to wash vs no hope except through washing (and still some dandruff for the first day post-wash)?

[Nique1202]

I think this might be similar to my problem, and the reason why I'll never be able to go WO or NW/SO. My sebum is very thick and waxy. It feels dry to the touch, but looks stringy. No matter how much I preen or use a bristle brush, the sebum will not move beyond the first 4 inches at the roots, and it does not respond at all to dry shampoo sprays or powders.

The normal dead skin that sheds from my scalp gets "stuck" in the sebum, it won't generally shake out on its own and it resists brushing or combing out once my hair gets "greasy"-stringy. It has to be washed out at that point and until I wash it it looks like how people describe dandruff but it doesn't go away with medicated shampoos because it's just the dead skin.

If I scratch my scalp at this point I do get a lot of bad-smelling cream-coloured junk under my nails, though I don't notice any particular redness and usually my itches go away immediately upon massaging or washing with any high-sulfate shampoo, which makes me think that it's not SD in my case, just the follicles getting annoyed and clogged with the sebum and dead skin cells.

You may have SD in addition to the thick sebum problem, or you may not, that's between you and a doctor to figure out. But if you're lucky, you can manage it the same way I do: by not bothering to stretch washes beyond when it starts to look greasy.

[lapushka]

I would try and ditch the 2-in-1 and possibly clarify and condition the length only (not the scalp area!). Then continue to wash & condition like that in the next few weeks - see what that does.

[SparrowWings]

I think this might be similar to my problem, and the reason why I'll never be able to go WO or NW/SO. My sebum is very thick and waxy. It feels dry to the touch, but looks stringy. No matter how much I preen or use a bristle brush, the sebum will not move beyond the first 4 inches at the roots, and it does not respond at all to dry shampoo sprays or powders.

The normal dead skin that sheds from my scalp gets "stuck" in the sebum, it won't generally shake out on its own and it resists brushing or combing out once my hair gets "greasy"-stringy. It has to be washed out at that point and until I wash it it looks like how people describe dandruff but it doesn't go away with medicated shampoos because it's just the dead skin.

If I scratch my scalp at this point I do get a lot of bad-smelling cream-coloured junk under my nails, though I don't notice any particular redness and usually my itches go away immediately upon massaging or washing with any high-sulfate shampoo, which makes me think that it's not SD in my case, just the follicles getting annoyed and clogged with the sebum and dead skin cells.

You may have SD in addition to the thick sebum problem, or you may not, that's between you and a doctor to figure out. But if you're lucky, you can manage it the same way I do: by not bothering to stretch washes beyond when it starts to look greasy.
That does sound similar, though I don't know that I have any particular issue with shed skin getting stuck when I comb. Just trying to shake it out is only partially effective, but combing seems to work. I wanted to try a BBB this time around and see what that did (or didn't do), because I have one, but it's ... somewhere. Hopefully I can find it this weekend to try next week. As for washing as soon as it starts looking greasy, I think I'd rather continue to go by when it starts itching more than I can stritch out. I just don't have the patience to deal with washing/drying it every 2-4 days like I would need to do based on stringy-ness.


I would try and ditch the 2-in-1 and possibly clarify and condition the length only (not the scalp area!). Then continue to wash & condition like that in the next few weeks - see what that does.
I am planning to try a different shampoo and/or conditioner once this one gets closer to empty. I was also going to chelate with citric acid this week, but I wound up still having some of my ACV rinse left, so I'm going to finish it up instead and try the citric acid next time. I'm trying to only change one or two things at a time, so I can track it better, so it's probably just as well that I still have a bunch of the 2-in-1 left. At least that gives me a known baseline for all these other smaller things. I am also collecting up a list of ideas, though, so even if the suggestions aren't used immediately, they are not in vain!

There is one thing I don't get, though. How would conditioning the length reduce the stringy roots? Or am I misunderstanding something about your suggestion?

[lapushka]

I am planning to try a different shampoo and/or conditioner once this one gets closer to empty. I was also going to chelate with citric acid this week, but I wound up still having some of my ACV rinse left, so I'm going to finish it up instead and try the citric acid next time. I'm trying to only change one or two things at a time, so I can track it better, so it's probably just as well that I still have a bunch of the 2-in-1 left. At least that gives me a known baseline for all these other smaller things. I am also collecting up a list of ideas, though, so even if the suggestions aren't used immediately, they are not in vain!

There is one thing I don't get, though. How would conditioning the length reduce the stringy roots? Or am I misunderstanding something about your suggestion?

ACV or citric acid is not enough to clarify. You need a sulfate shampoo for that.

I think you might have stringy roots because you slather conditioner over them (the 2-in-1). So try and go without it (only condition the lengths) and see what that does.

[Nique1202]

There is one thing I don't get, though. How would conditioning the length reduce the stringy roots? Or am I misunderstanding something about your suggestion?

If your scalp makes a lot of sebum (which it does if your hair gets stringy, even if it feels dry) then everything above your shoulders doesn't need conditioner, because your scalp's doing the job in spades. Also some scalps overproduce sebum when exposed to conditioners, so keeping conditioner away from your scalp sometimes helps to prolong the time until it gets greasy.

So, it's not so much "conditioning the length" as it is "keeping conditioner away from the scalp" that reduces stringiness.

[lapushka]

Thanks Nique, for further explaining! :D :thumbsup:

[SparrowWings]

Aaaah, now I follow! I hadn't thought of it that way; that actually makes a lot of sense. Thanks lapushka and Nique. :)

With that in mind, maybe I really should be seeing about something different sooner, rather than later. It'll probably still be a few washes down the road, but definitely something to consider a more pressing issue. I might have to see about getting something less, rather than more, harsh, though. The times I've used straight shampoo in the past (and all of them that I remember being pretty harsh), I really did get full-on frizzies after that, even around my scalp, it stripped things so much. And then it definitely put me into the overproducing, washing-sooner, overproducing-worse cycle. So that'll be an interesting balance to try and find.

[spidermom]

I've noticed that I have different types of sebum at different times. I think it might have something to do with the amount of quality fat in my diet.

[SparrowWings]

I've noticed that I have different types of sebum at different times. I think it might have something to do with the amount of quality fat in my diet.
Interesting! My diet is pretty stable and healthy these days, but I'll make a note to see if/how things change if/when my diet shifts again.

It turned out my mom still had some of the straight shampoo, so I decided to do a half-and-half mix this time. I clearly remember my hair being unmanageable and feeling like straw, even at my roots, for the first couple days post-shower back when I used to use shampoo only, so I'm not too excited about returning to that. But perhaps leaving some, but less conditioner from the 2-in-1 will get it to a better balance until I find a more suitable product altogether. I also wasn't doing ACV rinses back then, but I'm still not convinced that's having a significant textural impact. It does seem to be slowly returning me to my original golden blonde, but that's about it.

[lapushka]

Aaaah, now I follow! I hadn't thought of it that way; that actually makes a lot of sense. Thanks lapushka and Nique. :)

With that in mind, maybe I really should be seeing about something different sooner, rather than later. It'll probably still be a few washes down the road, but definitely something to consider a more pressing issue. I might have to see about getting something less, rather than more, harsh, though. The times I've used straight shampoo in the past (and all of them that I remember being pretty harsh), I really did get full-on frizzies after that, even around my scalp, it stripped things so much. And then it definitely put me into the overproducing, washing-sooner, overproducing-worse cycle. So that'll be an interesting balance to try and find.

Then why not try CWC washing? You *could* put the first conditioner a tiiiny bit over your scalp (because that one washes out with the shampoo you apply over top of it), then only condition the lengths after washing. Might be worth a shot!

[SparrowWings]

Halfway tsk-tsk on me, I changed a couple things back to back, but...

So I was doing 2-in-1 + ACV rinse + cursory tap rinse weekly for a month, and that slowly brought back my blonde tones, but nothing else too discernible. Possibly a result of slow chelating for the first time ever, possibly ACV-based lightening, though it was dilute enough, I don't know if that's terribly likely.

Two washings ago, I tried a 50/50 mix of 2-in-1 and the straight shampoo (since that's all I had available right away), and the same ACV rinse + cursory tap rinse. The wispies were super-wispy again, but the rest wasn't bad, and it went back to 2-in-1 normal in a few hours, so that's manageable. It seemed to take longer to start looking stringy, too, but as a one-off, it's not decisive, since some weeks are better than others normally anyhow.

Last washing, Wednesday night, I did the 50/50 mix again, plus a citric acid rinse, which I rinsed out thoroughly after a while and then did a cursory second citric acid rinse and left it in. I figure if the acid's supposed to bind to the minerals in the hair/water to do the chelating, then it seems reasonable to want to remove the bound stuff, rather than leave it still sitting in the hair. Then if there's any more binding to do, the cursory final rinse can cover that. The next morning, it was still quite damp, which is unusual, but not unheard of. Once it dried, the color looked the same, maybe just slightly blonder again, but not sure. And my word was it slippery! The number of tangles was comparable (it's not usually bad after a shower anyhow, though), but getting it to stay in a bun was next to impossible! I've been redoing it several times a day since that washing; it just won't stay put. It's getting slightly more secure now, 3+ days later, but still only slightly. It's also interesting how different the bun tensions need to be for different width sticks. As for the wispies, they were virtually nonexistent at first, but I noticed they actually got worse as the day went on, the first day -- it seemed like handling worsened them, so each time I had to redo the bun, they got worse. By the second day, they'd calmed back to normal. There's no sign of stringiness yet, but it's still a bit early anyhow.

I'll probably do the 50/50 mix + single citric acid rinse a few more times to get a solid baseline for how that makes my hair. Then maybe I'll try just the 50/50 mix a couple times, to see if the citric acid is a regularly useful thing, or only a periodic one. Once I have that sorted, I'll move on to seeing what other shampoo and/or conditioner might also work better. And maybe somewhere in there we'll see how any of it works for eliminating static, too. I can't say I've noticed any since the last washing, but static tests might be on hold until next winter at this point, anyhow. Hard to say. It's definitely transitioning to not so dry already, though.

[lapushka]

Might it be an option to leave out the rinses completely? ACV & citric rinses are only a *must* after a bar of (alkaline) soap, to bring down the pH, but since shampoos are all usually pH balanced, this brings down the pH when it shouldn't. Might that be the issue?

[SparrowWings]

Actually, if anything, I'd say it's better since I started testing with the rinses, but that's a pretty loose assessment. More likely, it hasn't changed. My hair looking stringy pretty quickly, despite my scalp seeming bone dry (if varying amounts of flaky) for several more days has been the status quo for as long as I can remember. Certainly for as long as I've been doing weekly washes; it might have been more universally oily when I was washing twice a week, since I know my hair was dirtier faster (yay overproduction).