Newbie with a ?

[mommy101405]

I have been mostly a short hair girl but have been trying to grow mine out a bit. Its about shoulder length right now with a lot of layering and fringe. Whenever I try to grow my hair it get a few inches below my shoulders and them stops growing. It is possible that I just can't have long hair?:(

Any suggestions?

[Flaxen]

Yes, it is possible, but very uncommon. Most women are *supposed* to be able to get to waist length. Tell us a little about your routine. It's possible that your hair is breaking as fast as it's growing, for no overall gain. Or, it's possible that you have very slow growing hair and any trims you're having are taking too much growth.

[mommy101405]

I feel like I'm at an AA meeting, lol

Hello my name Courtney and I shampoo every day. I also blow dry often *cowers in shame* The thing is I have super oily hair and I have to shampoo in the morning or my hair is gross. And if I am going somewhere right away I need to dry a least a little so I dont freeze.

I have a bunch of shampoos. Head and Shoulders, John Freida Brilliant brunette, Biolage.

Oh and I am color treated.

Ok, so now its all out on the line. You know all my deep dark secrets.;)

[Sillage]

Hello my name Courtney and I shampoo every day.

There are lots of daily washers here, myself included! See the poll Lamb started (http://forums.longhaircommunity.com/showthread.php?t=2408)? :D

[Flaxen]

Hello, Courtney! LOL, you do have secrets! OK, here are some tips:

~ Dilute your shampoo. Start with 1 Tablespoon and add enough water to make 1/2 cup total liquid.
~ Practice CWC (condition, wash, condition). After you wet your hair, coat the length with conditioner. Do not rinse it. Shampoo your scalp and rinse everything. Then do a final condition of the length only.
~ If you color yourself, do only the roots. Never pull the solution over the ends more than once.
~ Get some coconut oil. The kind for cooking is perfect. Put a teeny, tiny dab on your palms and apply it to the ends of your hair when it is fully dry. You can also put more on (to the point of greasiness) about an hour before you wash. Coconut oil will protect your hair from protein loss.
~ Lower the temp on your blow dryer if possible, and only do the crown area.
~ Never brush wet hair, and make sure there are no seams on the teeth of your comb to tear at your hair.

[Teazel]

A quick tip from me: if you have a habit of fiddling with your hair, try to stop. A friend of mine recently complained to me that she can't grow her hair past bra-strap length, and I was trying to work out why... then I noticed that she was continually flipping her hair back over her shoulders, then bringing it forward again and playing with it. When I looked at the floor under her chair after she left, there were a whole lot of broken hairs. I think I've found her problem.

[Anje]

So you shampoo every day... that's not necessarily bad, though it can be a little rough on the hair.
Do you condition every day too? If you don't, start now. It makes a big difference in moisture levels and can help prevent your hair from breaking. Also, try just shampooing your scalp, not the length of your hair. That saves considerably wear and tear on it, helps reduce drying, etc.

You say your hair is color-treated. Do you go lighter or darker? Clearly, lightening your hair can cause damage, but many permanent hair dyes in darker colors still contain peroxide because the manufacturer doesn't know which direction you're coloring your hair and wants all the results to be the same. You might consider using a deposit-only color, and when you're coloring, just do the roots most of the time rather than pulling it through.

[MotherConfessor]

patience and babying your hair and patience.

Have you checked out the monistat thread?

[Miss Murphy]

I feel like I'm at an AA meeting, lol

Hello my name Courtney and I shampoo every day. I also blow dry often *cowers in shame* The thing is I have super oily hair and I have to shampoo in the morning or my hair is gross. And if I am going somewhere right away I need to dry a least a little so I dont freeze.

I have a bunch of shampoos. Head and Shoulders, John Freida Brilliant brunette, Biolage.

Oh and I am color treated.

Ok, so now its all out on the line. You know all my deep dark secrets.;)

I am colour treated too, and in the colder month I blowdry regularly. I only wash my hair once a week, though.

When I first came here I felt bad, too - but nobody here will look at you like a weak person for blowdrying. Or shun you because you colour your hair.

I have found that I just abhor my natural hair colour. And what fun is uberlong hair if I can't bring myself to look at it?
My regimen might not take me to knee-length, but that's fine with me.
Long hair should be fun, not a torture. And you already received a lot of helpful tips for stretching out between washes (the main reason I do that though is not because it's better for my hair, but because washing long hair is a hassle). :)

[seabear]

Hi, Courtney, and welcome!

This might sound obvious, but how often are you trimming your hair? If you go in to the salon for a trim every 6 or 8 weeks, you may just be getting all your growth cut off. Try stretching it out as long as possible between trims, and emphasize to the stylist you are growing your hair longer and want as little taken off as possible. OR, do what many of us do - let your hair grow untrimmed, or trim it yourself. That way, you KNOW somebody isn't cutting off all your hard-won length increase!

[Katze]

Welcome Courtney!

Lots of great advice so far.

As someone who used to want long hair but could never understand why it didn't grow, I can only second the good advice already posted.

For my fine hair, coloring (and home bleaching, highlights, sun-in, etc) meant that it was getting too damaged to be able to get long. Going back to my natural color has helped my hair and scalp be a lot healthier.

Oh, and every 'hair professional' always told me my hair would not grow - then cut off any growth I had. I have since learned better!

See if you can stretch your washes out to every other day and longer. The longer your hair is, the better able it is to 'clean itself' and (after a possible adjustment period) you will find that hair washed less often is sleeker, smoother, and shinier. I had the oiliest hair in the world, with nasty icky sebhorreic dermatitis, dandruff, you name it...and after a few months of LHC (and washing once a week) had MUCH softer, shinier hair. Healthier hair is hair that doesn#t have its own oils (sebum) stripped from it - so you will find this makes a difference.

Depending on your hair type, you might want to try different things, but, as mentioned, gentle treatment, more moisture, and less to no heat are good for all hair.

good luck and welcome here!

[Robinlyn]

Welcome! Looks like you've got a lot of great advise so far! I'm pretty new here as well, just 6 months. I never thought I could put my blowdryer down, but am so happy that I did. I also had trouble not washing my hair everyday. I went thought an adjustment period and now can go every other day. My hair is fine so right now I need to wash every 2nd day. If you are starting a new routine like co, give it 2 wks to see if it works. Don't get too discouraged, you have all of us here behind you!! Good luck & happy growing!

[Aljona]

I feel like I'm at an AA meeting, lol

Hello my name Courtney and I shampoo every day. I also blow dry often *cowers in shame* The thing is I have super oily hair and I have to shampoo in the morning or my hair is gross. And if I am going somewhere right away I need to dry a least a little so I dont freeze.

I have a bunch of shampoos. Head and Shoulders, John Freida Brilliant brunette, Biolage.

Oh and I am color treated.

Ok, so now its all out on the line. You know all my deep dark secrets.;)

Have you tried using cone-free products? Maybe your hair doesn't like cones and breaks off. I also have greasy hair and I'm a daily washer, but I've found Head and Shoulders to be too harsh for daily washing. I've had better success with using a milder and natural shampoo everyday and clarifying with a harsher one once a week.

[mommy101405]

Thanks for all the suggestions. I am going to TRY to go to shampooing less but I need to wait until my bangs grow out a bit. There is no way I can deal with the yucky stage with them in my face.

[heidihug]

Some great advice here!

mommy101405, I have very oily skin (and didn't they tell us when we were teenagers that we would grow out of it? Uh-huh.). Since I became a LHC member, I have cut the amount of shampoo I use drastically, and I cut my hair washes from every other day (and I thought that was stretching it) to every three days. My hair only took a couple of weeks to adjust, and I have less build-up and my hair is shinier.

I also have bangs, and I wash them every night between shampoos with my gentle facial cleanser so I don't have a case of the bang greasies when I wake up in the morning. Works like a dream. And when I shampoo, it's at night, and spread my hair out over my pillow to dry. In the morning it's usually just damp in places, so I never need to blow dry.

Hope some of this helps!

[mommy101405]

Some great advice here!

mommy101405, I have very oily skin (and didn't they tell us when we were teenagers that we would grow out of it? Uh-huh.). Since I became a LHC member, I have cut the amount of shampoo I use drastically, and I cut my hair washes from every other day (and I thought that was stretching it) to every three days. My hair only took a couple of weeks to adjust, and I have less build-up and my hair is shinier.

I also have bangs, and I wash them every night between shampoos with my gentle facial cleanser so I don't have a case of the bang greasies when I wake up in the morning. Works like a dream. And when I shampoo, it's at night, and spread my hair out over my pillow to dry. In the morning it's usually just damp in places, so I never need to blow dry.

Hope some of this helps!

Oh, I'll have to try that. Good idea!

[spidermom]

Hello, Courtney! LOL, you do have secrets! OK, here are some tips:

~ Dilute your shampoo. Start with 1 Tablespoon and add enough water to make 1/2 cup total liquid.
~ Practice CWC (condition, wash, condition). After you wet your hair, coat the length with conditioner. Do not rinse it. Shampoo your scalp and rinse everything. Then do a final condition of the length only.
~ If you color yourself, do only the roots. Never pull the solution over the ends more than once.
~ Get some coconut oil. The kind for cooking is perfect. Put a teeny, tiny dab on your palms and apply it to the ends of your hair when it is fully dry. You can also put more on (to the point of greasiness) about an hour before you wash. Coconut oil will protect your hair from protein loss.
~ Lower the temp on your blow dryer if possible, and only do the crown area.
~ Never brush wet hair, and make sure there are no seams on the teeth of your comb to tear at your hair.

These are the same suggestions that I have. In addition, when I started seeing a hair stylist on a regular basis for teeny-tiny trims, my hair started gaining length. At first I had it trimmed every 6-8 weeks and added 4.75 inches per year (averaged) on that schedule. Then I started stretching out the time between trims. I've discovered that every 3 months is just about perfect for me. I added 5.5 inches in a year on that schedule, and my ends always looked/felt nice.

Some people don't trim at all, and that may work for you, but it may not. It didn't for me.