Hair Care Using Only Water and a Boar Bristle Brush

One day while scrolling through instragram I came across an update by one of my fellow zero wasters who mentioned caring for their hair using only water and a boar bristle brush - intrigued, I did a bit of research and tried it out myself. So far I'm pretty happy with the results!

How I Got Here

When first going zero waste I started by cutting out plastic shampoo bottles and used a lush shampoo bars - they last a really long time and I only had to wash my hair once a week, that said I did find my hair dry and the shampoo bars still contain SLS which is the likely cause of the dryness. They are also pricey enough.

SLS is what is used to make many cleaning and beauty products lather but also harsh on skin and oil production, offsetting the delicate natural balance causing either dryness or over-production of oils. It's also shown to be harmful to ocean life once it gets into the sea, similar to micro-beads.

For the last month I have been using liquid castille soap diluted with water as a shampoo and apple cider vinegar as a rinse. It worked ok but I later read that I should be using filtered pasteurised apple cider vinegar due to possible bacteria passing through to breastmilk and I couldn't find if mine was or not. I also still found it left my hair dry. The bacteria was more for ingestion but I was fairly certain I could smell it off the baby after a feed so was convinced it was being absorbed into my skin and through to him. According to a stat I read, something like 60% of what we put on our skin is absorbed into our system, so the fewer things I use the better. 2 articles here and here go into more detail about the amount of chemicals that are untested which are allowed in cleaning and beauty products etc.

All that said when I read about using only water, I figured since I am on mat leave, now is the time to try it out. Even after the first wash I noticed a difference in my hair's health. The process also makes sense when you think that all other animals are self cleaning, so too is our hair. Shampoo was only invented in 1927. Its use drys out oils which tells your body to produce more which makes you use more of the product and thus continues a vicious circle. Other people report it takes their hair a while to rebalance itself but mine seems to have responded straight away (possibly due to the month prior using only castille soap - I'm not sure).

Benefits

Cost
Plastic free
Hair health, more shine, more volume
No harmful chemicals
Need to wash hair less frequently

I've yet to see but others report:

Faster growth
No need of other styling products
Faster air drying

How to do it

The steps are:

Pre-shower

Scritch (massage your dry scalp with fingertips to loosen dead skin and oils)
Preen (run fingers down strips of your hair to distribute oils down the length of your hair)
Brush (using boar bristle brush - again to distribute oils)

In shower

Wash in hot water (water and oil don't mix so make sure it's hot enough to break down oils)
Rinse in cold water (this should be done even with shampoo users to close follicles for healthier hair)

Dry with t-shirt or micro fiber cloth (again should be done even using shampoo to de-frizz hair)
Detangle with wide tooth comb (brushing wet hair is very damaging, detangling with wide tooth comb keeps hair healthy)
Air dry or blow dry (air dry is healthiest for hair, if you blow dry, you can use silicone-free heat protectant, silicone builds up over time needing harsh shampoo to remove it - more on that here)
Brush with boar bristle brush once dry (it's important to wash your brush frequently with water and a cloth to remove oils - otherwise you just keep spreading oils back into your hair)

It does take a bit of extra prep before you shower but as it restores balance to your system you shouldn't need to do it that often. I have read of some people only washing their hair 3 times a year (sounds gross I know but only because we've been sold the idea of needing products to clean ourselves).

Daily upkeep

You need to brush with the boar bristle brush morning and night to keep the oils distributed down the lengths of your hair instead of concentrated at your scalp. The boar bristle brush is key in this method of hair care as the bristles carry to oil down your hair better than others. There are tutorials on how to best achieve this. If you have long hair and your tips are a bit dry (not enough oil to reach them) - you can use coconut oil to hydrate them.

Variations

There are variations to the above required for curly hair or hard water, just google them if they pertain to you.

Before and After

Here are my before and after photos

The before shot is 6 days after washing it with just water the first time and having used the bristle brush morning and night (I'm covering my eye as we are a little sleep deprived this week and I have developed a stye which has my eye half closed over due to a new sleep program we are trying out with baby - the joys)