The TL;DR version: You can find my no ‘poo photo diaries here to see exactly how my hair has changed since going no ‘poo in March 2015, my natural haircare recipes can be found here, and you can find a whole bunch of frequently asked questions here which includes what I’m using to cleanse my hair these days.
Right, I have scoured countless blog posts now detailing other people’s No ‘Poo experiences. Most of them start off by explaining what the whole No ‘Poo movement is - usually with a joke about bowel movements thrown in. My bowel movements are no laughing matter(…), so for those who haven’t heard of No ‘Poo, here are a couple of quick snippets from good old Wikipedia’s No ‘poo entry to bring you up to speed:
Proponents of “no poo”-practices believe that shampoo removes the natural oils (sebum) produced by the scalp—causing the scalp to produce more oil to compensate. They also believe that regular shampooing causes a “vicious cycle” to develop as it becomes necessary to shampoo regularly to compensate for the excess oils produced by the scalp (which are produced in response to being stripped from the scalp by the previous shampooing).
According to some dermatologists, a gradual reduction in shampoo use will cause the sebaceous glands to produce at a slower rate, resulting in less oil on the scalp and hair. The time taken to break the cycle after adopting “no poo”-practices varies, however a “two- to six-week period” is typical. A much longer period, as long as a year, can be necessary to transition over to no-Shampoo.
The “vicious cycle” part should probably ring a bell with some of you - personally I can’t remember how many times I’ve heard someone say that they wash their hair every day because it gets so greasy so quickly, only for someone else to pipe up to tell them that’s the exact reason why their hair is acting up.
Reasons to go No ‘Poo
So you get the gist: there’s a bunch of dirty hippies out there sticking it to The Man and going off the grid. Or something like that. Some of the reasons I’ve heard for ditching commercial shampoos include frugal living, going eco-friendly, and concerns for all the chemical nasties that hair care products contain.
As I promised before and after photos, here’s my hair before:
There was nothing really wrong with it except for having to use straighteners to tame the dried out ends, and having to use dry shampoo the day after shampooing it then wearing it up any days after that because it would be greasy.
And I’d already stopped using hair dye on it by this point because of this little disaster here…
Anyway, I’ve never had a great immune system, and since cutting out gluten and loads of other things from my diet, I’ve stopped getting ill as often, so I’ve been interested in finding out whether using chemicals on my body might also be stopping my body from effectively fighting off illnesses.
But I’d tried using an organic shampoo years ago which left my hair feeling sticky, limp and dirty, and I got put off.
Then in March 2015 I happened to come across a column on Snapchat on how another woman hadn’t shampooed her hair in years, and I wanted to know how it was possible to have hair as healthy-looking as hers without using chemicals.
Once I’d done some more research on the whole detox period, realising why my hair had felt so disgusting before, I felt brave enough to give it all another go.
I stayed up half the night reading and researching, announced my plans to Graeme the next morning (it went down really well…), and ran out to stock up on baking soda, apple cider vinegar, aloe vera juice - the list was endless, unlike my bank balance.
How to go No ‘Poo
Generally, people pick an alternative shampoo and conditioner and then start trying to stretch out the days between each time they wash their hair.
Some people do a clarifying wash first; I didn’t come across clarifying in my research before I jumped in, but a lot of people swear that it strips the hair of any silicones that have built up and speeds the process up, so have a look into it if you want.
The first week for me was generally okay. I was a bit greasy, but I kept my hair up in a ponytail and to be honest I was only washing my hair every 4 or 5 days by this point anyway. Because lazy. So it wasn’t too horrendous.
I was holding out for as long as I could, because most people seem to believe that waiting for as long as possible between washes speeds the detox process up and helps your scalp to stop over-producing sebum sooner.
After that first week, it got worse before it started getting better. A lot worse.
But I got through it in the end, and I’ve settled on a few staple go-to methods centred around Ayurvedic herbs, with plenty more herbs to try out.
There are loads of different methods out there; here’s just a couple of the most common ones that I’ve tried and my experiences with them. Everyone has different hair needs, though, so if you do decide to ditch your normal shampoo, research research research first!
The Baking Soda and Apple Cider Vinegar method
So this is where you wash your hair with a mix of BS and water, which is very alkaline and meant to clean off excess sebum, and then follow it up by rinsing your hair with ACV (acidic) to seal the hair shafts back up.
Didn’t work for me - I’m not known for my patience, and after just one attempt I did a heap more research and stumbled across this anti-baking soda post via Pinterest, by a blogger who had started to lose clumps of her hair from using baking soda.
They had realised that baking soda is too alkaline for our hair’s natural pH balance, leaving it dry and brittle after prolonged use in some people.
You might get on great with baking soda, crack on and give it a go if you like. Me, I moved on.
Next!
The pH-balanced method
So I did a load more research before searching for pH-balanced shampoo recipes. I went for a coconut milk and aloe jelly recipe that ended up filling about 6 ice cube trays, and I couldn’t wait to try it out one wild Saturday night at home.
Now, I know that the lovely blogger Robin advises you to give this recipe a few tries before writing it off, and I really wanted to love it - but my hair was still soaking wet the next morning. See?!
I really, really wanted to wait a few more days and give the shampoo another try, but after 2 solid weeks of being greasy and now this - I got desperate, gave my hair a good shampooing, and went back to Google.
Morrocco Method
So while my hair was drying back to its fluffy post-shampoo state (yaaay! I mean boooo), I revisited some blog posts I’d come across raving about this raw, vegan, paleo, gluten-free and wild-crafted line of shampoos and conditioners from a company called Morrocco Method (aaaand breathe).
Now, a lot of these bloggers are affiliates, and amazingly many had “become converts” after just one month of using the products, which as a consumer I feel naturally sceptical of. Not to mention the price is pretty hefty.
But Graeme had decided that anything resembling a ‘normal’ shampoo had to be better than the crazy things I had been cooking up, so he ordered me the starter kit, along with the scalp massager and a tub of the Zen Detox clay mask, while I grabbed a natural boar bristle brush from another site to give ‘scritch and preening’ a go.
There are five shampoos and they recommend you rotate through them all to see which ones your hair responds well to, whilst doing a Zen Detox once a week for the first three weeks - which I did every week for the first seven weeks in an attempt to shift the grease in my hair.
The first detox went great, and I usually managed to wear my hair down on the first day of each detox - you can see how happy I am in the photo below that something had finally made my hair feel clean and dry!
But if I washed my hair in the morning with one of the normal shampoos, sometimes it would take until I’d slept on it that night for my hair to finally dry off, by which point I’d had to tie it up because it was just a bit limp and urgh.
Finally, during week 4/5, my hair didn’t dry properly at all and I was left with a slick mess that couldn’t even be saved by a ponytail. It was weird - my hair was drying nicely at the front, but clumping together in the centre and at the back, leaving me with an over-pronounced parting at the crown, and my whole head was feeling waxy and gunky.
Side note: BBB
I found that the boar bristle brush was making my hair look even more limp, and during one scritch and preen session Graeme noticed that the bristles weren’t actually hard enough to reach past my top layers of hair.
I did a little more research and ended up ordering some bamboo brushes and a comb to try out, which have been much better. I don’t brush often though, simply because distributing my sebacious oils instantly weighs my hair down and I really hate that slick look.
I have heard a good tip though that if you brush your oils through your hair before bed and then sleep on it, you can wash it off in the morning and it’s like a deep condition, so maybe that’ll be worth trying?
Also, from what I gather it’s kind of the point to coat our hair in our own oils - some people go full-on water-only and swear by just scrubbing their scalps with their hands in the shower, dragging their oil through their hair, and off they go.
Braver people than I…
Another side note: dry shampoo
I was also desperately rubbing cornflour into my scalp every couple of days, trying to eliminate greasy patches - but now I’m sure this was just adding to the product build up and hindering the detox process.
Even though my hair of course ends up getting greasy after a few days, I never use dry shampoo anymore - and this is from someone who would use half a can of Batiste the day after every normal shampooing!
I was at a bit of a nightmare stage in my transition at this point, but I wanted to stay strong - I just needed to find something that would shift that gunk.
Using egg to wash waxy or greasy hair
Things were looking pretty bleak, so I started Googling ‘no poo waxy hair’ to see if there was anyone out there with similar hair woes. Eventually I came across this Reddit thread detailing someone’s success using raw egg to wash their hair.
I went on to read a lot of other blog posts about using egg with their tips and tricks - about how it can make your hair crunchy and OD on protein if you do it too often, how you’ll need to wash using very very cool water to avoid getting cooked scrambled egg in your hair, and all the different recipes to address your hair’s needs - before deciding that at this stage, it was worth a shot.
So the next morning I grabbed the last 2 eggs from the fridge (sorry for stealing your breakfast, Graeme), whisked them up in a bowl, hopped in the shower, and took the plunge.
I got my hair wet and gradually massaged egg throughout my scalp, dishing it into my hand with a spoon.
Can I be honest? I nearly cried in the shower. For the first time in weeks, my hair got that slippery, squeaky clean feeling that I thought would only come with SLS-loaded shampoos.
I had long-ish, thin hair but a lot of it (it’s become a lot thicker and stronger since using the Ayurvedic herbs), but with two eggs I still had loads left over, so one is probably enough.
I was off out soon, so I only left the egg on for a few minutes before rinsing it out, but it made so much difference.
I was flipping my wet hair around with ease and running my fingers through without them getting caught, and the first bits of dried hair were as fluffy as if I’d used normal shampoo.
Hours later, when it had dried, sadly it did look a little flat, but Graeme reassured me that it just looked like my normal hair without being straightened.
Clays
The egg did leave my hair limp and a little wiry on top (making me paranoid of OD’ing) and the price of the Morrocco Method Zen Detox is obscene, so I ended up using clays including Rhassoul and Bentonite which finally shifted my grease and sebum for a reasonable price.
When I first used the Rhassoul it was brilliant. I gave my hair a quick scrub in the shower with it and managed to go to a Christening without anyone realising what I’d done.
So it took me about seven weeks to get from shampooing to completely detoxed, and although I spent a lot of the time after that using clays which gradually broke my hair down, I finally discovered Ayurvedic herbs in 2016 which are known for hair health and growth and I’ve been noticing some real gains from that.
You can find all my no ‘poo photo diaries here to see exactly how my hair has changed since going no ‘poo in March 2015, my natural haircare recipes can be found here, and you can find a whole bunch of frequently asked questions here which includes what I’m using to cleanse my hair these days - srsly, those Ayurvedic herbs are the bee’s knees.
I hope this has helped some of you deciding whether or not to go No ‘Poo, anyone with waxy issues like me, or just given some of you a good laugh at my expense!
