What Is High Porosity Hair
If youre asking yourself, What is high porosity hair? Youre not alone. High porosity refers to extremely porous strands, which suck up any moisture like a sponge. If your strands have high porosity, they cannot retain much moisture, leaving them feeling dry and rough. Hair with low porosity is more resilient and doesnt absorb water as easily as high-porous hair. This is why you need to be diligent about treating your strands! But first, we want to understand what causes this issue in the first place.
Several factors may contribute to an increase in porosity: natural aging of hair follicles , chemical treatments such as relaxers or perms, prolonged use of heat styling tools such as flat irons or curling irons, or color treatments. Its always best to consult a stylist before jumping into treatment options, but here are some of our favorite products if youre dealing with high porosity hair.
Devacurl Ultra Defining Gel
Coconut and pineapple extracts offer weightless definition while strengthening proteins, grape seed, and other beneficial nutrients fortifying strands. The result is high porosity hair thats frizz-free, shiny, and deeply hydrated. Apply to dry hair for hold or onto wet hair as a finishing product to extend curls.
How To Care For Low Porosity Hair
When you have low porosity hair, you may be tempted to apply a larger quantity of a product, or more than one hair product at a time, in an effort to saturate your hair.
But because the cuticles are so close together, not much product will penetrate, no matter how much you apply.
The key is to find products that have the right formulation for low porosity hair. These products will have ingredients that can more easily penetrate your hair.
Another important tip is to apply products when your hair is wet and warm. Heat can lift the hair cuticle, allowing oils and moisture to more easily penetrate the hair shaft.
If you want to know what types of ingredients and products tend to work well for low porosity hair, here are some suggestions.
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Is Deep Conditioning Good For Low Porosity Hair
Deep conditioning is very good for low porosity hair. Remember, low porosity hair doesnt let moisture in easily.
A deep conditioning session is a great way to get that moisture in because heat opens up the cuticles.
This allows the nutrients from the deep conditioner to penetrate the hair shaft and work effectively.
How To Test For Low Porosity Hair
There are several ways to test hair porosity. An easy way to do this at home is called the float test.
To do this, place a clean strand of hair in a container of room-temperature water. If the strand floats before sinking, it is likely less porous. If it sinks immediately, it may be highly porous.
Other testing methods include:
- Spray test: This involves spraying water on clean, dry hair and watching for results. Low porosity hair is slower to absorb the water and slower to dry. There may be visible beads of water on the hair.
- Dynamic vapor sorption: This test measures the weight of hair as it becomes exposed to humidity. It is not one that people can typically do at home.
- Fiber swelling: This measures the dimensions of a hair fiber after exposure to water. It would also be difficult to do this at home.
- Gas adsorption and pore size analysis: This test exposes a hair sample to nitrogen. The results show the distribution of the nitrogen that the hair absorbs and the size of the pores in the cuticle.
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Glycerin For Hair During Summer And Winter
Glycerin works or behaves differently during summer and winter. The two seasons have different temperatures and humidity levels, and these two factors influence the hygroscopic activity of glycerin.
During summer, glycerin is an excellent choice for hair hydration therapy. The humidity is generally around 50-65 %RH level, thus having a balanced moisture level in the air.
A mixture of glycerin and natural oils or butter work to boost the hairs moisture content, lubricity, and tactile properties.
However, conditions are the exact opposite in winter. The air is dry and the temperature is low. The humidity is also low and might also have frosty windy conditions.
Under these conditions, glycerin may not be a good option for your curls. Instead of drawing water molecules from the air, glycerin would attract water molecules from inside the hair and scalp cells.
That means, more water molecules outflow from the hair surface, making hair and scalp even drier.
Therefore, glycerine should be avoided in cold winter conditions .
Instead, the better option is to use emollients and oils to preserve the internal moisture level, lubricate the surface, and minimize the water loss from the surface.
How Do I Know If I Have A Protein Overload In My Natural Hair
Protein-overload hair feels hard and stiff to touch. It will also dry out faster than usual. So even if your hair products have always given you the best results in the past, you will notice that they will suddenly start to give unexpected results.
To solve this problem, you may wash your hair with a clarifying shampoo to get a fresh start, and if this doesnt work, it means that you might have protein overload. Since you cant avoid hair products, you can use one of the products in this post to relieve your hair of the excess proteins in it.
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Use The Greenhouse Effect
The greenhouse effect is another great way to get your cuticles to lift.
You can moisturise your hair as you usually would then put on a shower cap over your hair. You can do this overnight or during the daytime if you are not going out.
If you are a little creative you can do it even when you are going out by covering the shower cap with a headscarf. I have done it many times in the past and no one had a clue what was going on under there.
You will notice that when you take off the shower cap there will be lots of steam and it will feel quite warm. This is exactly what you want to happen. The heat that is trapped in the shower cap will help the cuticles of your hair to open up.
You can get yourself some really cheap disposable shower caps here
Its a great and easy way to get some moisture into your hair if you dont have a lot of time during your day to dedicate to it.
Why Does My Hair Act Like It Has Too Much Proteins When I Use Products With Coconut Oil
Its possible that you are allergic to coconut oil or another ingredient in the hair product. If you find that your hair absolutely does not like coconut oil, regardless of the product brand used, then I will suggest you do away with coconut oil for a while.
Your hair product may also be conflicting with a particular ingredient in the other hair products you have layered in your hair. So before you write off coconut oil, I will recommend pairing different products together to see if you get a better result.
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How Often Should You Clarify Your Hair
Theres no clear-cut answer to how often you should clarify your hair it really depends on your individual hair type, lifestyle, how often you wash your hair, and maintenance routine.
You might need to clarify it anywhere from once a week to once every few months, it just depends.
If youre new to clarifying, I would recommend starting out by clarifying your hair once a month. This will help remove any hair build up from products and residues that may be weighing your hair down.
If youre not seeing any results after clarifying the first time, then increase the frequency or try a chelating shampoo.
If youre using a lot of hair products such as gels, mousses, lots of conditioners, products with silicones, mineral oils, or petroleum, you may need to clarify your hair twice a month.
If on the other hand, youre using more natural ingredients, you might need to only clarify once a month to every six weeks.
Experiment with your hair on how frequently you need to clarify.
Clarifying shampoos are best used once monthly as maintenance shampoos to lift build up from the strands that other regular shampoos may be leaving behind.
Monthly clarifying is a necessary part of any healthy hair regimen and will give your hair a fresh start each month.
Some clarifying shampoos are relatively strong and can compromise your hair if used excessively. So, it is very important to follow up with a great moisturizing conditioner or deep conditioner to return moisture balance to the hair.
Use A Clarifying Shampoo
Applying clarifying shampoo to your hair every two weeks is an excellent way to keep grime out of your hair and promote new hair growth. Unlike standard shampoo, the clarifying variety contains ingredients to give your hair a deep clean.
Clarifying shampoo removes items such as:
- Product build-up
As a result, clarifying shampoo will help strengthen your hair and prevent fading in color-treated hair. Although clarifying shampoo applications are outstanding for low porosity hair, using them in moderation is crucial.
Otherwise, your scalp could overproduce oil, leaving you to struggle even more with greasy hair. You can also make a clarifying shampoo at home. To do so, combine one cup of water with three tablespoons of apple cider vinegar and let it soak into your wet hair.
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Can A Regular Shampoo Be Used As A Clarifying Shampoo
This is such a good question! The answer is Yes!
Although there are shampoos specifically formulated to clarify the hair, any regular shampoo that contains ALS or SLS can work pretty well.
A good example of this is the VO5 Normal Hair Balancing shampoo.
Ingredients
Water , Sodium Lauryl Sulfate, Cocamidopropyl Betaine, Ammonium Chloride, Sodium Laureth Sulfate, Fragrance , DMDM Hydantoin, Citric Acid, Tetrasodium EDTA, Benzyl Salicylate, Butylphenyl Methylpropional, Linalool, Yellow 6 , Sodium Chloride, Polysorbate 20, Tocopheryl Acetate, Panthenol, Ascorbic Acid, Niacinamide, Biotin.
As youll note, it is not marketed as a clarifying shampoo but it contains ingredients that will clarify your hair, like sodium lauryl sulfate or sodium laureth sulfate.
I dont necessarily recommend this product because of the harsh sulfates and due to the possibility of irritation and the drying effects it could do to hair and scalp.
The point Im trying to make is, that a product does not have to be labeled as a clarifying shampoo to do the job of a clarifying shampoo.
Also note, even though Cocamidopropyl Betaine is in the formula, it may make the formulation a little milder, but only just a little bit.
There is a new generation of amphoterics on the market today that are more effective and can improve the mildness index significantly.
Oyin Handmade Pumpkin Seed Curl Moisture Conditioner
If youre looking for a protein treatment that will never weigh your hair down, try Oyin Handmades Pumpkin Seed Curl Moisture Conditioner. This mask is thick, creamy, and can be used as often as needed. It smells like a pumpkin pie and smells just as delicious. As far as protein treatments go, its fairly gentle and wont cause breakage or excessive dryness. It works especially well on fine hair but will work with all curl types .
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Tip #: Use Heat When Deep Conditioning
Studies show that hair strands exposed to heat, whether from hot water or heat styling tools, have relatively more lifted cuticles and are more porous than virgin hair.
This leads trichologists to conclude that heat can open hair cuticles, just like how heat opens up your skins pores.
Now lets talk about how to deep condition low porosity hair. With less porous hair, a deep conditioner wont work effectively if it cant get into your hair shaft.
Thats where the heat comes in. To help your deep conditioning product get into your hair, you can lift your cuticles a bit using heat.
Here are three different ways to apply heat on low-porous hair when deep conditioning:
- Use warm water to wet your hair before using the hair treatment.
- After applying your deep conditioning product, wrap your hair in a towel, then use a hair dryer on your covered hair for 2 to 3 minutes.
You can do either or both of those methods to open up your hair cuticles and let the nourishing ingredients of your conditioner into the hair shaft.
Why Should I Use Protein
Even though our hair needs protein, and a protein-moisture balance is so crucial for healthy hair, the dangerous truth is that if theres an overload of protein in your hair, it can cause more harm than good.
Thats because a lot of hair products are formulated with some form of protein. So by the time youve added the shampoo, deep conditioner, leave-in conditioner, styling product, gel, and serum, you might end up piling way too much protein in your hair without knowing.
Therefore whenever you can, try to use a protein-free product until your hair bounces back to health.
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Protein For Low Porosity Hair
Amongst hair care consumers, combating porosity is a top concern, and they look for products that will be effective in solving this problem.1 Protein treatments are frequently advised to address this issue.2
Many people also have questions about whether proteins are suitable or compatible for low porosity hair. It is probably one of the biggest confusions amongst all hair porosity types.
When we think about protein for hair, we usually associate it with high porosity hair. This is because protein helps to fill in the gaps and holes along the cuticle layer, which is often found in damaged high porosity hair.
However, protein is not just for high porosity hair, it can also be beneficial for low porosity hair!
More often than not, protein treatments are often the go-to solution.
We will now study low-porosity hair fibers and the possible use of proteins on these hair fibers.
How Often Should You Do A Protein Treatment
Its important to do your own trial and error, taking into consideration all the factors we mentioned above. How does your hair look and feel? Does it feel thirsty or hungry? What is its porosity and damage level? How often should you use a protein mask? Also, make sure to adjust the protein and moisturizing treatments keeping the following information in mind:
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Low Porosity Hair Characteristics
Low porosity hair has tightly packed, flat cuticles. This means theres little space for water or other treatments to come in or out of.
Because of that condition, less porous hair typically
- takes long to wet and dry, and
- accumulates products outside the shaft.
Similar to other porosity levels, genes play a big part in having low porosity hair because the placement of cuticles can depend on the texture of the hair.
Chemical treatments like coloring, perming, bleaching, and others cant be blamed as causes for low-porosity hair. Damage from these treatments can only make hair more porous, not less porous.
When youve finally determined if your hair is less porous, you can then learn how to fix low-porosity hair.
How To Tell If Your Hair Is Protein Sensitive
Here is a simple test to determine if you have protein sensitivity:
Youll notice the section will be harder than the rest of your hair, which is normal. However, if the section is extremely stiff or starts breaking, you have protein sensitive hair.
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Camille Rose Naturals Moroccan Pear Conditioning Custard
*This product contains coconut oil . This post is about protein-free products.
Product Claim: Moroccan Pear Conditioning Custard is a culinary cocktail blend of nourishing oils to soften and protect the hairs moisture barrier. Its infused with sweet Moroccan pear and cherry kernel oils crafted to nurture dry strands and promote accelerated hair growth with potent B vitamins.
Customer Review:Best conditioner Ive used in a long time. Instantly smoothing. My hair is shiny, smooth, and hydrated from the inside.
Can Low Porosity Hair Use Rice Water
There is no definitive answer to this question. Some people have had success in using rice water as a treatment for their low porosity hair, while others have not.
It is recommended that you test a small amount of rice water on a hidden section of your hair before applying it all over your head to avoid any potential damage.
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Aphogee Two Step Protein Treatment Review
September 30, 2022 by Emily Evert
There are affiliate links in this post.
When I was new to the curly girl method I read about protein overload and was scared of protein as a result. I successfully avoided using much protein for quite a while without a problem. I think after about a year and a half, I started experiencing moisture overload.
Id wash and style my hair the same way, using the same products as before, but Id barely get a cast when I used to get a hard cast. Plus, my waves would fall flat after just a few hours or less than a day, when they used to last multiple days. I couldnt avoid protein any longer.
Once I saw how much my hair benefited from some protein, I started incorporating it into my routine more often. I remained afraid of really strong protein treatments though. Yet, I continued to find myself in moisture overload fairly frequently when using more mild protein treatments. If you havent already, Id recommend learning your hair type and how your hair type impacts what products you should use.
A year or so ago, I finally decided to try a strong protein treatmentthe Aphogee two-step protein treatment. I bought the sample packet at first. It went really well, so Ive since bought the full sized bottle.
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