Split ends are a well-known problem to anyone with long hair. But with the right split ends treatment, you can learn how to keep your hair strong and healthy from the root to the tip.
When the ends of your hair are dry, damaged, and brittle, they become frayed and dull. To learn how to prevent split ends – and which split ends treatment to use if it’s too late –, you’ll first need to know what causes them.
What Causes Split Ends?
The following are just a few examples of things that can cause your hair to become damaged:
- Overbrushing: It’s important to brush your hair, but don’t overdo it. Brushing too often, or too aggressively will damage your hair.
- Heat-Styling: Do you regularly use a blow dryer or hot iron to style your hair? Heat-styling without any protection is a sure path to damaged hair. If you can’t bring yourself to ditch this habit altogether, try using a product to protect your locks from the intensity of the temperature.
- UV Rays: Prolonged exposure to sunlight will also cause damage the outer layer of your hair.
- Chemical treatments: Aggressive chemical hair treatments like bleaching, coloring, or perms can cause hair to become dry and brittle and lead to split ends, especially if done repeatedly.
How To Prevent Split Ends: Wash Less Often
You might be surprised to learn that if you want to keep your hair healthier and prevent split ends, you should wash it less often. Here’s why.
At the roots of your hair, a natural oil, called sebum, is secreted in small amounts. This is your hair’s natural layer of protection, and if you use shampoo every day, you are destroying that layer before it has a chance to do any good. Moreover, when your hair is deprived of its natural protection, your body’s sebaceous glands go into overdrive. That means greasier hair, which means more washing, and more damage – including split ends. Most conventional shampoos also contain chemical ingredients such as silicones, which trigger the same cycle of damage by causing hair to be even more weighed down and greasy-looking, leading to even more washing, and even more damage.
If you’re looking for a split ends treatment, stop washing your hair. The fact is, you don’t need to wash it every day. If you want to prevent split ends, with the right shampoo, and after your body has had time to adjust, washing your hair two to three times a week is plenty. To avoid getting caught in the vicious damage circle, try looking into No Poo Shampoo. A simple DIY dry shampoo can also be a short-term solution.
But remember, everyone’s hair is different. Try different combinations of shampoos and conditioners until you find what is right for you. If you’re worried that trying out different products will be hard on your wallet, try making your own homemade conditioner.
Prevent Split Ends by Drying Your Hair Properly
After you shower, gently and carefully squeeze the water out of your hair, and then wrap it up into a turban. Don’t towel dry your hair: the rubbing motion is abrasive, and can cause damage and increased breakage.
Tip: To prevent split ends, it’s best to take enough time for a shower so that your hair can air-dry by itself, without the need for heat-styling. If you are in a hurry and can’t do without a blow dryer, make sure you use only warm or cool air, never hot.
How To Fix Split Ends: Do Conventional Products Work?
If you’re trying to figure out how to fix your split ends and are wondering how to choose a product, you’re not alone. Thousands of expensive hair-care products promise to give you a split ends treatment that will cure your damaged hair.
But the thing is, although prevention of split ends is possible to some extent, repairing split ends that already exist is not.
Products that promise magical split end treatment always do the same thing: they replace the broken strand’s own protective film with an artificial one, and can, at best, seal the hair, temporarily protecting it from splitting further.
But here again, conventional products contain a number of ingredients such as silicones and perfumes, which can irritate and damage your hair.
Split Ends Treatment: Natural Remedies
As we’ve seen, the bad news is: if you’re looking to fix split ends, it turns out that you can’t. But the good news is: after your next haircut, you can prevent them from happening again. In addition to healthy hair washing and drying routines, learning how to prevent split ends requires only a few simple, all-natural ingredients that you probably already have at home.
- You use it to make stir frys and salad dressing, but have you ever tried using olive oil for your hair? No better time than the present! Olive oil nourishes hair and locks in moisture by forming a protective layer around each strand. It can also help soothe dry scalps. Work the oil into your hair, leave in overnight, and wash out well with shampoo in the morning.
- You can also use a coconut oil hair cure as a split ends treatment. Just like with the olive oil, massage a hazelnut-sized amount into your hair and keep it in overnight. Don’t forget to wash it out thoroughly in the morning.
The Importance of Regular Trimming
The only real way to fix split ends is to cut them off. By regularly trimming your hair, you can make sure that any split ends that have formed don’t have a chance to continue too much further up the strand. That’s why if you want to grow your hair out, regular trimming is even more important.
But remember not to be stingy: make sure that you make the cut up where your hair is still healthy, to get rid of the damaged part of the strand completely. Otherwise, it will just split again, and you’ll be right back where you started. You can usually feel the difference between healthy and damaged hair. Healthy hair will be smooth, while damaged hair is rough and uneven.
This text was translated from German to English by Christie Sacco. You can read the original here: Spliss: Das hilft gegen kaputte Haarspitzen
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