*disclaimer* most of the enlightening info her was gleaned from the lovely smarty pants on this website, some from personal experience and some form other source. Thought i'd put this all together to hopefully save people from having to repeat themselves in multiple threads.
Everyone feel free to add anything and everything i've missed.
First port of call for those who know they've ruined their hair:
http://www.hairdyeforum.com/index.php?topic=1935.0
In my experience many many people say in the bleaching and lightening section that their hair feels great etc despite obvious double triple or even quadruple processing. This may be the case. However feeling great is not enough. In this scenario your hair feels fine because you are using deep conditioners, serums etc that are loaded with silicones that mask the damage. Also straightening your hair pushes the cuticles flat and make hair seem shiny and soft.
If you honestly think your hair is fine... shampoo it twice with a clarifying shampoo. If it feels stretchy, gummy, brittle or dry prior to conditioner your hair needs help. If hair take a long time to dry naturally, it needs help.
Now if you've discovered that your hair does need some babying. Search the forum and follow great advice on this topic.
For example, CUT your hair. No arguments 🙂 you must remove as much damage as humanly possible to prevent it spreading.
Begin protein treatments such as mayo, coconut oil and k-pak (forum fave)
http://www.hairdyeforum.com/index.php?topic=1320.0
Deep condition.
Repeat these steps often and avoid heat. Do not sue dyes with developer. That means box dyes, demi permanents and bleach. Only 100% veggies are safe at this point.
There are many mannnnnny great threads discussing all the steps you need to save your hair this post is just designed to help people recognise when they have.
Also just a little note to urge anyone who thinks they might of damaged their hair to ask for advice, not be shy about it and definately don't ignore it.
Posted : December 2, 2012 6:04 pm
Awesome post!
To concur, my experience has been that if you step in when it just feels a little bit dodgy (a bit dry, a tad strechier than it ought to be...), have a vigorous trim, don't process it for a couple of months, and really look after it in the meantime - it is possible to make a difference to your hair. If you ignore all this ('my hair feels fine!) and keep processing it, the best case scenario is that you're flogging a dead horse looking after hair that really needs to be chopped, and the worse case scenario is that your hair melts off in chunks when you next do something innocuous.
MUCH better to acknowledge that bleach is damaging, be cautious, and treat it as damaged even if it's not wrecked. That way it won't GET wrecked. 😀
PS - the happy flipside of this is that if you're paranoid about hair health, your idea of 'bad' isn't as bad as you think of it. I recently went to my hairdresser bleating that I'd had to double process, that it was really dry, and that I felt guilty about how much I'd damaged it and wanted him to chop three inches off. He went 'really, it's not that bad. It's a tiny bit tangly at the ends. You should see some of the people coming in here who think their hair isn't damaged!'.
Posted : December 2, 2012 6:22 pm
Thanks for this; it's a great post!
If you have damaged your hair, please don't hesitate to ask for our help! A lot of us have firsthand experience--we've all done it at some point and we have a lot of knowledge regarding the different levels of damage, so if you let us know exactly what you've done and how your hair feels, we can help recommend a care regime for it.
Posted : December 2, 2012 7:00 pm
Latest Post: 30 vol developer Our newest member: thevoguelounge Recent Posts Unread Posts
