Question about air drying my hair...

[PrittyKitty7]

Hi guys! I recently started letting my hair air dry a lot. When I was younger (I'm 28) I always hated letting it air dry because it would be ugly and frizzy and out of control, but I think part of the reason for that was because it had already had so much heat damage done to it since I used to constantly flat iron and blow dry it.

Anyway, fast forward like 5+ years and now I regularly get Brazilian blowouts. By regularly I mean about every 4-5 months. The reason I started getting them is not because I have course or curly hair... my hair is actually pretty straight, and its fine but I have a lot of it. However I wanted to stop using so much heat on it and figured if I started getting Brazilian blowouts, I could get it air dry (or at least just use the blow dryer instead of the flat iron) and then it would be healthier while still looking good. So that's where I'm at now and ever since I've been doing that I notice that my hair is healthier, and when I let it air dry now, even if the Brazilian blow out has grown out, my hair still looks much better.

Now for my question... now that I'm an avid air-drying-my-hair person, I notice that when I let it totally air dry (no blow dry what so ever - hair is wet, I put a tiny bit of product in it, brush it how I part it and totally let it air dry) it dries SO FREAKING SHINY. Like shinier than ever. I notice that it dries shinier when I let it air dry even compared to when I blow it dry...so even if I blow it dry and use a round brush and "polish" my hair with the dryer, my hair is shinier when air dried.

How is this possible? I am just wondering why this happens? I always thought that heat sealed the cuticle and thats what made hair so shiny.... so how is it that when I let it air dry it looks insanely shiny? I actually dont even like using my flat rron anymore because compared to air drying, it actually makes my hair look more dull and lifeless.

How crazy is that? Anyone have any answers as to why air drying your hair leaves it so shiny? Another thing I want to mention is that I recently started using a mason pearson brush.... but only a few days ago so I dont think that has much to do with it. Looking forward to responses from you guys!

[lapushka]

Getting a Brazilian keratin treatment (relaxing type service), is hardly the way to get your hair healthy, n°1. It seems quite counter intuitive to me, maybe that's just me.


How is this possible? I am just wondering why this happens? I always thought that heat sealed the cuticle and thats what made hair so shiny.... so how is it that when I let it air dry it looks insanely shiny? I actually dont even like using my flat rron anymore because compared to air drying, it actually makes my hair look more dull and lifeless.

How crazy is that? Anyone have any answers as to why air drying your hair leaves it so shiny? Another thing I want to mention is that I recently started using a mason pearson brush.... but only a few days ago so I dont think that has much to do with it. Looking forward to responses from you guys!

But... If you're happy with the Brazilian keratin treatments, then by all means... :flower:

Maybe it's the products you're using on your hair?

[meteor]

Welcome to the LHC, PrittyKitty7! :cheer:


^ Agreed on keratin treatments being not the best option in the long run for optimal hair "health"/condition. I shared links to some studies on this, if you want to check them out (scroll down to the bottom for semi-permanent straightening treatments - keratin/Brazilian/Japanese straightening): http://forums.longhaircommunity.com/showthread.php?t=136845&page=13&p=3192947&viewfull=1#post3192947


As for the OP's question about why air-drying can result in shinier hair, I think one of the reasons could be that you are not disturbing hair cuticle, not causing frizz by not touching hair unnecessarily as it's drying and sort of setting in its natural state as it's going from wet to dry. You are basically leaving hair texture undisturbed, which allows it to reflect light better. ?
With standard blow-drying (unless you are using a diffuser on low heat), if you are using a round brush or any other brush and blow-dry at short distance on high heat and high speed, your texture will change temporarily (broken hydrogen bonds - more on this: http://hairmomentum.com/hair-chemistry-101-quick-glance-hydrogen-bonding/), because you are essentially trying to force your hair to lie straighter than it would otherwise naturally lie on its own. This can cause frizz, flyaways and is not great for the condition of hair in the long run...


Also, it's likely that by air-drying you are avoiding unnecessary drying out of hair that can happen with high-heat blow-drying, so this probably results in more moisturized hair that reflects light better than it would after blow-drying on high heat. Here are some studies on blow-drying that could help: http://forums.longhaircommunity.com/showthread.php?t=136845&page=10&p=3191167&viewfull=1#post3191167