By Anastasiya Sytnyk
Our hair is one of the first things we notice about ourselves. If your hair is messy or you’re having a bad hair day that will have an effect of how you see yourself throughout the day. Will it be a messy bun or ponytail kind of evening? But when your hair is freshly washed, styled and healthy you feel a hundred times better and that’s simply facts.
Sadly, sometimes to reach our hair goals we need to change how our hair naturally looks, for example if you’ve got curly hair, you’ve always wanted straight hair, and if you have straight hair you always curl it! It’s a never-ending battle and unfortunately, we need to damage our hair to win.
Heat damage is one of the most common hair problems today, from drying it with your hair dryer, to using the curling or straightening iron you are inevitably destroying your hair. This does not mean that you have to stop styling your hair the way you like it however.
One suggestion to avoid such a predicament is to be more mindful of how you apply heat and what your haircare routine is! So, lets give those dry split ends a little breather, shall we?
In order to revive your hair, you need to figure out what the problem is. Are you not applying enough conditioner and not leaving it in long enough for it to work? Do you have a dry or itchy scalp or maybe you find that your hair is just too oily. If you have colour treated hair, you need to take that into consideration too!
Once you have figured out the problem you can go straight to step 1!
Step 1: Picking out your treatment
This is the foundation for recovering your hair. You need to invest in your hair revival and speak to a consultant or your hairdresser and ask for advice about what shampoo and conditioner you should be using to cater the needs of your scalp and roots. There are specific brands that focus on colour treated hair, and have intensive ingredients to help undo the damage that the bleach or dyes have done as well as ones that protect the colour you have and let it stay in longer.
Step 2: Heat protection
Heat protection does not come with your shampoo or conditioner which means you need to buy a specific serum or spray that will help you against heat damage. There are different serums that protect against certain degrees of heat. If you are using heat on your hair daily or more than twice a week talk to your hairdresser about a stronger heat protecting treatment plan that you will need to add after each wash or before heat appliance.
Step 3: Trimming helps
Cutting off some of your hair can be stressful, especially when you’ve been growing it out for a long while. But let’s face it, sometimes the damage is beyond repair and you will need to get a trim. Experts advise that you sign up for a small trim once every 10-11 weeks depending on your hair status.
Step 4: After shower care
Once we get out of the shower, we have a tendency to just wrap up our hair in a towel of any sort and go about our day or go straight for the dryer. Experts have been advising that people replace towels for simple cotton or linen t-shirts which are more gentle on your hair, and will soak up more moisture, rather than you rubbing your hair and damaging it when it’s at its most vulnerable. So why not try drying with a t-shirt and when brushing your hair use a wide toothed comb in gentle brushing motions.
Step 5: Watch your diet
Food can sometimes be the best remedy. If you want to really keep your hair in a good state, you need to invest in foods that are natural helpers. Foods to include in your diet include eggs, berries, spinach, fish, sweet potatoes, avocados, and nuts.
A healthy diet affects your whole body as well as your hair so, if you are looking for strong, luscious locks a change of diet can give you just that.
Step 6: Hair food
Hair masks and hair food are all very important for damaged hair. Most of the hair masks have specific instructions and recommendations as to what they are best suited for. Speak with your hair stylist about which brands you should look out for and which nutrients they should include.
Happy treating!
