Healthy Hair Beauty Supply

I have found in my lifetime that when dealing with my hair as a woman of color, there are many misconceptions to “growing” long hair. This month’s blog series will go over the four major mistakes when trying to grow healthy long hair in weekly installments. One of the things we as African Americans have heard said or we say to ourselves often is that, “Our hair doesn’t grow!” The actual fact is our hair grows just as fast as any other race. In addition to that our hair is the thinnest in texture compare to all other races. That one of the reasons why do not see a change in our length because our hair breaks off at a faster rate than it grows. Our hair texture is so tightly coiled, that with every bend and twist of the hair strand becomes a weak point in the hair shaft making it prone to damage.

Mistake #1 THINKING THAT WE NEED TO APPLY GREASE TO OUR HAIR

Ø Grease was an invention made by people outside of our race as an answer to our dry hair. As a result of this invention, we pack on the grease and in turn it makes our not only limp but embarrassing to touch! In fact in some way, grease can deter us in our quest for healthy long hair. Now that there is more sophisticated researched dedicated to answer this lingering questions, we no longer need to “grease” our scalps!

Ø In addition to that, “grease” does not moisturize hair; it just seals in the moisture that was already there and if you don’t have moisture in the hair before applying oil to you scalp, it would be safe to say that the grease did not solve the problem. Adding further to that, most people do no know that “grease” can prevents the skin cells that normally should shed from the scalp from naturally shedding which causes an added problem to the already problematic situation.

Ø In a sense grease smothers the scalp stopping it from exfoliating the dead skin. This overtime presents a problem for hair growth. The scalp needs oxygen to grow hair along with a good circulation of blood flow, so if you are constantly clogging your scalp with hair grease, you in turn hinder the growth of your hair in the long run. Knowing now that oil does not moisturize but seals in moisture, it is good to realize that our scalp makes it own oil due to the sebaceous gland. It is the sebaceous gland that secretes oil from you scalp, flows down the hair shaft sealing in the moisture of your hair. That is why people with naturally straight hair do not have dry hair because the are more able to seal in the moisture imparted through their hair via the sebaceous gland. Their main problem that they have to deal with is keeping the hair from becoming too oily thus becoming limp and hard to curl and stay curly.

Ø The problem that we as African American women face is that because our hair is so tightly coiled that this oil can not evenly distribute itself down the hair shaft evenly causing the ends of you hair, which is that portion of you hair that has been through the most damage, to become very dry and even more so prone to damage. This is why our hair can become very limp if you have relaxed hair and have not washed it for a week or so. Because you hair is now straight, it will be prone to have an oily look even when you have not washed you hair well over a week and in some cases like me within the first few days.

In conclusion hair grease is not such a great thing, in fact it can actually hinder hair growth by clogging the pores in your scalp. Learning the history that grease was an invention made by people outside of our race as an answer to our dry hair helps us realize why we all need to take a more proactive approach to our hair care. Any scalp problems that you are dealing with need to be specifically treated other than being coated with “grease”. We all need to realize that our scalp is the same as the skin on the rest of your body. With that analogy being said, you wouldn’t put grease on your body, then why put it on your scalp?

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