Low Poo- Two Months and Going

So…by week 4, this low poo thing was proving harder than I originally anticipated. The week after I hennaed my hair, my hair and scalp were looking fantastical. I was able to go about 2-3 days without washing my hair and not have it looking like I didn't wash my hair--AWESOME. My hair felt 90% clean. I was continuing to use my Morrocco Method shampoos with no conditioners, because they indicated a separate conditioner wasn't necessary. Then my scalp started to get dry. WHAAAAT? Why?? I decided to try moisturizing my scalp with some argan oil for the first few days, then continued to moisturize with a green conditioner I purchased not too long ago made by Briogeo (full review of this product to come). I only did this once or twice and will not make it a habit to condition my scalp (it's not necessary for me), but just condition the middle of my hair to the ends. This seemed to do the job and scalp was dry no more.

I've been doing this low poo-ing for about 2 months now and I think I'm going to stick with it. My hair seems to produce less sebum/oil and I like that I'm using less chemicals in my hair. Don't get me wrong, I'm still shampooing every other day, but the second day doesn't look as bad as it did when I was using regular shampoo. One thing I will miss? The delicious smells of my old chemical-y shampoos. Man. Oh and that feeling of having 100% clean hair--when you low poo, it's hard to get that feeling when you have a low sudsing shampoo. It does feel 90% clean, which is a percentage I can live with. I'll post again in a few months to let you know how my hair does and if I can actually stick it out. Wish me luck!

**Update: I cheated on my low-poo regiment….I'm starting to try natural shampoos with no bad ingredients because I missed that feeling of 100% clean hair. I feel terrible, but I'm determined to get the best of both worlds. I'll keep using my super low-poo shampoo and rotate with more natural shampoos that also give me some lather. Sorry low-poo.

Low poo - Week 3

I made the mistake of trying this no poo thing exactly 2 weeks before my boyfriend came to visit me from out of town. I guess I secretly hoped I would be the small percentage of lucky people who would go through the detox/transition period in 2 weeks…turns out, I wasn't.  I ended up washing my hair straight for 3 days just for that weekend so he didn't have to suffer during my crunchy journey.  I digress, on to what I did for week 3!

I heard baking soda was no good, then castile soap was no good. DOMME. I researched some more and settled on a pH balanced, low-poo, no junk-toxic-stuff shampoo.

Photo Courtesy of Freedigitalphotos.com

I decided to try Morrocco Method shampoos, which are raw, wild-crafted and gluten-free shampoos. They're free of the nasty chemicals that are commonly found in typical shampoos SLS, phthalates, propylene glycol, etc.).  They have several different shampoos to try (5 of them), and they believe in rotating the different shampoos to ensure that your hair never gets used to any one shampoo and retains good results. I purchased the sampler kit, the Earth and Apple Cider Vinegar shampoos and a Zen Detox hair mask. I confirmed with them first that their shampoos are pH balanced--whew.

I started off with the Earth Essence shampoo. Let me preface with this: I was in the middle of my detoxing period where my hair was pretty gross and oily. My scalp wasn't regulating itself and the oil production was just straight gross. By the end of the first day, my hair felt like it needed a good scrub down--only, when you're trying to go no/low poo, you need to try to space out your shampoos less frequently. UGGGGH. Lots of bloggers will just put their hair in a ponytail during this dreaded phase to get over it, as they see the benefits of their scalp regulating itself as worth this short time of feeling dirty. I'm unlucky in this way because if I put my greasy hair in a ponytail, it looks like greasy hair in a ponytail. So I did end up showering every other day like normal, and this was my plan until after my hair got out of the transition phase. I was told the Zen Detox hair mask would help clean my hair during this dreaded detox, which is the reason for that purchase.

First, the shampoos don't smell THE best. They smell ok, not terrible, not wonderful, just ok. I'm willing to use shampoos that smell just ok for the benefits. Especially with this being pH balanced, contains natural products, and scores very low on the EWG Skin Deep website, the pros outweighed the cons. It seemed to smell like a not-as-good-version of a spa. More of a very earthy smell (which some of you may love).

Directions are to mix 1 tablespoon of shampoo with 1 cup of water (this helps to dilute and help spread the shampoo) and to shampoo twice--once to get the grease out and the second to let the good ingredients work in your scalp.

I did this for the first week every two days, and my outer hair looked fine, but hairs underneath felt gross. At this point, I decided to also buy a bristle boar brush (oftentimes labeled "BBB" on green bloggers sites--I had to look this one up, and bam, here it is for you) to help brush out and condition the rest of my hair. Sebum is a naturally occurring oil that comes from your scalp. This helps keep the hair from looking TOO gross closer to your head. Check out this post from Almost Exactly if you want to learn more about BBB-ing.

Still going through the detestable detox process, but I'm determined to make it though to the other side. I've been reading a lot about Henna so I decided to henna my hair in the middle of this detoxing process because I heard it was good for your scalp and makes your hair shiny and voluminous. And the best part? It's natural. I'll be posting about that experience soon.