The greatest gift I could give my hair
It's a really great feeling to walk out of the salon with one of the greatest compliments a stylist can give you - "I can't believe how healthy, soft, silky and shiny your hair has gotten!". That's exactly the compliment a received yesterday and it makes my heart go all a flutter.
My hair wasn't always in this condition. It's taken a leap of faith and some trial to find out what works best for my hair type. Naturally my hair is very curly. The curls are rather tight yet with some work I can brush them out and style my hair into something almost straight. Because I prefer the straight look to my hair taking a blow dryer and a flat iron to my mane was something I wasn't timid about. In fact, I styled my hair in this manner more often than not, especially on work days. On the weekends I tended to not care as much so I would just let it do whatever it wanted.
Now because my hair was curly and colored, I've gone through various recommendations: "use shampoo for color treated hair", "use moisturizing products", "use deep conditioners". Well, the products for color treated hair were the first things I've tried. Red is. Very hard color to maintain and I wanted it to last as long as possible. I had gone through products like Eufora. Which I really liked but it was not easy to obtain. But, alas my hair tends to get used to products after a while and I needed to switch because my hair felt weighted down and like the product was not as effective.
I then started going to an Aveda salon because I had moved and needed something a bit fancy to treat myself. There I was recommended to use their color conserve product to keep the red going strong. Well, it really didn't and maybe it's because their products (all of their products including the dye) are about 99% natural. Something just still wasn't jiving to keep my red from getting all coppery and brown.
Flash forward to today. I had at bangs before our wedding and would often style them with a bit of an anime flip to them because just having them be flat against my forehead looked absolutely awful. I do not for one second ever regret having them, though in my defense I've usually had angles or an extremely long bang that was I was able to tuck behind my ear for as ling as I could remember. This was the first time in a long time that I had a real bang. And the. Of course I got lazy and didn't feel like styling them after a while and decided to grow them out. During that time period I was also really stressed out with work and I just didn't feel like taking the effort to take the flat iron to my hair. Not to mention my stylist was fixing my hair more often than not because of the damage a flat iron will do - even with heat protectant products.
So, I figured if I was going to let my curls run rampant for a while I should do something to fix them. And. By that I mean enhance the curl. After so many years of brushing and drying and straightening my hair as well as the length the curl was a bit out of whack. With the weight of my hair underneath was rather straight and wouldn't curl at all. After doing a bit of research online, it seemed a lot of people with curly hair were steering towards sulfate free shampoos. It was an interesting idea and let's face it: I don't think I ever once paid any mind to what was in the shampoo - I really only cared what it smelled like and how my hair felt after a shower.
Once I had my mind made up I was going to try this adventure I geared up and mentally prepared myself for along trip at Ulta, prepared to read the back of every bottle of shampoo. Because if anything they were surely to have what I need. I finally settled on using Rusk Deepshine Color Moisturizing Shampoo. Say that 10 times fast. I tried it and I loved it.
A sulfate free shampoo feels very different than a normal shampoo and even after reading it the experience still threw me. It doesn't lather and get all bubbly like normal. I was very afraid that because of that my hair wasn't really going to be as clean as it should, or how I wanted it. Have no fear though it works fine. I was rather sad a out the lack of bubbles. I guess after all these years you just come to associate the bubbles with cleanliness. But now I'm in love with this shampoo. My hair started curling better and shaping better along with the help of a curling mousse. And even when I decided to dry my hair it seemed to be putting up with the heat better. And the. The greatest difference I noticed was that my hair was staying red for longer. My stylist would notice too, and now she doesn't pull the dye through to the ends every time (which is also helping my hair heal and save me some money), she'll just do the roots.
Every time I go in I now get a compliment on how long the red lasts and how healthy my hair is. I wouldn't have known any better if i hadn't been curious enough to look it up and try it out. Now, I know that particular brand is a bit pricey and not sold everywhere but when I need to I buy Organix brand shampoo which I can find at the grocery store for 1/3 the price and it works just as well. But why not treat your hair?
Do the research and find out what your hair type needs to stay healthy. I know I found what works wonders for me and I tell you, it's the best gift I could give my hair :)