Protection During Summer
Have you ever noticed that your hair feels extra dry and lifeless during the summer months? That’s because your hair can get damaged in many different ways during summer. From sun damaged to water damage to your body creating more sweat when it’s hot out, taking extra steps during the spring and summer months is crucial.
Here are some tips to help protect your hair and scalp from summer damage:
1. Use sunscreen- Just like you need sun screen to protect your skin from the suns UV rays, our hair needs the same protection. Making sure you are using a leave in product that has UV protection in is optimal. When applying the product, it’s good to make sure your scalp gets some as well.
2. Cover your head- Wearing a hat is always your best bet if you want to prevent your scalp from getting burned. But if you have any hair left out underneath the hat, apply some of your UV protectant to that hair.
3. Use colour formulated products- Heat tends to oxidize your hair, which will open your cuticle. This can result in fading of hair colour, as well as your hair feeling dryer. Make sure the products you’re using are made for colour treated hair.
-If you have bright colours in your hair (eg. red, pink, purple) using a toning shampoo or conditioner will help to preserve the colour.
-If you want to maintain your ashy blonde, using a purple or blue shampoo during summer will help prevent your hair from getting too yellow or orange. The heat from the sun can bring out the natural pigment in the blonde, which will always be a warmer one.
-If you’re thinking about changing your hair colour, try to plan to do it a month or two before the summer months, or wait until fall. The less chemical damage being done to your hair over summer the better. If you have recently coloured it, try to wear a hat for a week or two after the colour service to allow your hair time to recover.
4. Use Conditioner- While you want to be using conditioner year round, you may find that you want to use it more often, and leave it on for longer over summer. This will help prevent brittleness as well as nourish your dry hair. If you plan on swimming, using conditioner before getting in the water can help act as a barrier to chlorine, or bacteria that is in the water.
5. Deep Conditioners and Leave Ins- If you’ve spent a long day in the sun, you may want to use a deep conditioning treatment that night to help replenish your hair to prevent it from feeling too dry. You can use one that is meant to add in more moisture, or if you’ve recently had your hair lightened, you can use one that is meant to help rebuild it. Either way, a conditioning treatment will load up your hair with extra nutrients, and help to close the cuticle and lock all those extra goodies in.
6. Reduce hot tools- Since your hair is already spending so much time in the heat and sun, if you lessen the amount your using your blow dryer or flat iron on it, you won’t experience quite as much dryness. But as always, if you do use any hot tools, you want to make sure you have applied some form of heat protection beforehand.
7. Wet your hair first- If you plan on going swimming, whether its in a pool or lake, make sure you wet your hair a bit first. If your hair already has water in it, it will soak up less of the water you’re swimming in. This will help with chlorine damage, as well as free radicals from any fresh or salt water you’re swimming in.
8. Rinse after swimming- After you’re done swimming, try to give your hair and body a quick rinse. While you’ll still need to make sure you wash later, this can help prevent further damage being done by not letting the chlorine or bacteria sit on your hair and skin.
9. Use a chelating shampoo- While all shampoo is meant to clean your scalp and hair, if you’re spending a lot of time swimming, a chelating or cleansing shampoo will help to remove any extra buildup. These shampoos are meant to be a bit stronger than traditional shampoos, and they’re formulated to do a deep clean. This is useful for chlorine, salt water or bacteria from fresh water. You don’t need to use this shampoo every wash, but you can use it after every swim, or once a week.
10. Use dry shampoo- During the summer months, our skin can be a bit extra dry as well. This can cause our sebaceous, or oil, glands to work extra hard. This is the body’s way of trying to moisturize our scalp. Using a dry shampoo will help get rid of the greasy look, while still maintaining a regular shampooing schedule. If you notice your hair is looking or feeling extra greasy, using a chelating shampoo will help to remove the extra oil buildup so as to not clog your follicles. You can also brush your hair a bit more often to disperse your natural oil to moisturize the rest of your hair.