synthetic oils to combat dry hair

Embyra

Well-Known Member
http://www.hairliberty.org/black-ha...tion/silicones-for-african-american-hair.html



Compared to other hair types kinky-coily hair is particularly fragile. That's because all types of curly hair are dry due to the bend in each curl. The area where the curl bends has less protective layers which means it's porous and can't hold on to moisture well. More kinks in a strand means more issues with dryness and breakage. With that in mind, the #1 goal of a good regimen for African American hair is to keep the hair moisturized and therefore minimize breakage.

Porous hair needs products that seal moisture in. When you apply a sealant to moisturized skin or hair, the moisture can stay in for a few hours and benefit the keratin cells, instead of quickly evaporating away. If you don't apply an effective sealant, the skin or hair will become dry quickly and you'll need to re-apply moisture over and over again. African American women with natural hair often prefer natural sealants like coconut oil, olive oil, castor oil, jojoba oil, and shea butter. Those oils are rich in nutrients like fatty acids and Vitamin E, so they can replenish what the strands may lack. Plant-based oils have many proven benefits for the hair, but they actually don't make the best sealants.

For many years, the best personal care sealant available was mineral oil, a byproduct of petroleum. In scientific studies, mineral oil was shown to provide a better seal or protective layer than other oils. Since African American hair is known to be porous, mineral oil and petrolatum began to appear in most ethnic hair care products. Even though the products created back then were very simple, they provided two crucial elements: water for moisture and mineral oil as a highly effective sealant (and pretty good heat protectant too).




Fast forward a few decades and moisturized hair is not enough. African American women want their hair to be soft, but not greasy and strong, but not stiff. Customers also want their hair to be easy to comb, even if it hasn't been washed in days and thermal protection for flat irons that get as hot as 450°F. There is no natural oil that can meet all of those demands which explains why hair care companies began using silicones.



Synthetic oils protect your hair without making it look greasy

Silicones are synthetic oils. They are made in science labs for use in hair care, pharmaceuticals, food, and hundreds of other products. The first popular silicone, dimethicone, has been used in skin creams and lotions since the 1950s. About 20 years ago, the cosmetic industry realized that dimethicone would be useful in hair products. In studies, dimethicone was found to condition the hair better than mineral oil. Scientists continue to make better silicones and now there are silicones that can help the hair dry faster so less heat is required (cyclomethicone) and target the most damaged areas of the strand to provide deep conditioning (amodimethicone).

Despite the proven advantages of silicones, some women make a big effort to avoid them. They are often choosing to follow the hair care method promoted by Lorraine Massey in her 2001 instructional book for curly-haired women, Curly Girl: The Handbook. Regarding silicones, Massey wrote:

"I suggest that you avoid conditioners that use silicones. Although they do add temporary shine to the hair, I find they weigh down curly hair. (That means avoid using products with ingredients whose name end in -cone.) The ingredients you absolutely need in conditioner include emollients, humectants, proteins, and moisturizers."

Four years later, in a Q&A featured on NaturallyCurly.com, Massey admitted that her original book was written before she ever heard of more sophisticated silicones like amodimethicone. Unfortunately, misinformation had already spread across the Internet and to this day, silicones are wrongly blamed for drying out the hair due to build up when in reality the opposite is true.




Any oil, natural or synthetic, can build up on the hair, but you can easily avoid build up by cleaning your hair with shampoo. If you feel like shampoo is damaging, that's a sign that your shampoo needs an upgrade. Always choose a shampoo that says "dry", "damaged", "fragile", and/or "chemically-treated" hair on the label. A good shampoo gently removes build up from your hair.and conditions your strands at the same time.

Help your hair stay moisturized by applying a shine or smoothing serum to finish your style

Silicones, especially dimethicone, are in many parts of our lives. You can find them in "oil-free" lotions, deodorants, skin medications, and even Chicken McNuggets. The reason thousands of hair products contain synthetic oils instead of natural oils is because they work extremely well to condition, soften, and seal the hair without weighing it down. It can't hurt to add a serum as a final step after you style your hair. You might still find advice that recommends a "no silicones" or "no shampoo" regimen to combat dryness. Feel free to experiment, but if you don't see the results you hoped for, i.e. softer, more manageable hair, come on back to the other side.
 
And this is why I don't follow the current. Never been afraid of silicones. In fact, I have shared how applying a serum to damp hair made my hair feel soft and smooth w/o being sticky and if I wasn't more into baggying than having product in my hair, I'd be using John Frieda serum over damp twists all the time. I don't do it because I love to baggy and serums would make my scalp itch something awful if I baggied. So I only use them when I don't plan to baggy: when my hair is flat-ironed. Otherwise, yep, :love: love me some petrolatum for my skin and serums for my hair.
 
And this is why I don't follow the current. Never been afraid of silicones. In fact, I have shared how applying a serum to damp hair made my hair feel soft and smooth w/o being sticky and if I wasn't more into baggying than having product in my hair, I'd be using John Frieda serum over damp twists all the time. I don't do it because I love to baggy and serums would make my scalp itch something awful if I baggied. So I only use them when I don't plan to baggy: when my hair is flat-ironed. Otherwise, yep, :love: love me some petrolatum for my skin and serums for my hair.



I follow the cg method but i noticed regardless of the shampoo being sulphate free
i cant use shampoos that lather ANY lather frizzes my hair like CRAZY its a no go for my hair

and then i have to battle extreme frizz and try to combat it with conditioner which never brings my hair back to normal after one use



I recently had a sample of hairveda whipped ends my hair was a different kind of soft for DAYS i then found out the base she uses contains petrolatum i didnt care though i bought the full size :lol:
 
Thank you for posting this. I have started using cones to seal my hair with and it doesn't leave my hair greasy but softer and moisturized.

I don't tend to disregard a product because it has "bad ingredients" in them. If anything they can be used for sealing.
 
Thank you for posting this. I have started using cones to seal my hair with and it doesn't leave my hair greasy but softer and moisturized.

I don't tend to disregard a product because it has "bad ingredients" in them. If anything they can be used for sealing.

what cleaners do you use?
 
Embyra, frizzes might be from the alkaline in the shampoo. Don't they go when you condition though? Shampoos that don't lather do not clean my hair and I'd end up with hard hair with a coated feeling. I couldn't tell you if shampoos make my hair frizzy coz I don't take long to condition after I rinse off to notice. :giggle:

So Embyra you can't even use Giovanni 50:50? I loves me some Giovanni. Squeaky clean scalp, and soft clean hair that is ready for some conditioner pampering. :lick:
 
And this is why I don't follow the current. Never been afraid of silicones. In fact, I have shared how applying a serum to damp hair made my hair feel soft and smooth w/o being sticky and if I wasn't more into baggying than having product in my hair, I'd be using John Frieda serum over damp twists all the time. I don't do it because I love to baggy and serums would make my scalp itch something awful if I baggied. So I only use them when I don't plan to baggy: when my hair is flat-ironed. Otherwise, yep, :love: love me some petrolatum for my skin and serums for my hair.


Before joining LHCF, all I did was wet my hair and saturate it from root to tip with John Frieda serum (I loved it so much that I would buy four at a time).
 
Nonie Squeaky clean has me running for the hills :lol:

I used a non lathering cleanser that didnt have sulphates it STRIPPED my hair of everything it was worth :nono: and i ended up with matting and tangles which i never get only from demon shampoos

I will take a pic one day as refrence but the frizz doesnt go with conditioner its still there my hair never gets smooth all the way

so for me its not worth the endless cycle of having frizzy hair and then trying to condition it which doesnt help only to end up using more styling product because my hair is just a bush:lol:

your hair seems like most shampoos dont effect it that much (i have read you say you can use most clear shampoos)

shampoos are just one of those things for me that i just cant mess with once i find something that my hair likes i just stick with it

I heard alot of people saying the giovanni left their hair stripped so you know i didnt even bother:nono::lol:
 
Cones? No cones? Sometimes all of this information is overwhelming. What's a girl to do?

That's my reaction too. But I've started to just listen to my hair. I DC with cones now and have good results. I'm now beginning to wonder if oils like One n Only Argan Oil really isn't as bad as I thought it was.... http://www.sallybeauty.com/argan-oil/ONEONL16,default,pd.html?cm_vc=SEARCH

Ingredients: Dimethicone, Cyclopentasiloxane, Dimethiconol, C12-15 Alkyl Benzoate, Fragrance (Parfum), Argania Spinosa Kernel Oil, Yellow 11 (CI 47000), Red 17 (CI 26100)

I might give it a chance now, but the ingredients still make me cringe. :ohwell:
 
I too never cut mineral oil or silicones from my regimen, and I never will. I was a certified PJ when first coming to the forums, and IME (I almost hate to say it) VERY few natural products perform as well as synthetic ones in my hair. I never understood the issue in the first place, though. The qualms with these products are that they seal off the hair shaft and prevent moisture from getting in, right? Isn't that the point of sealing? To keep stuff in, which effectively keeps stuff out? I dunno. It has always seemed to me that if synthetics are giving you issues, your hair hasn't been properly moisturized in the first place.
 
I originally cut mineral oil at the beginning of my journey because it was essentially suffocating my hair because my "moisturizer" had that as the second ingredient and petroleum as the third ingredient. If I moisturized with a leave in on wet hair then used that "moisturizer" like a sealant then I think it would work but I prefer the feel of butters like avocado and monoi because I get 3 days of moisture without the build up and weighed down hair.
 
If you have normal porosity hair then I think many more things work for your hair vs when you have porosity issues. But as a low porosity head, dimethicone is way too tricky for my hair. So I just avoid things which require too much precision to prevent damage.

You definitely have to know your hair. I believe in reading and researching to make a wise decision but then you have to try things out and monitor things and just make the decision based on what you experience.
 
If you have normal porosity hair then I think many more things work for your hair vs when you have porosity issues. But as a low porosity head, dimethicone is way too tricky for my hair.


From reading her post on curlynikki she doesnt really believe african american hair is low porosity
She said as it naturally has bends and kinks in it this raises the cuticle :ohwell:
 
There was a point in my journey where I tried sealing with cone-based serums and it doesn't work for me. Tried different ones, tried em with different moisturizers and it was a no go. I'm sure it works great for some people.
 
Interesting article. I agree that silicones are necessary to meet the market demand for silky looking, strong, frizz-free hair that doesn't look greasy. I also agree with the article in that cosmetic scientists keep improving silicones in product mixtures. Both my natural and relaxed hair are fine with 'cones in my conditioners and leave-ins as long as the other ingredients are quality. I wash my hair ever 4+ days with a mild sulfate shampoo so I'm not concerned about build-up.
 
From reading her post on curlynikki she doesnt really believe african american hair is low porosity
She said as it naturally has bends and kinks in it this raises the cuticle :ohwell:

@Embyra, when people say the cuticle is raised at the bends in kinky hair, I give them the side-eye. Why? Coz the scales of the cuticle are so small that if you zoomed in at the bend to where you could see them, you'd end up looking at what looks like a flat surface so the bends do not cause a raise in the scales.

So to say that kinky hair cannot have low porosity because cuticles open at the bends is wrong! When it comes to porosity the cuticle scales are either raised or not all through the length even at the bends.

For a visual, here is a magnified hair:

Hair%20Structure%2010.jpg


The section you're looking at shows you scales of the hair cuticle. How small are they? That image shows a magnified section that is 10 micrometers big. That is 0.001 cm or 1/1000 of a cm. And I counted 15 rows of scales, so the scales are at least 0.00006 cm wide. In other words if you took a cm which is the distance from 0-1 in the scale below and divided it into TEN THOUSAND sections, six of those ten thousand minuscule sections would be the size of a cuticle. :look:

image1831.png


Now a coil on my hair is tiny. I once posted the photo below to show how small my coil are:

TrueSizeofMy4BCoils-vi.jpg


One of my coils is about 1/8 of an inch which is a little more than 0.3 cm--or 3 of those ten divisions between 0 and 1 on the cm scale above (and if we are to be anal, the curve is actually about .45 cm (half the circumference of a circle with a diameter of .3)--or 4 and half of the tiny spaces between 0 and 1). That would be 300 of the black and white magnifed image above in that little bend of my hair (or 450 if we want to be exact and line them along the curve of my hair not just the distance across).

So how is a bend that is so many times bigger than the scales that lie on it supposed to raise them? As far as the scales are concerned, they are lying on flat surface. It's like planet earth. It's not flat but we are so small compared to its size that when we lie down, we don't lie curved but we lie flat because the distance we cover is relatively flat. Similarly, cuticles are not affected by the bends in our hair because they are so small compared to the bends in our hair.
 
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[USER=164918 said:
Embyra[/USER];15774115]From reading her post on curlynikki she doesnt really believe african american hair is low porosity
She said as it naturally has bends and kinks in it this raises the cuticle :ohwell:

Nothing personal against Curly Nikki but my hair does what it does. So whatever she wants to call it makes no difference to me. My hair is hard to wet, does not hold much moisture, was hard to relax, etc. etc. And when I use dimethicone, waxes or heavy butters, my hair is just hard and wiry. Doesn't matter if we call it low, high or normal. Nothing really changes. There are some who will be able to use silicones successfully and some that won't. Not any different than protein, shea butter, sulfates, etc.

I respect all the theorists, but they are all just theories and they don't hold 100%.
 
@Embyra, when people say the cuticle is raised at the bends in kinky hair, I give them the side-eye. Why? Coz the scales of the cuticle are so small that if you zoomed in at the bend to where you could see them, you'd end up looking at what looks like a flat surface so the bends do not cause a raise in the scales.

So to say that kinky hair cannot have low porosity because cuticles open at the bends is wrong! When it comes to porosity the cuticle scales are either raised or not all through the length even at the bends.


:yep:exactly this i know i have LOW porosity for my hair to get wet you have to rub the water into my hair i can be under the shower for 15 mins and my hair will come out DAMP

Ellepixie has the same problems we talked about it before so i know there is such a thing as curly and kinky hair having low porosity

but in the comments she wasnt having it and implied that its people use of oils why they THINK they have low porosity
and if that were true water would run off the hair cuticle im like err hello??!! thats exactly what happens with low porosity!! care to join me in the shower and observe:lol:

In her opinion only type 1-2 have low porosity hair...:ohwell:

her ebook is coming out soon and she said she talks about it more there....
 
Nothing personal against Curly Nikki but my hair does what it does. So whatever she wants to call it makes no difference to me. My hair is hard to wet, does not hold much moisture, was hard to relax, etc. etc. And when I use dimethicone, waxes or heavy butters, my hair is just hard and wiry. Doesn't matter if we call it low, high or normal. Nothing really changes. There are some who will be able to use silicones successfully and some that won't. Not any different than protein, shea butter, sulfates, etc.

I respect all the theorists, but they are all just theories and they don't hold 100%.

:yep: I like reading other people opinions on hair etc but i know i didnt just conjure up my hair being low porosity for the sake of it:lol:

I can use butters i have been trying them recently but when i think back to when i was using silicones it was my first year of transitioning and thats exactly how my hair felt wiry/crispy
 
I too never cut mineral oil or silicones from my regimen, and I never will. I was a certified PJ when first coming to the forums, and IME (I almost hate to say it) VERY few natural products perform as well as synthetic ones in my hair. I never understood the issue in the first place, though. The qualms with these products are that they seal off the hair shaft and prevent moisture from getting in, right? Isn't that the point of sealing? To keep stuff in, which effectively keeps stuff out? I dunno. It has always seemed to me that if synthetics are giving you issues, your hair hasn't been properly moisturized in the first place.

I agree with the bolded. But it depends on how long the person wants the hair to be blocked...If your flatironing, live in the south, and probably a natural, you would want to use a cone to seal so that your hair wont be trying to grab the moisture from outside. That way you would have a long lasting flatiron without having to go back and touch it up throughout the week.
But if your doing a regular M&S daily, cones wouldnt probably work to well because when you go back and try to moisturize again it wont get in.....

But like you said if your hair was moistured correctly from the beginning you wouldnt have this issue anyways.

If you have normal porosity hair then I think many more things work for your hair vs when you have porosity issues. But as a low porosity head, dimethicone is way too tricky for my hair. So I just avoid things which require too much precision to prevent damage.

You definitely have to know your hair. I believe in reading and researching to make a wise decision but then you have to try things out and monitor things and just make the decision based on what you experience.

Is having a low pH and porosity not the same?
Low pH means the cuticles are closed tight.
Low porosity means means the same right?
 
Is having a low pH and porosity not the same?
Low pH means the cuticles are closed tight.
Low porosity means means the same right?

ZebraPrintLover, pH is a measurement of how acidic or how alkaline something is. When you take hair of any porosity, whether low (closed cuticle) or high (open cuticle) and you put them in an acidic solution, their cuticles will close--whatever their definition of "close" is. For low porosity folks, that means a tight seal that would make it hard for moisture to penetrate. For high porosity hair, that would lower the scales from a "wide open" position to a partly closed position, but never fully closing the cuticles tight, because that is the nature of the hair.

So low porosity is a characteristic that is part and parcel of hair. If someone with low porosity used an alkaline solution like baking soda, the tight cuticles would be opened. In other words high pH of the solution would open the usually tightly closed cuticles. That is the magic of relaxing. Whether hair has low porosity or high porosity, the high pH of the relaxer opens up cuticles so that the product can enter hair and break bonds to change the texture of the hair. After relaxer, neutralizing is done using a product with a low pH to close the cuticles back to what is their NORMAL closed position.

I've heard that sometimes the neutralizer doesn't fully close the cuticle back to what was normal so that people who previously had low porosity and hair that was impossible to moisturize find it easier to moisturize after relaxing. I am not sure but I think divachyk (or was it sunnieb) had this experience.

Anyway, hope you now know the difference between low porosity and low pH. Also I don't think you can talk of hair as having a pH. pH is a measure of how many hydrogen ions are in a water solution...so dry things don't have a pH. But the pH of something that you apply to your hair will affect the state your cuticle will be in. It will not necessarily change the porosity of your hair so that a high porosity person suddenly has low porosity after an acid solution or vice versa, but if your cuticle was abnormally raise, a low pH will return the cuticle back to what is normal "closed" for your hair.
 
Not me either @sunnieb & @Nonie. I'm low porosity all day everyday. Using heat helps my hair retain the best moisture. I feel that moisture soaks up in my strands better when my hair is straight than when it's wavy from air drying. I rollerset to fulfill this need.
 
Not me, @divachyk was this you?

Not me either @sunnieb & @Nonie. I'm low porosity all day everyday. Using heat helps my hair retain the best moisture. I feel that moisture soaks up in my strands better when my hair is straight than when it's wavy from air drying. I rollerset to fulfill this need.

sunnieb and divachyk, thanks for responding. Divachyk, I dunno why I keep thinking it was you. :lachen: While trying to find a discussion on this so I could remember who echoed the theory I've heard that people with low porosity saw it change after relaxing, I found another discussion where I said I thought it was you. :lachen: So that makes it twice I've accused you falsely. :rofl: You're my poster-child for low porosity hair so I just lump you into every discussion that talks about low porosity. :lol: Sorry. :giggle:

I found one discussion where we talked about this. EllePixie and SmileyNY might understand what I'm talmbout, this idea that relaxing can change low porosity hair into normal porosity. Or maybe the discussion we had on this can help paint the picture: http://www.longhaircareforum.com/showthread.php?t=535269
 
@[URL="http://www.longhaircareforum.com/member.php?u=34547" said:
ZebraPrintLover[/URL];15823821]I agree with the bolded. But it depends on how long the person wants the hair to be blocked...If your flatironing, live in the south, and probably a natural, you would want to use a cone to seal so that your hair wont be trying to grab the moisture from outside. That way you would have a long lasting flatiron without having to go back and touch it up throughout the week.
But if your doing a regular M&S daily, cones wouldnt probably work to well because when you go back and try to moisturize again it wont get in.....

But like you said if your hair was moistured correctly from the beginning you wouldnt have this issue anyways.



Is having a low pH and porosity not the same?
Low pH means the cuticles are closed tight.
Low porosity means means the same right?

Never mind ... I see Nonie answered this already.
 
nice bit of info.

I do avoid most cones, because the build up means I have to clarify more often (which is harsh on my hair), but I have liked some products over the years with amodimethicone.
 
@ZebraPrintLover, pH is a measurement of how acidic or how alkaline something is. When you take hair of any porosity, whether low (closed cuticle) or high (open cuticle) and you put them in an acidic solution, their cuticles will close--whatever their definition of "close" is. For low porosity folks, that means a tight seal that would make it hard for moisture to penetrate. For high porosity hair, that would lower the scales from a "wide open" position to a partly closed position, but never fully closing the cuticles tight, because that is the nature of the hair.

So low porosity is a characteristic that is part and parcel of hair. If someone with low porosity used an alkaline solution like baking soda, the tight cuticles would be opened. In other words high pH of the solution would open the usually tightly closed cuticles. That is the magic of relaxing. Whether hair has low porosity or high porosity, the high pH of the relaxer opens up cuticles so that the product can enter hair and break bonds to change the texture of the hair. After relaxer, neutralizing is done using a product with a low pH to close the cuticles back to what is their NORMAL closed position.

I've heard that sometimes the neutralizer doesn't fully close the cuticle back to what was normal so that people who previously had low porosity and hair that was impossible to moisturize find it easier to moisturize after relaxing. I am not sure but I think @divachyk (or was it @sunnieb) had this experience.

Anyway, hope you now know the difference between low porosity and low pH. Also I don't think you can talk of hair as having a pH. pH is a measure of how many hydrogen ions are in a water solution...so dry things don't have a pH. But the pH of something that you apply to your hair will affect the state your cuticle will be in. It will not necessarily change the porosity of your hair so that a high porosity person suddenly has low porosity after an acid solution or vice versa, but if your cuticle was abnormally raise, a low pH will return the cuticle back to what is normal "closed" for your hair.

Nonie, thank you so much for responding cause it made me understand better :yep:.
And I called myself reading this section Friday night from the SBH book trying to find out where my hair was. Its crazy, I been around for too many years not to know anything about my hair. It doesnt talk to me or either I dont listen....:look:. It tells me NOTHING!
 
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