Distilled water - anyone?

[Lamb]

I live in an area with very hard water, and when I go home, it's not much better.
I am having some issues with it, too - I have fine hair, and mineral deposits make it crunchy and WO rinses or misting with tap water are not a possibility.

I had a roommate who said her stylist (in a different province) was able to tell her hair had mineral deposit on it...

I thought of adding distilled water rinses to my routine to eliminate this problem. Has anybody had any experience with them, good or bad?

[kdaniels8811]

I noticed a huge difference when we finally (after many years) installed a water softener. Barring that, distilled water for rinsing will have the same effect. Hard water is really hard on your hair. You should see a difference with distilled water. I use reverse osmosis water, about 50 cents a gallon at the grocery store. A couple quarts in a pitcher and I am rinsed. Let us know how it turns out for you.

[Unnamed]

Rinsing with distilled water didn't help at all for me. Didn't make things worse, but it also wasn't an improvement. Tried that during a thread I started trying to fix my crunchy/coated ends. Also fully understand about the nope on WO rinses. :lol: It did seem to be something that worked for others, though; so it could definitely be something to try (and probably is a good first thing to try).

My solution at that time was citric acid rinses and/or shampoo/conditioners with citric and/or ascorbic acid in them (the latter of which was pretty much already the case for shampoos, as those were the only ones that really worked lol).

Other things I figure would work but haven't tried would be: Washing solely with distilled water (not using any tap water). Or a water softener. :lol:

For about the last month or bit more I've been washing using a very strong mix of the 'miracle water (http://archive.longhaircommunity.com/showthread.php?t=51184)' that's in the archives, which is a mix using tap water with a little bit of citric acid and ascorbic acid. It might be something to try if rinsing with distilled doesn't work and you don't want to buy distilled water to wash with.

The mix I've been using is 4x what's in that link. I tried less, but less than 1 tsp citric acid doesn't cut it with our water. :rolleyes: No more citric acid rinses (which also had to be quite strong to work) or final conditioner with citric and ascorbic acid...and can even use a non-sulfate shampoo without perpetually gunky hair. Oh, and much reduced weird warm tones in my cool toned hair colour, and I could be wrong but I don't think my scalp is as oily (ETA: or, well, gunky/coated...probably about as oily, really). So far it's been great with no negative affects, and quite easy to mix up right before. Sometimes if I want/need more than the one gallon I'll use a bit more citric acid and fill the jug back up to half or a bit more and use that.

[Anje]

I think rinsing with citric acid might be your best option for mineral buildup, barring a chelating shampoo. Citric acid is also a chelator. (You may want to make this in distilled water, just to improve the effectiveness.)

I don't think I'd be inclined to always do final rinses with distilled water, though. Too much expense and hassle. That said, I love having a water softener.

[Áine]

I wash with bottled water from the grocery store. Or rather, I buy them in gallon jugs. One gallon is enough water for me to wash thoroughly.

The water I have in my area is not only has very high salinity, it is somewhat hard, and has a high amount of chlorine... none of which my hair likes, so it is easier to do bottled water.

It has made a vast difference. I no longer have the dry, crunchy feeling, and my conditioner just works better, and I use much less of it.

[ratgirldjh]

I have tried distilled water for washing my hair and the last rinse. What I found was that the drinking water worked better than the distilled! I don't know why.

[wintersun99]

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