Hair Styling Tools

I remember back when I was in high school, and no, I’m not ready to reveal how many years ago that was.  Anyway, it was trendy at that time to have long straight hair.  It didn’t matter whether your hair was suited for a longer length or not, it was just the style you wore so you could easily fit in with the “in-crowd”.   What stands out most in my mind, however, is that I was always sitting there looking at my split ends and pulling them apart to get rid of them.  Obviously, that was not the right thing to do.  Also, we did not have the variety of haircare products that are now available in the marketplace to aid in dealing with dried out hair and split ends.  The only solution at the time was to just make sure you were using a type of conditioner and to keep your hair trimmed on a regular basis.

Well, here it is 30 something years later (oops, I wasn’t going to reveal how long ago my high school days were) and yes, keeping your hair trimmed is still important, however, hair stylists have perfected the way in which they are cutting the hair.  Also, what hasn’t changed is that we all are experiencing the same exposure to the sun that we always have and as we all know, sun exposure/uv rays are damaging to the hair.  Since we are on a roll here, what else is causing our split ends?  Those of us who color our hair on a regular basis are split end prone.  How about those of us who wash our hair daily or every other day?  With the washing comes the drying, and if you use a hairdryer to blow dry your hair, the continued artificial heat is also playing havoc on the ends of your hair and drying them out.  If you use an inexpensive styling brush or hair brush, you could also be contributing to the damage of your hair.  Even excessive brushing of your hair, especially when it is wet will also wreak havoc on your hair.

So, now that we know what’s causing the problems with split ends or just plain dry, brittle hair that breaks off, what is the reason for this happening?  In a nutshell,  damaged ends  occur when the protective cuticle of the hair has been stripped away from the hair fibers.  Knowing now why and how damaged ends occur, the more important information is how to keep dry, brittle hair from happening and how to keep our hair healthy.  Take a look at the following list and if you aren’t already following these tips, try them out and see if the condition of your hair improves dramatically.

1)  Maintain a somewhat regular hair appointment schedule to keep your hair trimmed.

2)  Avoid excessive coloring treatments of hair.

3)  Do not brush your hair while it is wet.

4)  Try to deep condition your  hair at least once a week.

5)  Try to minimize exposure to the sun.

6)  Use a natural bristle brush that does not pull or yank at your hair.

Obviously, many of these helpful tips boil down to just using common sense, however, as we all know, the majority of the time we are getting ready to go somewhere, we are in a hurry and some of the quick steps to getting out the door are used.  Thus, if you can’t always follow all of the tips, at a minimum be sure to buy good hair care products that will help save your hair, especially if you use many of the hot styling tools that we all use to facilitate our particular hairstyle.