Crazy frizz ! Suggestions ?

[UltraBella]

I go snorkeling in Key Largo every summer and the humidity makes my hair CRAZY !!!!! I live in a very dry climate, so the change is shocking and my skin and hair tend to freak out.
Right now my hair is wavy/slightly curly and I am a "fuzz head" by nature. When I get off the plane in Florida I always have my hair in a bun and immediately I have an explosion of ringlets all around my hair line, which are adorable ! But the rest of my hair is just frizz. I keep my hair up the majority of the time, but if I do happen to wear it down, does anyone have any suggestions for encouraging soft shiny curls to form, instead of frizzy poof ? I am determined to make it through my entire vacation without heat styling my hair, which is something I have never accomplished. If I am going to wear my hair down I usually curl it with a large barreled curling iron to smooth it all out, but it's no use in all that humidity and it's a chore.
Soft shiny curl secrets please ???

[Ranee]

I'm not a curly girl, but when I get frizzies I mix some coneless leave-in conditioner with some oil (EVOO or coconut) to smooth down the hair. Always works!
You have a wonderfull head of hair btw!

[Loreley]

Oiling works for me. Or maybe you should try a heavier conditioner or a deep treatment. And leave-ins can be good too, as Ranee suggested. :)

[UltraBella]

I appreciate it, but I am hoping someone has a suggestion other than oiling, because my hair tends to look frizzy yet greasy when I oil. Maybe a product, or conditioner, or an overall "curl" regimen ?? I see so many beautiful heads of shiny curls here, come on ladies :) tell me your secrets !!!! Pretty please ?

[moominhapa]

Maybe Kimberly's Defrizz Spray (http://forums.longhaircommunity.com/showthread.php?t=277) might help.

[GlassEyes]

Not a girl, but I do have curly hair.

CO washing helps, as does the Curly "Girl" method.

CO washing--LHC Style

http://forums.longhaircommunity.com/vbjournal.php?do=article&articleid=18

For me, I wash first with a conditioner like I would with shampoo, then use a heavier conditioner after. No cone is often best, but I alternate. I like cones, but often I have to use a sulfate shampoo with them eventually, which a lot of people don't like.

CG Method:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iDhw3jj_e0Y&feature=related

There's two related videos--the other should be in the side bar or something. I also change this, in that I use more straight conditioner as leave in, oil, then gel. You don't need much oil--then again, I have curlier hair than you.

Other things that might help--a denman brush. They're great for combing conditioner through and curl definition. Another thing to do might be to join naturallycurly.com and look for product recommendations. You can even ask on the forum and give a price range. I don't have the money for a lot of products, so I use Suave Naturals conditioner and their new one, the Almond and Shea Professionals series, or Pantene, and then a hard hold gel--like Biotera or LA Sports--all fairly inexpensive. If you're in moist heat, you want a hard hold gel with PVP or polyquartinum-4...or 11. Can't remember.

I'm also fond of Curl Junkie's Curls in a Bottle and Kinky Curly Curling Custard, but both are really pricey. Anyway, hope that helps. Feel free to ask me anymore questions.

Oh, if you need clarification on any curly methods, you can also ask about that on Naturallycurly.com.

Oh, and one more thing--if CO doesn't work for you, look into WC, or Condition, wash, condition. You use conditioner, then shampoo, then use conditioner again. It helps, somewhat, but without the issues CO sometimes causes.

[UltraBella]

Thank you !!

[TiaKitty]

I grew up in Florida, and from looking at your hair in your siggy pic, it looks like we're similar in texture, color, and length...

I grew up with coney conditioners and coney leave in treatments. Nothing else worked for me. My absolute favorites are CitriShine by Schwartzkopf. It's hard to find now and may have been discontinued.

Another I really, really like is a Fantasia product called Hair Polisher. It has a picture of aloe plants on it and it says aloe enriched. It is alcohol free, which is nice. It also says "with protective sunscreen" which I particularly like. It smells lovely, a nice kind of Fruit-Stripe gum smell, but subtle. It is also not tested on animals. You can find it at Walgreens in the ethnic hair care section. Walmart also carries it. And Sally's. There's one that comes in a bottle and is a clear syrupy thing, and there's another that's the same, as far as I can tell, but is diluted and in a spray bottle. I like them both. The spray is easier to use, for me, but both work very, very well for combating the dreaded humidity frizz.

If you can wear cones I'd say try this!

The ingredients are: Cyclomthicone, Dimethicone, Phenyl Trimethicone, Aloe Extract, Benzophenone-3, and Fragrance.

It's also made in the USA, but it looks like the company is based out of London.

Or, you could wait until you get there and check out a store there and look for similar in the ethnic section. There should be a bunch of products marked at Hispanic women. Most of them concentrate on combating frizz. I've tried both types, for African-American hair and Hispanic hair, and I like them all.

My biggest fuss with snorkling was that dern band on the back of my head. I found a special strap that was neoprene, and that cut down on my breakage/pulling.

Enjoy yourself enough for me, too?!? I really miss Florida!

[spidermom]

For being in the water, I recommend oiling heavily and braiding. After you wash the oil out, leave some conditioner in, smooth some gel over the surface plus finger-comb some gel through the bottom half of length, then twirl strands of hair around your fingers as it dries. You can use a moisturizing styling gel or pure aloe vera gel. Fruit of the Earth makes a good one.

[going gray]

Thanks for the above information, it's very useful to me too when I travel outside of Colorado where my hair behaves itself, we have very little humidity.

[UltraBella]

You know, until getting on this forum I never even considered whether something had cones in it or not. I have always used cones, I don't know how to tell if I should use them or steer clear of them......Are there some cone guidelines I should be considering ??
I will look for that Hair Polisher, especially if it comes in a spray !
I haven't had any pulling or breakage from the snorkel strap, but I French braid my hair quite tightly and that helps.
I am concerned the oil spill may ruin our adventure, it is such an enormous disaster and no way to know yet if the oil will make it's way into the Loop and get carried to the Keys. If it does, I am going to try to find a way to volunteer with clean up while we are there. Tickets are already purchased, so I am going either way !

[GRU]

GlassEyes pretty much said everything that I would have said.

After my CO wash and condition in the shower every morning, I use a variation on the CG method. I have a big plastic cup (maybe 24 oz or so) that I keep in my shower, along with an old water bottle filled with ACV. I put a splash of ACV in the cup and then fill it up with shower water and dump the whole thing over my head, from roots to ends.

Then I put a generous squirt of conditioner (I'm currently in love with Suave Naturals Tropical Coconut -- it's not too heavy, has great slip, and smells divine!) in the cup, and add some shower water and swish it all around until it's well-blended. It's not watery, but it's more liquid than straight conditioner. I guess it's a consistency kind of like ketchup?

I slather that on my crown with my fingers and work it all through my temples and the back of my head, all the way to my scalp (my hair is quite dry, so I can leave conditioner on my roots -- YMMV). Watering it down a little makes it easier to get into all my hair without ending up with areas where it's gunky after it's dried.

Then from my nape down, with my hair still dripping wet with the ACV rinse, I put straight conditioner on it (again, the Suave Tropical Coconut). I make sure to work it through all the hair, not just the top layer -- I rake with my fingers and smoosh the ponytail all together. When I'm confident that I have complete coverage, I "squeegee" the excess moisture from my hair with my fingers. I then fill the plastic cup one more time with shower water and rinse off the floor of the shower so I don't slip and break my neck on the squeegeed conditioner.

My ends are REALLY dry, so I usually add a skosh more straight conditioner at the end. This gives me quite diluted conditioner left on my head, somewhat diluted conditioner on my length, and undiluted conditioner on my ends. At first I figured that all this conditioner left in would leave me with greasy, sticky hair, but my hair honestly does soak it all up!

I don't use any type of gel or styling product on a daily basis. Once in a blue moon I'll use some cone-free gel for a special occasion, but I'm very much a jeans-and-sneakers kind of gal, so my special occasions are few and far between. :)

[TiaKitty]

I really haven't noticed what the cone guidelines are, either. I know there are lots of peeps here who don't use them, and I imagine it's because they aren't "natural." I'm kind of in a mixed state between natural products and unnatural products, in all areas of my life.

If a natural product works as good or better, I use it. But, there are some things I just can't live without, and coney serums are one of those things.

The other thing I used to do, but I don't know if it would really help with frizzies... I would condition my dry hair, then braid, then mask up and swim. It seemed to help the look of my hair later in the day.

[09robiha]

lots of conditoner as a leave in - I just use my regular one and keepy putting it in till theres no more wet frizz
Scrunching with a t-shirt or microfibre towel is a HUGE frizz buster for me
A bit of gel scruched through

[Debra83]

The videos on the Mixed Chicks product site shows a technique that makes my normally frizzy hair a pile of curls - no appliance method - just air drying. The more careful I am doing it, the better the results.

http://forums.longhaircommunity.com/picture.php?albumid=4366&pictureid=67814

[BattahZ]

I'll give you my routine, which has been rocking lately - yesterday I was out all evening in rainy and humid weather, and I didn't have a smidge of frizz.

I wash using Curl Junkie daily fix cleansing conditioner - that's my most recent co-wash of choice, and I'm loving it. Then, I "condition" using Kinky Curly Knot Today, which isn't really a conditioner but does the trick and makes my hair super slippery. I leave in a teeny bit.

I squeeze the water out, then add a couple of drops of camellia oil from the ears down. I find that adding oil to wet hair really eliminates any oily look, esp if you only use a little, but it keeps the ends together so they stay in clumpy curls and don't frizz apart.

Then I flip my hair down and brush it out with my fingers, then separate into 6 sections. I squeeze the water out of each one, add some Kinky Curly Curling Custard (KCCC), brush through with a Denman, and twist into a spiral. Once I've done all six sections, I plop them into a towel. I usually do this before bed and sleep in it, but yesterday I did it in the morning and took it out a few hours later.

This is key now - it only takes a couple of minutes, though it sounds like it takes a long time - I take the hair out of the plop towel, and, with fingers lightly coated in KCCC, I pull each clumped curl out of the big twists and twist it downward (right now all the curls are sort of pulled up from styling upside down) in the direction of the corkscrew. I do my whole head pretty quickly, then I just leave it to air dry.

Voila, perfect hair. To scrunch out the crunch, I also use a few more drops of camellia oil - that keeps the ends from fuzzing, too.

Hope that's helpful! I've found KCCC really kills the frizz. I think it's got a pretty good hold as a gel, but it also seems really moisturizing, so once you scrunch out the crunch, it still holds your curls in place beautifully.

Good luck! And you have GORGEOUS hair!

[UltraBella]

Wow you guys !! Such great info !! I really appreciate all of it ! :)

[GRU]

With the CG method, products with 'cones are avoided because we aren't washing with sulfate shampoo, which is what removes the 'cones. Since we don't remove the 'cones with shampoo, we don't use 'cones at all, to prevent them from building up on our hair. (If you do use shampoo, then going 'coneless isn't a necessity.)

There may also be people who avoid them for tree-hugging-crunchy-granola reasons, but for people who CO-wash or WO-wash, it's a case of avoiding product build-up.

The naturallycurly.com website has ALL KINDS of info about the Curly Girl method, or you can just buy the book (or check it out from the library, like I did).

[May]

I suggest Garnier Curls & Shine curl gel-creme...I use it when I travel home to Montreal where the summers are as humid as anywhere. I highly recommend it and I have some the *the* frizziest hair EVER! lol :o

[GlassEyes]

I really haven't noticed what the cone guidelines are, either. I know there are lots of peeps here who don't use them, and I imagine it's because they aren't "natural." I'm kind of in a mixed state between natural products and unnatural products, in all areas of my life.

If a natural product works as good or better, I use it. But, there are some things I just can't live without, and coney serums are one of those things.

The other thing I used to do, but I don't know if it would really help with frizzies... I would condition my dry hair, then braid, then mask up and swim. It seemed to help the look of my hair later in the day.

Actally, it's mostly because of Sulphates, I think. Cones can build up and block moisture (though, not permanently) and removal with a sulfate is the only way to be rid of them quickly--which can dry out hair a lot.

I don't really have a problem with them.

[julliams]

It's always hard when you travel because your hair has to get used to the new humidity levels. My husband is Canadian and whenever we travel there I find it takes me about 2 weeks to work out what will work for my hair over there. It's never the same routine unfortunately.

I have read from another thread that you are exploring no cones at the moment. I recommend Giovanni's Leave in treatment as it's really great and it gives me curls like you see in my siggy. I do the following:

1. Wash hair as normal (I use SLS free for my scalp)
2. Condition as normal
3. Squeeze (not rub) hair with a towel and put up in a microfibre towel for a few minutes
4. Run a leave in or clear gel through your hair.
5. Use the towel to scrunch your curls, holding in place briefly for a few seconds and repeating around the head until all your hair is scrunched or plopped (whatever you like to call it).
6. Now you need to leave your hair alone until it dries which may take a couple of hours. Don't put your hands through your hair at all, just leave it and peek at it to see how it's going. At first it won't look like it's particularly curly, but when it is totally dry, the curls will be at their best.

The first day I get curls like my siggy, by the next day they seem to fall out a bit and go to waves and by the third day it's almost straight.

I personally find the cones give my hair a bit of slip and make the curls sit nicer when there's not too much build up. Once I get too much build up, the curls disappear and I seem to go straight. In this case I just clarify and the curls come bouncing back.

Hope this works for you.

[Armelle]

I'm glad you asked about this. I always forget the insane levels of summer humidity around here and the effect on my hair. I'm dealing with insane frizz. Even extra conditioner doesn't help much and, like you, I go directly to greasy if I oil my hair.

[Jessica Trapp]

Aloe vera gel?

jes

[Crazy Diamond]

Flax seed gel works miracles with my hair. It smoothens and defines my curls and my hairs stays soft and manageable, it tends to tangle, when using aloe vera.

[eezepeeze]

Try products by Frizz-Ease. I have 3c hair. This is how I countrol frizz year round.

Shampoo and condition (pantene and Aussie 3MM). While soaking wet, I add leave in conditioner, curl enhancer spray, and frizz ease anti frizz serum. Then, I add some stronger hold curl enhancer gel. I especially like the one from Herbal Essences in the purple squeeze tube.

DO NOT TOUCH HAIR WHILE DRYING! This breaks up the curl and encourages frizz. Air dry for maximum curl definition. YOU MUST COMB OUT HAIR WHILE SOAKING WET OR NOT AT ALL!! If you try to comb or brush after its dry,you will get frizz for sure. Anything you want to do to your hair is best done while it's wet, including braiding, buns, etc. This is the opposite of what most people on LHC say, but it's the only way to comb out or style curly hair if you really want to combat frizz.

After you've done all this, you want to be able to go a couple days without washing. So, at night, pile your hair on top of your head in a very high pony and secure with a soft scrunchie. Flip the tail over your pillow and try not to move too much :-) You'll probably be able to get 2-3 days out of your curls. Remember: don't brush them out!! Finger comb very gently. You really just want to re-arrange the curl so it looks nice.

If you are hanging out at the beach all day, take advantage of the texturizing sea water. After you get saltwater in your hair, scrunch like crazy. You will have a wild and free look with great curls. bring a hair tie or bandana.

Hope this helps! I've been a curly gurl all my life and have discovered many little tricks for dealing with frizz. It just comes with the territory when you have curls.