No Shampoo Hair Care

I used to have a gigantic collection of products in my shower, from body washes to shampoos to conditioners. Although I am a fairly manly man I really enjoyed pampering myself in the shower. But I am also a really big fan of colognes (see my pages for Cartier Cologne and Creed Cologne), and I found that the cheap perfumes in my body washes really clashed with my colognes. What is the point of wearing a $100 cologne when you can't smell it over a $2.99 body wash?

I started to research fragrance-free body washes and the more I read about the harsh detergents and chemicals in the average body wash the less I liked what I read. From the alcohols that dry out your skin to the SLS detergent that strips the oils from your skin (The same detergent used in car engine degreasers!), I just couldn't keep putting that stuff on my body. In my search for a non-scented and more gentle body wash I found Johnson's Baby wash, and then later I found what I use today, Dr. Bronner's Baby Mild liquid soap. My body is just as clean as when I used an average body wash, but I am no longer mistreating my skin with harsh chemicals, and I don't smell like cheap perfume.

In my research on body wash I learned that most shampoos contain the same harsh chemicals as body wash. What is worse, the detergents strip your hair of natural oils that keep your hair soft and smooth, plus your body actually produces excess oil from your scalp to compensate. If you ever wondered why your hair gets nasty if you don't wash it everyday, this is one reason. I tried a couple of different 'natural' shampoos but I kept looking for alternatives. Then I read about “no poo” hair care.

“No Poo” is the name for the hair care system where you don't use shampoo to keep your hair clean. I didn't think it was possible to do without shampoo, but I read dozens of forums, message boards, and articles, all full of people who have found it possible to keep clean hair without shampoo. There were a bunch of different techniques people were trying, including water only, apple cider vinegar rinse, even conditioner only. As I read the results people were getting I found that the water only technique sounded best to me.

I gave away my shampoos and conditioners to my girlfriends and decided to go water only. I had read that for the first 6 weeks or so my hair would be greasy because my scalp would be still be producing excess sebum in response to the shampoo I used before having stripped away all the oils. If my hair got too greasy I could wash my hair with a small amount of baking soda and then rinse with vinegar and water and this would help.

The first week everything was fine with water only, but the second week my hair got really greasy, so I washed with vinegar and then dried my hair really, really well with a fluffy towel. This cleaned out the worst of the grease, and using a boar bristle brush I brushed my hair and smoothed out any remaining grease. For the six weeks this combination of water only every day, a vinegar rinse once a week, and drying my hair really well with a fluffy towel solved most of the problems I had with grease, and only one other situation came up that required my attention: flakes.

It is natural that your scalp sheds dead skin, just like the rest of your body. But where dead skin from your body is rubbed off on clothes or just falls to the ground, the skin from your scalp gets stuck in your hair or falls on your shoulders. These flakes will normally rinse out with the suds from the shampoo, but do not rinse out so easily with just water. I bought myself a fine-toothed comb and use it when I rinse my hair, and then again after dry my hair. I still have the occasional flake, but it's nothing bad.

The sixth week arrived and I was still having to work to keep my hair from being greasy, but sometime around the middle of the seventh week my scalp stopped producing the extra sebum and my hair was back to like it was when I was shampooing every day, but only now without the shampoo.

1. Make up your mind that you will stick with the experiment for at least a full six weeks, or until your scalp stops producing excess sebum. If you wash with shampoo it will set back your scalp recalibrating its sebum production and you will have to wait longer for it to normalize.
2. Get a box of Arm & Hammer Baking Soda and a bottle of apple cider vinegar for when you need to clean your hair of excess grease. To wash your hair, put about two tablespoons of baking soda in your palm, wet it until it is a runny paste, then rub it into the scalp and in the heaviest greasy areas of the hair. Rinse your hair with water, then with apple cider vinegar diluted to half strength with water. Let this sit for 3 to 5 minutes, then rinse the vinegar out of your hair with lukewarm water.
3. Get a cheap plastic fine-toothed comb and comb your hair as you do the final rinse in the shower, then after you have towel dried your hair.
   
4. Use a clean towel to scrub your hair dry and to remove any last remaining greasiness.
   
5. Keep up this routine until your scalp has normalized sebum production, up to six or seven weeks, and then continue your water only hair care routine, and washing with the baking soda and vinegar when necessary.

That's it. It's really that easy to enjoy “no poo” hair care!