How often should you wash your hair? It’s a simple question but the debate surrounding it is far from straightforward! In recent years, hair care experts have been suggesting the answer: every couple of days. Your hair is naturally moisturized with a greasy substance known as sebum, which protects it and prevents it from drying out. Washing your hair too often leads to this protective layer of sebum being stripped away, which can result in dry and weak hair that breaks easily.
It’s not just washing your hair that ruins the sebum barrier. Every time you’re outside, your hair is exposed to the elements. Dry winds, dust, dirt, rain – all of these can sap the moisture out of your hair and make it vulnerable to further damage.
Keeping your hair vibrant and healthy is key to a more youthful overall appearance – you may be working hard to keep your skin fresh and vibrant, but thin, brittle, damaged hair will draw attention to itself and away from your face. This means it’s important to ensure that your hair is protected from harm.
One of the best ways to make up for your lost hair protection is to treat your hair with essential oils. These oils are all-natural remedies that can replenish your hair’s moisture, as well as nourish your scalp with nutrients. Here are some of the best essential oils that can promote healthy, youthful-looking hair.
1. Lavender oil
Lavender oil has a wide range of healthy effects, ranging from antiseptic properties to stress reduction. Applying lavender oil to your hair may well promote these effects along with moisturizing and protecting your hair. It can also help alleviate any scalp conditions that are associated with inflammation.
2. Chamomile oil
Chamomile oil is another essential oil with anti-inflammatory properties. As such, it’s not only a moisturizing agent for your hair but also a great treatment for scalp conditions like psoriasis and eczema.
3. Lemongrass oil
Lemongrass oil is a highly versatile essential oil with powerful antibacterial and antifungal properties, and may even help treat depression and chronic pain. It’s a great treatment for dandruff and itchiness, too.
Bonus oils: Extra-virgin Olive oil & Almond oil
Although not essential oils, extra virgin olive oil and almond oil can do wonders to preserve the quality of our hair. Olive oil’s health benefits have been known for millennia. Considered a healthy fat, it’s a superb cooking oil, a great skincare solution and a quick and easy natural lip balm. Amazingly, it’s also wonderful for your hair! Olive oil has antioxidant and anti-inflammatory properties when applied to the skin, and these properties carry over when you apply olive oil to your hair. It’s also loaded with vitamin E and fatty acids that can help moisturize your scalp, prevent dandruff and slow down the loss of moisture.
Almond oil
Almond oil won’t just moisturize your hair it will cleanse it at its roots, too. This essential oil can help clear away the debris that accumulates over time in your hair follicles. It’s also loaded with minerals that can promote hair growth.
How to Apply These Essential oils
Now this is the most important part! Essential oils should not be applied directly to the hair, as they’re highly volatile and potent, plus they can sting like crazy, so be sure to wash your hands thoroughly if any drops fall on your fingers. Just like when applied to the skin, essential oils for your hair must be diluted using a carrier oil.
Useful carrier oils include coconut and jojoba oil. The trick is to use just a few drops of essential oils in your carrier oil of choice – a good ratio is 20 percent essential oil / 80 percent carrier oil. You can also combine several essential oils at once to compound their effects.
Keep in mind that there is no miracle cure-all oil combination that can solve all of your hair problems. Everyone’s hair is different, and as such, everyone’s hair care solutions will be unique. Some of these potent essential oils may also prove to be allergenic or irritating to your scalp – if you experience any itching or worsening of any condition when you use essential oils, stop using them!
That said, if applied correctly, these essential oils will protect your hair and nourish it, along with the wide range of benefits that they each provide separately.
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