I’ve spent the last few blogs focused on anti-aging hair care, because there are so many factors that contribute to your beautiful hair’s becoming old before it’s time.
Other blogs on the subject of anti-aging hair care
In earlier blogs I have suggested strategies to address brittle, thinning, aging hair that is the result of hormonal shifts. The three biggest causes of hormonal shifts are imbalances due to pregnancy, approaching menopause or thyroid issues.
Other factors that contribute to damaged, brittle hair are environmental. Where you live and the time of year can both be very hard on your hair.
But often our aging hair is the result of self-inflicted wounds
- hair that is dry and dull due to sun exposure.
- hair that is thinning and weakening due to heat styling.
And the last self-inflicted wounds I can think of at the moment, that cause your hair great distress, are using wrong product for your hair type, or- even worse, using any kind of hair product containing petroleum-based ingredients. For great hair, get the right product!
Using the wrong products for your hair type
Hair care products are formulated in various ways, for weakened hair, flyaway hair, color-treated hair, curly hair, straight hair, African-American hair, Asian hair etc. And it actually matters what you use. This is not a conspiracy to sell you product you don’t need. If you use a regular shampoo on color treated hair you will strip out some of the hair color, resulting in faded hair color, or worse, changing the hair color by taking out just part of it, leaving it brassy or greenish and very fake-looking. If you use the wrong mousse, or any kind of paraffin-based volume-izing product on thinning hair you will load down the already delicate root of the brittle hair and make it even more brittle, causing it to break and thin further – the opposite of what you want to do with thinning hair. So get the right product for your hair.
THE PROBLEM – Using hair care products with petroleum-based ingredients
Most hair care products you get at the drugstore – and many of the more expensive ones you can buy at the beauty supply store – even if they say they have “all-natural ingredients” – still depend largely on petroleum-based ingredients. For example, if your hair seems to lackluster you might buy a hair care product to add shine. The easiest and cheapest way to do that is with silicone.
At first your shine factor and manageability goes way up and your hair feels slick-smooth. Woo hoo!! But not for long… Petroleum-based hair care products attach themselves to your hair shaft. They don’t wash out at all easily and as they begin to build up on your hair, it starts to starve from lack of nourishment because when it coats your hair nothing can get through to the hair itself – not even moisture. After a few weeks your hair becomes limp, dry and dull hair. And until you use a “clarifying shampoo”, which can be very hard on your now-weakened hair, you can’t get the build-up off the hair. Now your hair will need even more tending and conditioning to bring it back to it’s old strength and luster. You begin to think you just have bad hair.
There is no such thing as bad hair – only bad hair care product.
Have you ever been told that your hair gets “tired” of the same shampoo and you have to switch brands in order to keep it effective? Well that is not true at all, but when you are using cheap products your hair does get tired very quickly of it. The products buildup and stop doing their job, in fact they begin to do the opposite, so then yes, you certainly have to switch brands. Unfortunately switching won’t really help much unless you switch to something genuinely good.
THE SOLUTION – Using hair care products with plant-based ingredients
After a visit to your hair stylist your hair always feels better. Even if it is considerably damaged, it will feel better. Why? Because hair stylists care that their work looks great on you. They don’t want to be blamed for split ends and frizzy ends when they know full well that was caused by your beauty products. So they use great product in order to allow their great hair cut or hair color job to shine through. And any stylist worth his salt will tell you to use high-end plant based hair care products to both nourish your hair and gently clean and condition it without building up on it and weighing it down. They know what your scalp looks like after even one application of a petroleum-based styling product, versus how it looks after being cleaned and conditioned with a vitamin-enriched, plant-based shampoo and conditioner.
In addition, the styling abilities of these kinds of hair care products – the best of which are
Minardi Hair care products and Rene Furterer Hair care products not only don’t hurt the hair, they are far more effective. For example there is not a volume-izing product out there better than Minardi Root lift. And there is no mousse that I am willing 
to allow near my fine, flyaway hair except for Tonucia – which is light, slightly orange-smelling mousse that nourishes and protects my hair before I blow it dry.
They are much more effective because they are not working against themselves or your hair, as the petroleum-based products are.
This is why you always ask your stylist to recommend hair care products. I learned about 
Beth Minardi and Rene Furterer hair care products from my own Beverly Hills hair stylist. I used to think I had bad hair – I mean for years I struggled with it. But these days I have enviable hair – and I can have great hair, than almost anyone can, because trust me, I was NOT born with it!
