Natural Hair Care for Black Women

Ask any hairstylist how they would describe African American women's hair and the first two words they are likely to use are brittle and hard to take care of. Many spend countless hours and thousands of dollars trying different types of hair treatment to straighten their hair and make it easier to take care of. The good news is that there are a number of different types of natural hair care for black women which are far less damaging than using heat or harsh chemical types of hair treatment.

It All Starts When You Are Standing in the Shower

The best form of hair treatment starts from the moment you step into the shower. When your hair is wet, it is in its most vulnerable state. Hair that is wet is brittle and easily damaged. To help reduce the risk of this type of damage, you need to use a shampoo made with natural ingredients as part of your hair treatment program. Choose one that does not contain harsh chemicals which can strip your hair of the natural oils which keep it strong and healthy. Sulfate free shampoos can be used, but all-natural ones make a much better choice.

You should never shampoo more than three times per week as this form of hair treatment can dry your hair out causing even more damage. Choose an all-natural conditioner as these contain a number of herbs, minerals, and botanicals carefully chosen to nourish and strengthen your hair. You should never wash your hair unless you are going to condition it at the same time. Doing so will leave it stripped of these nutrients and open to all forms of damage.

Once You Step Out of the Shower

When you step out of the shower, your hair is still wet and vulnerable. As part of better hair treatment, you should never use anything besides a wide tooth comb on your wet hair. At this stage your hair is still extremely brittle, if you use a brush or fine tooth comb, you will break large amounts of hair. Use a towel to pat your hair dry or bundle your hair inside of the towel to dry. Using a blow dryer may be one of the worst forms of hair treatment at this point as your hair has no defense against the heat and is easily dried out and damaged. You can massage in a heat protectant as a hair treatment to help if you can't resist using a hair drier.

Beware of the Stylist in You

Women love to style their hair and the modern style of flat hair amongst African American women has become extremely popular. Flat hair is far easier to take care of, but the chemical or heat related hair treatment used to achieve this style is very damaging. If you must use a flat iron or blow dryer to straighten your hair, you need to use an oil based hair treatment made to protect your hair from heat damage. A far better choice is going with a style which does not require straightening as often as possible and reserving the flat hair for special occasions.

Keep Your Hair Moist

African American hair is by nature very dry and requires special types of hair treatment. One of the best forms of hair treatment is to keep your hair as moist as possible. While you might already be using a top quality natural conditioner, you should be using a moisturizer on top of this. Your hair will absorb all the moisture it can and the more moisturizer you can give, the better it will look and feel. The best moisturizers contain coconut oil, olive oil, jojoba oil, or carrot oil. This form of hair treatment is the final touch in your search for the best natural hair care for black women.

How to Take Care of Black Hair?

Taking care of your hair is essential to a good self-image. Styling and hair treatments can be hard on your hair, resulting in dry, brittle, and broken hair. Determining the type of damage done to your hair is vital toestablishing a proper hair care routine. Finding the best shampoo for breakage and establishing a hair care routine that involves nourishing deep conditioners will go a long way in improving the health of your hair.

Why Is My Hair Breaking?

Broken hair happens to everyone. Even if you avoid excessive styling, rough handling, or chemical treatments a certain amount of breakage will occur. Black hair in particular has a unique make up that makes it vulnerable to breakage. Due to this unique make up, individual hair strands go from thick to thin back to thick again. Black hair often has greater elasticity than any other type of hair. The thin spots are often the easiest damaged and therefore weakest parts of the strand. It is important to find the best shampoo for breakage based on the type of damage done to your hair.

Chemical treatments such as relaxers, straighteners, color treatments, and perms are made up of harsh chemicals that can alter the chemical makeup of the hair follicle and strip the hair of essential proteins making it more likely to break. Limiting the use of these treatments to every 8-10 weeks will help reduce breakage. The best shampoo for breakage when using chemical hair treatments involves a nourishing protein, lightweight moisturizers, and a pH balancer.

Heat can also damage your hair. Use of flat irons, curling irons, and blow dryers dry out the outer layer of your hair and make it brittle. Brushing your hair while blow drying can also stretch and break your hair. Using a soft brush or wide toothed comb can help reduce breakage. The best shampoo for breakage while using heat treatments is one that has a deep penetrating moisturizer.

Finding The Best Shampoo For Breakage

Finding the best shampoo for breakage can be a daunting task. There are a wide variety of shampoos and conditioners that claim to reduce, treat, and prevent breakage. The best shampoo for breakage will vary depending on the types of treatments you use on a regular basis. Chemically damaged hair will require different ingredients than heat damaged hair. Regardless of the damage type, the best shampoo for breakage will be sulfate free. Sulfates can further damage or dry out your hair.

With chemically damaged hair, the best shampoo for breakage will be one that restores the proteins that are stripped from your hair and brings the chemical makeup of your hair back to normal. In order to prevent breakage you need to strengthen and repair damaged hair. The best shampoo for breakage will contain a combination of protein, keratin, and amino acids. These ingredients penetrate deep into the hair and restore the balance in your hair. They will smooth out and repair damaged strands.

Heat damaged or overly styled hair requires deep penetrating moisture instead of protein. Over styling or over heating your hair damages and dries out the protective outer layer of the hair strand, making hair brittle. The best shampoo for breakage will boost your hair’s moisture levels with ceramides, nutrients, and antioxidants. By moisturizing your hair, the outer layer of the hair follicle is repaired and strengthened.

Establishing a regular hair care routine is essential to reducing broken and damaged hair. Determining what type of damage affects your hair will help you find the best shampoo for breakage. Make sure to wash your hair once a week with a sulfate free shampoo and follow it with a deep conditioner. Try to avoid rough handling and over styling your hair. Following these simple steps will help you maintain a head of healthy, vibrant looking hair.

How to Take Care of African American Hair?

African American hair has a very unique structure. It has greater elasticity and curl than other types of hair. These differences create a varying thickness in the hair follicle itself, going from thick to thin and back to thick again. Over treatment and rough handling tend to weaken the strands at the thin points causing hair breakage. There are a wide variety of hair breakage products to help reduce, repair, and prevent damage to your hair.

Understanding Hair Breakage

Hair breakage occurs when the hair follicle is weakened due to over processing or harsh styling. Many of the products used to relax, color, or style African American hair contain harsh chemicals that damage the hair strand and alter the chemical makeup of your hair. Breaks usually occur when the middle layer of the hair follicle is damaged.  Heat styling, such as hot air blow drying, flat irons, and curling irons dry out and damage the hair making it more vulnerable to breaks as well. Finding the right hair breakage products to add to your hair care regimen is vital to having a head of strong, healthy hair.

Easy Steps to Healthier Hair

Starting a healthier hair care routine is vital to preventing hair breakage, and taking care of your hair to prevent breakage is simple. Here areseveral easy steps to create healthier, more vibrant looking hair. Wash your hair about once a week with a moisturizing shampoo that is sulfate free. Use a clarifying shampoo that removes built up hair products once a month. Long term buildup of hair product can prevent your hair from absorbing moisture and gaining the full benefit of hair breakage products and protein treatments. Always condition your hair after every wash. Try to avoid rough handling and aggressive styling. Use a soft brush or wide toothed comb and avoid tight hairstyles. Last but not least, use of the hair breakage products which contains a combination of proven ingredients that will help prevent hair breakage.

Types of Hair Breakage

There are several different types of hair breakage. The most commonly seen types are split ends, chemical, and heat breakage. Split ends happen to everyone and are caused most often by heat styling, towel drying, over combing, and poor diet. Chemical hair breakage is caused by relaxing, straightening, or coloring your hair. These treatments contain harsh chemicals that weaken the hair strands and allow them to split. Decreasing the frequency of chemical treatments greatly reduces hair breakage. Heat treatment weakens the hair by drying out and damaging the outer layer of the hair follicle. By using a hair breakage product most types of hair breakage can be prevented.

Preventing Hair Breakage

It is best to start a treatment with hair breakage products as soon as you notice broken hair. Hair breakage products come in a wide variety from salon treatments, to at home treatments and even ones you can make yourself. Hair breakage products are widely available and can be found at your local beauty supply store, salon or grocery store. The most commonly seen hair breakage products are moisturizers and deep conditioners, hot oil treatments, and protein treatments. There is a difference between moisturizers, conditioners, and hot oil or protein treatments. Moisturizers and conditioners allow the hair to regain its normal hydration levels making it smooth and silky. Hot oil and protein treatments provide vital nutrients to your hair, making it strong and shiny. There are also several hair breakage products available that offer a combination of protein treatment and deep conditioning.

The process of applying hair breakage products does not vary much from salon to at home method. The treatment is applied to damp hair and covered with a plastic cap. The hair breakage product is then left in the hair for a set period of time during which it can be treated with a warm dryer or just left to sit.

Preventing hair breakage and taking care of your hair is easy. Remember to use a moisturizing shampoo that removes hair product buildup and condition after every wash. Avoid rough styling or over processing your hair with harsh chemicals. Make sure to moisturize and nourish your hair with hair breakage products containing proven ingredients. Soon you will be on the road to strong, healthy hair.

How to Stop Hair Shedding with Proper Hair Care?

Hair Shedding is a problem for millions of women, who for some unknown reason begin to shed handfuls of hair each day. The good news is that there is almost always a reason for hair shedding, and stopping your hair from falling out is often easier than you might think. Keep in mind that everyone sheds some hair each day, up to 100 hairs. Anything over that might indicate a problem and it might be time to head to a dermatologist or doctor to find out why.

First Steps in Diagnosing Hair Shedding

Before you can decide how to stop hair shedding, you must first know why you are shedding hair. A doctor will ask you several questions about your nutrition, and your hair care routines, then will order some blood tests. Blood tests will check for a variety of disorders and illnesses that might be at the root of your hair shedding. Your doctor may also decide to do an analysis on your hair to see if it is lacking in any particular nutrients.

Get Checked for Your Thyroid and Other Conditions

A blood test can reveal whether or not there are any medical conditions at the root of your hair shedding. Most common are thyroid disorders, diabetes, and other auto immune disorders. In many cases you will also have other symptoms of a medical problem, such as fatigue, dry skin, or weight loss or gain. Once medical conditions have been ruled out it is time to look at things such as diet and hair care.

One if the Simplest Things to Fix

Often hair shedding is a product of poor diet and nutrient deficiencies. The good news is that these are very easy to fix either by adding certain foods or supplements into your diet or by adding these nutrients directly to your hair. A spoon of molasses in a cup of warm water provides a wealth of important nutrients to your hair. Simply massage into your hair and into the roots, leave it for one hour and rinse.

Omega 3 fatty acids can be added both to your hair or your diet. Flax seed oil makes a great warm oil treatment, and flax, chia, hemp, and oily fish in your diet will also help your hair to shine and be less prone to hair shedding. Borage oil supplements can help to reduce inflammation and promote healthy sebum (scalp oil).

A mineral deficiency can also affect hair shedding. Important minerals for your hair include calcium, copper, iron, magnesium, and zinc. You can add these minerals to your diet by eating lots of vegetables, or you can take a mineral supplement.

Treating Your Hair Gently

If you know you have an issue with hair shedding, how your treat and care for your hair can make a big difference. Moisturizing your hair is essential, and you need to make sure the conditioning treatment you use gets all the way down to the roots. Use a moisturizing shampoo and conditioner, and a monthly deep conditioning treatment. You can also use leave in daily moisturizers and oil serums to help protect from both hair shedding and breakage.

When brushing your hair, brush from the tips up, gently removing tangles as you work. If you start at the roots you are much more likely to have issues with hair shedding and breakage. Make sure to use the right brush or comb for your hair, and do not over brush your hair.

With the right care your hair can remain healthy and strong, and you can keep hair shedding down to a minimum. Finding the right cause for your hair shedding is vital to being able to remedy the problem. If you are unable to stop hair shedding on your own, a trip to the doctor should be able to help you determine the reason for hair shedding and get your hair back on the right track to health once more.

Hair Breakage Treatments Promising to Avoid Split Ends

There are times when you think your hair is healthy and beautiful, and suddenly you find the ends of it resembling a used broom, all rough, snagged and split in the middle. Many of us do not notice this change in hair when it starts splitting. Split ends (or Trichoptilosis) are a condition which results from severe hair breakage which goes under-noticed. Therefore, a proper hair breakage treatment not only protects the hair from being damaged, but also keeps split ends away.

Causes of split ends can be varied. Stripping your hair off moisture is one big reason. This can be due to reasons like your hair’s texture, washing hair daily without conditioning it, frequent usage of heat-styling tools, or swimming in the pool without a cap. Any particular illness and high amounts of stress will decrease general health of the whole body, including hair to cause breakage. Food that has more sodium, mostly packaged snacks cause hair shedding and weakness. Lack of proteins, iodine, essential fats, etc., in the diet causes hair to lose its shine.

Some hair breakage products claim that they treat split ends. This, however, is not true, since nothing can actually repair a split end. They just seal the splits and make them look shiny and healthy, but the actual splits are still hidden in your hair. Therefore, it is always better to rely on hair breakage treatments which help you avoid split ends, not cure them.

Firstly consult a doctor to know the cause of hair breakage, which might be due to lack of nutrition, dry scalp or dandruff. This should be treated using medicines and supplements. Check with your professional hair expert to know the type of your hair, and what you must be doing wrong with it. Each hair type is unique, which requires a different shampoo, conditioner and serum from the other. Use these products as advised by your stylist. Apply styling products which contain sunscreen, to keep from getting sun-damaged. Get yourself a deep conditioning hair breakage treatment, to minimize the damage done and improve hair quality. Always use a heat protect spray before blow-drying, and a detangling spray to loosen those tough knots in your hair.

The most important thing to follow for hair breakage treatment is to avoid those activities you do to stress it. Teasing your hair aggressively, on a regular basis, cause hair to snag and break off in the middle. You will also notice that hair breakage is more when you towel vigorously, because it tends to be pulled beyond its comfort level. So avoid it. Try not to use styling tools, even a hair dryer on a daily basis to prevent hair breakage, as this depletes moisture from your hair make it dry, listless and easily breakable. Detangle your hair only using a wide-toothed comb, and start from the ends of your hair working upward. Avoid any kind of chemical hair treatments like colouring, perming and straightening your hair till your hair is back in its healthiest state.

Above all this, get yourself a trim every 6 to 8 weeks to eliminate split ends and keep hair healthy. Give your hair a lot of time and attention; use the right products and treatments to maintain healthy and shining hair.

Hair Breakage Treatment for Damaged Hair

Hair breakage is a most common problem faced by people these days irrespective of their ages. Usually people who have crossed their thirties encounter this problem but nowadays this problem is also reported among teenagers. According to a survey, about 41 per cent of women in America have admitted that they have a hair problem. To lose 5-20 hairs is a natural process and there is no problem when you lose that much amount of hair but the problem is when you lose around 200 hairs a day. This is when you should seriously start looking for hair breakage treatment.

Hair Breakage Reasons

The reasons for hair breakage could be lack of nutritional ingredients or using chemicals on hair which may be causing these side effects. If the food you consume lacks in vitamin B, E, iron, silica and zinc, then you are likely to face the problem of shedding hair, as these essential nutrients are necessary for strong hairs. The other causes for hair breakage could be use of curling irons and hot air blow dryers, which not only tends to make your hair hard but also led to their breakage.

Hair Repairing Treatments

Hair breakage treatment is vital for those who are facing this problem. There are also home remedies apart from consultant hair treatment specialists. But home remedies would not be as effective as those which are scientifically prepared for hair breakage treatment. The most common method of treatment is a hot oil treatment which uses canola oil as medicine for hairs. In this process one has to apply hot canola oil to hair and scalp and wait for some time after that wash off the oil with a good moisturizing shampoo. Regular application of canola oil will impart elasticity and strength to your hairs and prevent further hair damage loss.

Prevention Is The Best Cure

The best cure is prevention. Hence, if you regularly pay attention to your hair then you will never face hair breakage problem. Regularly apply canola oil which will nourish your hair with important ingredients required for healthy and strong hair and will eventually control hair damage in future. Other home remedies include washing your hair more than twice a week with a good conditioner or moisturizing shampoo. Avoid regular use of curling irons and hot air blow dryers, as they tend to make your hair brittle. Get your hair trimmed regularly to avoid split ends and choose products with gentle ingredients that does not harm your hair.

Hair is an important part of your physical appearance and personality and no one appreciates hair breakage and likes to look bald. With proper care and attention, you can avoid these problems with home remedies and will be spared from spending large money for hair breakage treatment. One should be aware of the factors responsible for shedding hair and should avoid these factors in his daily routine. A healthy diet not only keeps your body healthy but also makes your hair stronger. Regular and proper care of your hair will definitely avoid any hair breakage problem.

Hair is one of the important features to enhance one’s appearance and adds to the attractiveness and beauty of your face. One should opt for the right hair- breakage treatment to keep them healthy and shining forever.

Essentials of Hair Breakage Products for Repairing Damaged Hair

Though it is normal to lose 50 -100 hairs a day for any person but if your hair is breaking off and not shedding, then it’s a problem that needs to be dealt with immediately. Shedding hair is natural, and it happens when the hair completes its growth and falls off.  On the other hand hair breakage happens due to mishandling of hair or deficiency of something. Before breakage there is always discolouration and cuticle loss, these are the signs that your hair is damaged. There are many hair breakage products in the market but before you pick up a product you should know the real reason for hair breakage and the ways to treat it.

Reasons of hair breakage:

Internal Reasons - One of the simple reasons for hair breaking off can be a deficiency of essential nutrients in your diet. Deficiency of Vitamins B, B1, E, iron, silica and zinc can cause hair breakage. You need to increase the intake of fresh fruit and vegetables and lots of healthy fat like fish fat.

External Reasons - With the kind of lifestyle in today’s world external factor has a great impact in hair breakage. Some of the most damaging external factors are the use of excessive heat in the hair by ironing and regular blow drying, chemical treatments for hair like perms and relaxers, frequent brushing and roughly handing the hair, hair styling with metal bands or tying it up too tightly and lastly frequent hair dyeing.

Illness - Sometimes you tend to fall victim of hair breakage due to prolonged illness or side effects of medication.

Nonetheless there are many hair breakage products and treatment that can help you repair your damaged hair and get back your crowning glory.

Products and treatment for hair breakage

The most important question here is since the market is flooded with so many products making tall claims; what are the essential things you must see in a hair breakage product before you use it to prevent hair breakage? Let’s note some important factors you must never ignore- the product you chose must have a good and an established record of satisfied customers; it must use progressive technology which means, the product must not be only coating the outer layer of your hair, it must permeate the hair and work from inside; and lastly the manufacturer must guarantee its own product with great results.

Prevention of hair breakage

There are a number of easy ways to prevent hair breakage, let’s look at a few:

• A regular hot oil massages

• Wash your hair with a gentle cleanser at least 3-4 times  a week and follow it up with a conditioner this keeps your hair moist and manageable

• Get frequent trims to avoid split ends

• Evade excessive hair colouring and bleaching; avoid perms and use of extreme heat in the hair

• Never brush wet hair, if needed use a comb with wide tooth

• Avoid vigorously rubbing your hair when the hair is wet

• Always use a reputed hair product that is particularly suited to the problem of hair breakage

Following these few simple yet effective steps will prevent hair breakage but along with these you must follow a regular hair care regimen with the best available hair breakage products.