Friday, June 7, 2013

No 'Poo...For Real

When I became pregnant, I instantly became aware of certain things. First, whatever I used had to be healthy for my lil jellybean. Second, diapers and baby clothes are expensive.

Confession time. I love my Coach purses, my Victoria's Secret, and Yankee Candle. (We won't mention my Teavana problem because that developed later.) And now, I had someone else to buy things for! With less money.

Back to the issue at hand. I gave up alcohol (I can't believe this is an issue), caffeine (withdrawl sucked), and started looking at the chemicals in my everyday life. A consumate product junkie, I owned a plethora of hair and beauty products. They owned my credit cards.

The sad part was most of these miracles were liars. Pretty little yummy smelling liars. And so they sat in my bathroom closet, a fancy island of not so misfit products. My hair is thick, long, and has a natural curl that easily straightens but doesn't stay the way I like. Drizzle, extreme volume that only seemed to get better the longer I didn't wash it. Ew...kinda. My favorite stylistic actually told me years ago to not wash my hair more than twice a week. I could rinse, even do a little conditioning but no shampoo save for those two times.

But, then the bun in the oven happened. And no more diet soda. (I miss Dr. Pepper still.) Then, I noticed other things. Margarine is like plastic? Chemicals?

I'm not perfect. I still use some things now. But, a friend of mine sent me a no 'poo link after I complained about my straw-like ends and endless drying time that made my hair time even more difficult. A one year old makes life soooooo different.

The good news, I learned, was that I kinda was already doing this with my infrequent washes. Plus, since mommy-dom had cut down on hair styling time, I was already almost product free (still love my Fructis 3-in-1, though).

What could it hurt?

I'm trying it, not only for my hair quality, but more poor credit cards still haven't recovered.

Here's the deal. It isn't as Ew as it sounds. Your hair has natural oils it produces that are stripped out by chemicals and then we try to put them back in...which either dries it out or makes you have your very own oil spill. By shampooing less, or instead using natural ingredients, your hair eventually (faster for some) balances out. You still clean your hair with, for example, baking soda mixed with water (I'm trying 1 tbsp per cup of h2o) and conditioning/rinsing with apple cider vinegar (which my hair stylist recommended once, too!). Yes, I admit, there's a stinky smell when it is wet, but once dry, it disappears. (I'm going to try a few suggested things for this, too, like honey and essential oils.)

So far, my hair is soft and actually smells clean. We will see if I have the horrible transition stage (fingers crossed) and how things go. I'm hoping to try out a honey/aloe treatment and a coconut oil mask, too.

And, if I save money, how can that be bad with fabulous hair?