[stafl]

I have been no-poo since February - that's almost a whole year!

I have been loving it, but lately my hair has suddenly gotten weird and I don't know what's up. It's like I need to condition it or use something to detangle...but nothing I've tried really helps, and some things have just made matters worse. My hair feels wiry and coarse to the touch, and it's nearly impossible to get a comb through it, forget about even trying to use a hairbrush! But when it's wet, it feels like a wool diaper cover that has too much lanolin in it.

I have really oily hair, even a year after stopping with the shampoo, I still have to wash my hair every two to three days or it is just gross and greasy. So with any sort of conditioner, please keep that in mind. I've tried tiny amount of oil just on the ends (I have long hair), more oil on the ends, different kinds of oil, more vinegar in the rinse, just about everything I could think of. Surely someone here knows a trick I haven't thought of yet!!!

 

[girlndocs]

Hmm, that's strange, maybe the people at the Long Hair Community would have some ideas? They wouldn't be no-poo or natural, necessarily, but if you could get an idea of WTF's going on maybe you could find a natural solution. I hope you can figure it out. Do you think it could be due to any kind of hormonal shift? Your water hasn't gotten different has it?

 

[arcenciel]

Hi,

I've been no poo for about 9 months now and for quite a long time it was a bit like you describe. I discovered a thread about it somewhere else here and it recommended apple cider vinegar and baking soda. - before I was just rinsing it in the shower. The baking soda, mixed with really hot water and poured over my hair, then rinsed off a few minutes later, stopped it being greasy at the top but also made it a bit dry. I diluted some vinegar and rinsed my hair with it, and it's been great since. Some people use the vinegar once a week or so, I don't need it that often, but it helped stop it being dry.

Eggs were also suggested as a conditioner....

Oh, and I find a change of water helps. We have really hard water here and my hair doesn't like it at all. Perhaps rinsing with mineral or filtered water once in a while might help?

 

[stafl]

Thanks! It is kind of like when I didn't use any vinegar at all, so I thought more vinegar might help. Too much vinegar in the rinse makes my hair look oily. I just don't get it. Maybe it is hormonal. Hadn't thought of that aspect. Baby's eating more solids and nursing less, and I also had surgery to remove endo and adhesions last month.
I managed to detangle it by loading it up with apricot kernel oil and braiding it. Left the braid in for a day and overnight, and that did seem to help with the tangles, but not the coarseness. I want soft hair again!! *sniff*

I can't bring myself to put eggs in my hair. I can't eat them, they make me ill, and just the smell of eggs makes me want to gag. I think I might try some beer tomorrow, and see if that helps. (just don't tell my DH that I'm only going to drink half a bottle of beer so I'll have left-overs to wash my hair with :LOL)

Okay, when I first went no-poo, I noticed my hair was strange (well, different). But then I figured out a routine that works for me and things were better. Just wondering, though, if my hair isn't supposed to be somewhat coarse and wiry??? If I don't use vinegar in the rinse after the baking soda, my hair gets kinky curly and feels like steel wool. So, if after 35 years, I am just now letting my hair be itself, maybe that's just the way my hair is?

 

[LiminalOne]

Hmmm.

Are you brushing it with a boar's head brush nightly? I know that when I stopped doing that, I had more trouble with oily parts and dry parts. Sometimes I put a drop of EO on the brush but sometimes that gets a bit overpowering and I notice that for my hair if I condition it at all I have to wash it more frequently, but now I'm washing only once a week which I like. the other thought I had was to make sure that you are eating lots of EFAs, but that's just a guess. And maybe not spend a tons of time under the hot water in the shower or wash your hair with slightly cooler water (uggh, I know).

good luck

 

[stafl]

a boar bristle brush :LOL

nope, not my hair! I might as well just smooth it down with my hand for all the good a bristle brush does.

Though, I think the problem is solved. It must be a hormonal thing, because my skin has been really dry and itchy, too. I remembered hearing black girls in high school talking about putting cocoa butter in their hair to make it softer, so I figured it was worth a try. I have some unrefined cocoa butter here, so I melted some in the palms of my hands and rubbed it in my hair. Worked like a charm, and didn't make my hair look oily or greasy at all!!!

AND, it also fixed whatever was wrong with my skin, too.

 

[Pattyla]

Sounds like you found a good solution. The only thing I would add to it is try to stretch out the time between washes. Find days when you can live with it looking kinda greasy and don't wash those days. That is how I stretched mine out to needing to be washed just once a week.

Of course I got my hair cut last week and although the hairdresser agreed to just rinse it before I knew what was happening she was shampooing it

: . Now it is a mess and I'm having to detox it all over again.