Wax when wet, soft when dry?
I've looked through the waxy tags here, and nothing really comes close to how my hair's been behaving.
I'm WO, hard water, with herbal flaxseed washes twice a week (trying this week to get it down to one). A line cut, trying to grow it to mid back, maybe longer. Natural curl, and I never wear it straight. I do WO washes every morning. To define and add moisture to my highlighted longer sections, I use Aloe Vera gel - the kind you take as a dietary supplement - not the kind you find in the skin aisle at the store. Yeah, it's a pain to snatch it from the fridge, but I find this kind of Aloe Vera gives my hair softness and nice definition. Plus it washes right out. The only downside is that it has a weird tangy odor to it - nothing rancid, but those who want to try this type of gel might want to add a drop or two of EO's to null the scent. It dissipates once hair is dry, so I don't really mind it.
Anyway, I was thinning for a while. Not heaping handfuls of hair, but my hair dresser noticed enough to recommend Biotin. I'd talked about it in my initial post, so I won't bore you again with the sob story. Fallout HAS stopped since I've gone no poo/herbal only, and I've noticed a ton of new little hairs sprouting my all over my head. It's really encouraging to see that. I think it's grown over an inch or more the beginning of August. There's a recipe for a thinning serum I've been using also, but around my ears is the only place I apply it. The carrier oils are Jojoba and grapeseed, Eo's are thyme, geranium, lavender, cedarwood, ylang ylang, peppermint, and rosemary. And no matter how oily it looks in the morning, WO gets that out (which for some reason amazes me).
So what's my problem? Waxiness. And not the kind that sticks around when my hair's dry. My hair dry is great. It has a ton of volume at the crown where it had been content to lie flat and limp (especially this time of year when the humidity drops). The curls are really perking up. When I brush (BBB) I can tell where the sebum is coating and where it isn't. My sides and ends are still fried from the damn highlighting, but the back (shortest and no highlighting) has completely adapted to the no poo. This part is wonderful when dry - but wet, it feels like a melted candle. This is the ONLY part of my hair that's doing this.
I know the sebum has made its merry way to the tips back there. It's the shortest, least damaged part of my wee little head. I don't personally mind it since it kinda goes away when I flaxwash, and I can't feel it when it's dry. But I have a hair appointment coming up and I don't want to be embarrassed when she wets me down. I can just imagine the comments I'll get. I have good success with applesauce, but I can't use that RIGHT before a hair appointment. Then she'll think I have dandruff.
Is this normal? Am I overreacting to the non-squeaky clean feel? What I don't understand is why the waxiness leaves once dry, but returns when wet. It makes no sense to me. Is this the hard water reacting to the sebum in my hair? I noticed today whem I washed it was fine at first, but once I scrubbed and flushed my scalp a while, the waxiness snuck in there. It was hard to even comb it.
But now I can run my fingers through it fine. No wax. Nothing. So weird.
I'm WO, hard water, with herbal flaxseed washes twice a week (trying this week to get it down to one). A line cut, trying to grow it to mid back, maybe longer. Natural curl, and I never wear it straight. I do WO washes every morning. To define and add moisture to my highlighted longer sections, I use Aloe Vera gel - the kind you take as a dietary supplement - not the kind you find in the skin aisle at the store. Yeah, it's a pain to snatch it from the fridge, but I find this kind of Aloe Vera gives my hair softness and nice definition. Plus it washes right out. The only downside is that it has a weird tangy odor to it - nothing rancid, but those who want to try this type of gel might want to add a drop or two of EO's to null the scent. It dissipates once hair is dry, so I don't really mind it.
Anyway, I was thinning for a while. Not heaping handfuls of hair, but my hair dresser noticed enough to recommend Biotin. I'd talked about it in my initial post, so I won't bore you again with the sob story. Fallout HAS stopped since I've gone no poo/herbal only, and I've noticed a ton of new little hairs sprouting my all over my head. It's really encouraging to see that. I think it's grown over an inch or more the beginning of August. There's a recipe for a thinning serum I've been using also, but around my ears is the only place I apply it. The carrier oils are Jojoba and grapeseed, Eo's are thyme, geranium, lavender, cedarwood, ylang ylang, peppermint, and rosemary. And no matter how oily it looks in the morning, WO gets that out (which for some reason amazes me).
So what's my problem? Waxiness. And not the kind that sticks around when my hair's dry. My hair dry is great. It has a ton of volume at the crown where it had been content to lie flat and limp (especially this time of year when the humidity drops). The curls are really perking up. When I brush (BBB) I can tell where the sebum is coating and where it isn't. My sides and ends are still fried from the damn highlighting, but the back (shortest and no highlighting) has completely adapted to the no poo. This part is wonderful when dry - but wet, it feels like a melted candle. This is the ONLY part of my hair that's doing this.
I know the sebum has made its merry way to the tips back there. It's the shortest, least damaged part of my wee little head. I don't personally mind it since it kinda goes away when I flaxwash, and I can't feel it when it's dry. But I have a hair appointment coming up and I don't want to be embarrassed when she wets me down. I can just imagine the comments I'll get. I have good success with applesauce, but I can't use that RIGHT before a hair appointment. Then she'll think I have dandruff.
Is this normal? Am I overreacting to the non-squeaky clean feel? What I don't understand is why the waxiness leaves once dry, but returns when wet. It makes no sense to me. Is this the hard water reacting to the sebum in my hair? I noticed today whem I washed it was fine at first, but once I scrubbed and flushed my scalp a while, the waxiness snuck in there. It was hard to even comb it.
But now I can run my fingers through it fine. No wax. Nothing. So weird.