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View Full Version : Anyone else feel stopping heat didn't make a big difference?



Tangles
March 19th, 2009, 04:23 PM
It's been about six months now since I've used any form of heat on my hair, and I honestly don't see much of an improvement in condition. Cutting down on cones, doing deep treatments and doing self trims helped get rid of dryness, but they would have done the same had I not stopped heat.

It may just that I was never a big heat user, used it around once a week (maybe a blowdryer on warm for a couple minutes, rarely used a curling or flat iron). Maybe I can go back to using it weekly and it won't have an effect? Anyone know?

Anyone else feel like they might as well take a hot iron and PULL, PULL it through their hair right now!?

Speckla
March 19th, 2009, 04:27 PM
A blow dryer doesn't do any real damage on warm or cool.
________
VOLCANO VAPORIZER (http://vaporizer.org/reviews)

manderly
March 19th, 2009, 04:28 PM
Hmmm, yeah.

I used to blowyfry every day to smooth out my hair. I used a flat iron the other week just for the hell of it. I still blowfry my bangs.

I don't feel that my hair hair has really changed much since stopping the heat, other than I've learned to love these waves and wurls that I always fought so hard against :)

But then again, the last inch or two of my hair feel absolutely craptacular and I have to fight every day not to cut it (I want the length!!!!). I can only imagine that its crappy like that from heat and chemicals :shrug:

I don't think that using your heat appliances once and a while when you feel like it are really going to hurt you that much. Daily, I would advise against.....once and a while, sure, you only live once......and what's the point of the long hair if you don't like it?

Tangles
March 19th, 2009, 04:32 PM
Yeah, it's weird. My ends are really soft now, but my texture as a whole doesn't really behave much better than it used to, and as it grows the curl is lessening. It's also not very voluminous right now, for whatever reason. I don't think heat make my hair look substantially better, but it just seems like stopping it, didn't do anything other than slightly softening my ends.

spidermom
March 19th, 2009, 04:32 PM
Cutting down on cones, doing deep treatments and doing self trims helped get rid of dryness, but they would have done the same had I not stopped heat.


I'm not sure about that part.

If you have average growth, six months = 3 inches. That's not a lot of length to give you a good comparison for before/after heat. It wouldn't be enough for me at any rate.

I still use a blow-dryer on warm/cool, and I think that is just fine. I don't see it having a bad effect on my hair. And every once in a great while, I might allow a stylist to straighten my hair with her evil hot iron IF she's very quick. It's a great way to see the length.

Tangles
March 19th, 2009, 04:36 PM
[quote=spidermom;511050]

I still use a blow-dryer on warm/cool, and I think that is just fine. I don't see it having a bad effect on my hair. quote]

You have really long, healthy hair so if anyone can make an argument for occasional heat, you can. :D

icydove
March 19th, 2009, 04:44 PM
I think spidermom is on to something. Using heat appliances, especially flat irons, can cause permanent damage to your hair. Until you grow out the damage, you won't know the real difference.

On the other hand, using a hair dryer wisely and sparingly is probably not going to cause much damage. However, I would use a product with silicones for protection whenever you are going to use heat.

jojo
March 19th, 2009, 04:56 PM
I must blow dry twice a year if that and I straighten about 6 times a year and I have been on this forum 2 years this August.

I have noticed a huge difference in my hair but a lot of that could be I now only comb, I never wrap a towel round my hair to dry, I just drip dry, I don't wash with hot water and I put it up more.

My hair is very fine and prone to breakage, I could find a lot of splits now if I looked which sounds bad but last time when my hair was waist length, my hair was dry, fuzzy ends and splits on every hair, therefore to answer your question I think stopping using heat as helped make my hair more healthy but so have a lot of other things too!

neon-dream
March 19th, 2009, 05:01 PM
Oh I've seen loads of difference since I stopped using my straighteners!!!
My hair loves me again haha!
:blossom:

Honey39
March 19th, 2009, 05:20 PM
Yeah, I have to say - it's been the thing that has made the BIGGEST difference to my hair. I do occasionally straighten my hair for special occasions, and now when I do, my hair looks spectacular, all smooth and glowing. But before when I did it once a week, my hair was so dried out looking.

Maybe it's your hair type? If you have straightish hair, then I guess it's not as brutal. I have thick wurly hair, and a blow drier and straightener have to be used sooooo much to flatten my hair, it's just too much for it.

Plus - I actually think for me, I prefer my hair natural and air-dried, so that's actually a real bonus for me, to accept the hair I have rather than wanting it to be sleek and fine, which it just isn't!

InTheCity
March 19th, 2009, 05:24 PM
Great topic. For me it's been nearly three months and I freaked out when I recently saw a few splits. I figured oh heck, I might as well start straightening again... But I didn't. I gotta stick it out a little longer and I'll give you a thumbs up to do the same.

In the grand scheme of loving our hair, its been a relatively short time since we gave up damage.

Rohele
March 19th, 2009, 05:31 PM
I've noticed a huge difference since stopping heat styling, but I blowdried and flat ironed every second day with touch ups in between. My hair didn't start to feel soft until I ditched the heat entirely (I first started with no cones, then I stopped ironing and then finally stopped blowdrying). Like honey39, I've got thick wurly hair, so it took a lot of heat to get it totally straight.

Tangles
March 19th, 2009, 06:04 PM
I must blow dry twice a year if that and I straighten about 6 times a year and I have been on this forum 2 years this August.

I have noticed a huge difference in my hair but a lot of that could be I now only comb, I never wrap a towel round my hair to dry, I just drip dry, I don't wash with hot water and I put it up more.

My hair is very fine and prone to breakage, I could find a lot of splits now if I looked which sounds bad but last time when my hair was waist length, my hair was dry, fuzzy ends and splits on every hair, therefore to answer your question I think stopping using heat as helped make my hair more healthy but so have a lot of other things too!

My hair isn't all that fine, but for some reason it does break very easily. I used a BBB today and it brought out the shine but now I feel "guilty." Haha. Your hair does look incredible, that pampering obviously pays off. I have to stop taking such hot showers, I know it isn't good for my hair.

Tangles
March 19th, 2009, 06:05 PM
My city has hard water and therefore it often feels damaged to the touch even though it isn't.

maskedrose
March 19th, 2009, 06:15 PM
I agree with Spidermom too - sure, my hair has improved from root to tip a little overall since I joined almost two years ago. However, there is a big difference between my pre-LHC length and LHC crown. All of my LHC hair would probably be in great shape if I hadn't had the urge to do partial highlights last year. Even with the highlight damage, there is still a difference. Give it more time and pay attention to your new growth for changes.

SimplyLonghair
March 19th, 2009, 07:06 PM
I have used a silk scarf to bring out the shine without brushing. I use it to polish the hair like you would polish a horses coat with a rag. :shrug: It works and doesn't damage anything.:D

nowxisxforever
March 19th, 2009, 09:48 PM
I never really used heat, myself... but I would not imagine simply stopping using heat would make that big of a difference with your hair because the hair is already damaged... you would have to grow out the damage to see the real difference between heat-styling and not heat-styling.

EvaSimone
March 19th, 2009, 09:54 PM
I used heat heavily before LHC (think using a curling iron on damp hair!), now two years post LHC I notice a pretty decent improvement in how my hair feels and looks.


I still do use very occasional, gentle heat and I don't feel like it's a big deal. I use magnetic rollers and a heat cap to get really sexy voluminous waves when I want to feel all vampy. Otherwise it's braiding, bunning and air drying.

Tangles
March 19th, 2009, 10:24 PM
Yeah, it sounds like I need to make a final verdict when I'm at goal and can see more of the completely "undamaged" hair. My new growth doesn't feel anything special but maybe when that growth becomes my length I will see a difference.

Debra83
March 19th, 2009, 10:51 PM
I've used a blowdryer - which I didn't use much pre LHC even - ALL this week on my hair AND I can believe how nice my hair looks and feels. I've been babying it with oils and CWC's and sprays to protect it from the low setting. I am getting waves even, cuz I'm not going for the straight look, just the dry look and the combed look!!! When I was airdrying it only - I was putting too much of something in because it was starting to look "greasy" even though I just washed it. IT SURE IS A JOURNEY TRYING TO FIGURE OUT WHAT WORKS MOST OF THE TIME!!!!
But it is fun for sure!

Debra83
March 19th, 2009, 10:54 PM
I was inspired by that You Tube video we had washed awhile back - posted in a thread somewhere - where that girl with the really longggggggg hair showed us how to blow dry in "12 minutes". Her hair looked GREAT even though she was blowdrying!

Twitter
March 19th, 2009, 11:52 PM
I didn't think stopping heat made that much of a difference, then I looked at some pictures from a year ago, when I was straightening every day..wow my hair is SO much shinier now. I'm still growing out some of the damage, but my hair wasn't that long when I started, so it's mostly the ends.

Debra83
March 20th, 2009, 12:55 AM
From what people have said throughout the posts, straight ironing is prob harder on hair than blowdrying on low/cool setting unless you use a very, very low setting on the straightener and move it through fairly quickly. prob doesn't hurt to get some of that "goop" that protects hair from heat, and conditions instead.

P.s. goop is the technical term used when one doesn't have enough chocolate throughout the day.

RancheroTheBee
March 20th, 2009, 01:11 AM
I felt a huge difference after cutting out my flat-iron. I've trimmed away most of the damage, but I still have to fight the splits a lot. Then again, I ironed it almost every other day for about six months.

The blowdryer, though? Not so much. Upon the suggestion of Spidermom, I started using the dryer on cool while my hair was almost dry. This gets my hair to lay a little flatter than normal, and I get out the door a lot faster. And as of yet, I have seen no negative consequences from it. Unless you've got it on high and use while your hair is soaking, and then you rip through it with a brush... you're fine.

templeofvenus
March 20th, 2009, 02:09 AM
I think its the flat ironing that damages hair way more than a blow dryer! I blow dry but take care not to pull at my hair while drying it or holding the dryer too close I use it as if it was a warm desert breeze away from my hair and it seems to be fine! :)

WavyGirl
March 20th, 2009, 03:12 AM
Yeah, it sounds like I need to make a final verdict when I'm at goal and can see more of the completely "undamaged" hair. My new growth doesn't feel anything special but maybe when that growth becomes my length I will see a difference.

I think you're right with this. I just wanted to add that lots of people can blowdry, iron and chemically treat their hair and it still looks fairly good. Their secret? It's not long. If I keep mine shorter than apl I can get away with that sort of treatment. Past that the damage starts to show very fast. It's not the occasional use that really makes a visual difference. It's the continued use over a period of years. BSL for example is normally about 3 years of growth. That's a lot of styling. So I would be surprised if you noticed a huge difference now. 2 or 3 years from now I'm sure you'd be regretting daily use of those styling tools. Even if you don't give up completely cutting down will make a difference in the long run.

dearladydisdain
March 20th, 2009, 07:41 AM
I definitely think a blowdryer on warm is not going to damage your hair. The only thing I've noticed is if I do it in a certain way my hair gets tangled (but that's really only when my hair is longer).

(I used a curling iron on my hair in December and a flat iron once this week. I also got a haircut and the hairdresser used the blowdryer on hot right against my hair. My hair is fine. :p)

ETA: I had classic length hair that I occasionally blowdryed. It IS possible.

AmyJorgensen
March 20th, 2009, 07:50 AM
Have you done before and after pics? I didn't think my hair had changed that much after I started using more natural products, but I took another picture and I was shocked how much better my hair looked. I guess if you look at it every day you just can't see the change as well.

Ursula
March 20th, 2009, 10:20 AM
I would not expect to see a huge difference. Any "old" hair that had heat damage would still have that damage. Hairs that are split, or that burst from the heat, or otherwise broke down would still be that way. They would not have gotten worse from cumulative damage over that time, but they would not have magically reassembled themselves, either.

Where you might see a difference is at your roots, where you have hair that has not been heat treated. Those few inches of hair may be stronger/healthier than the length. But since heat damage is cumulative, you'd see a difference in your roots, either way, as the new growth would only have had a few exposures to heat, while the length would have had many more exposures.

Improvements would probably be noticable some years down the line - when hair at your shoulders or mid-back will be stronger and less damaged than it would have been had it been regularly heat treated for several years worth of growth. But because you won't have a side-by-side comparison of un-heat-damaged hair to heat-damaged hair, it may not be noticiable to you at that point, either. The effect would be subtle - smooth, strong hair, versus hair that might be rough or frustrating to work with. You won't know what you would have had if you'd treated your hair differently over several years - you'll only know whether or not you're content with your hair at any given time.

A few years after that, there might be a difference as the quality of your hair at your waist or hips may be somewhat stronger, so that you feel confident continuing to grow, versus perhaps being more delicate and breakable so you feel the need to trim if you'd continued to heat damage it. But again, you wouldn't have a side-by-side comparision of both types of hair, to know that you've done something that helped - you'd only know whether or not your hair feels good at that time.

jivete
March 20th, 2009, 10:54 AM
I'm not sure what made the most difference for me, whether it was giving up heat, dye, daily shampoo's, etc, but what I find really cool is if I have a shed hair and I do a tension test on the virgin roots vs. the length. My virgin hair is pretty strong, but the damaged length stretches a lot more and is actually thinner plus it breaks easier.

So like others have said, it'll take a while to really see the difference on your whole head. But I will say, my bangs are virgin and I blow-dry and flat iron them fairly often and then start looking damaged pretty fast. So I definately think the heat is pretty bad.

Delila
March 20th, 2009, 12:11 PM
I've noticed a big difference in my hair, and I think not blow drying is the one change I've made over the longest time to account for the difference.

Honestwitness
March 20th, 2009, 01:33 PM
Well, my hair is not long enough yet to be able to assess damage from heat versus no heat. I'm still using a low heat blowdryer with a diffuser most days. BUT... I am much more aware of everything about my haircare routine, since deciding to stop cutting it short all the time.

I have discovered something in the past week that I'd like your feedback on. I shower daily and have begun massaging my scalp under pretty warm water. I've noticed that I can feel the oil come out of my oil glands immediately and the hot water, along with my. fingertips, will move the oil all the way down to the ends of my hair. Once it's entirely covered, I leave it there while I shave my legs and wash my body with Ivory soap. The last thing I do is use shampoo and maybe a tiny bit of conditioner.

So, if I do my self-produced hot oil treatment every day prior to gently blow drying with a diffuser (after soaking most of the moisture out with a terrycloth towel and then a microfiber towel), am I being safe enough with my hair for the long haul?

Honestwitness

SmellyJelly
March 21st, 2009, 04:49 AM
As you said, you probably aren't feeling the difference because you didn't use much heat in the first place. A while back I cut down on my straightening, from everyday to about once a week and I did notice a big difference. I went back to my old habits after a while but now I am gradually cutting down on the straightening again. :)

templeofvenus
March 23rd, 2009, 05:05 AM
I think ditching the flat iron does make a difference! they do heat the hair up way too much and it dries it out! I am a reformed flat iron addict!