Three years ago, my husband and I decided to give shampoo bars a shot. My husband, Mr. T, went online, looked around and suggested Dr Bronners liquid soap. That it is all natural, no SLS, oil based soap looked like a very good starting point.
So the first time, I do my typical thing. I oil my dry hair, quite heavily, let it soak in before I shampoo my hair. I was genuinely surprised to see it so runny but lather quite well. I use it twice in one shower, that's how I usually shampoo and rinse it off well. It felt like all the oil had not washed away, but decided to let it dry before I gave the verdict. Well, after my hair did air dry, it looked like a greasy mess! Like I had not washed my hair at all! Like all the oil I had massaged it somehow managed to stay in my hair and with water on top of it, looked gross! :(
I was disappointed, honestly. Being a soapnuts gal for a long time, it was not my first oil-still-in-my-hair-after-washing moment. So, I decide to wash another time with the same Dr Bronners liquid soap, we used the peppermint back then. It was summer of 2011. Warm days called for peppermint, we thought. Anyways, the second time around was no better. It was still oily. Not just the scalp but along the strands all the way down my back. Arghh! I just did not like it. The worst thing was, every time I ran my hands along my hair, I felt more than a couple of strands coming out. And that did not stop all day along. Stressful!
Mr T, after seeing me so upset and hearing to my complaints, found this link: http://lisa.drbronner.com/?p=256 and we promptly ordered the rinse and the leave in conditioner. I persisted on with the liquid shampoo in the meanwhile. Looking like a greasy head at work :( Not my favorite moment.
Once we received the rinse, I tried it. Followed the instructions to the T. When I ran it along my hair and used my fingers to work it in, I pulled out quite a few strands! It helped with the greasy head situation a little but not a great deal. The leave in conditioner felt good for a second but very quickly looked greasy. I had to tweak the amounts and let my hair get used to it, I thought. And kept at it for another couple of weeks. I could not handle the dirty scalp for long. So I went back to my Giovanni tea tree shampoo and felt happier than ever! Some people opined that the shampoo bars were better than the liquid shampoo but I could not muster the courage to go through it all again. And decided to stick with semi-SLS and almost-no-SLS shampoos. Same old story, first couple of washes, find it great! Then it either would dry out my hair like crazy or weight it down by day 2. And the search continued without much practical application.
Looking back, I may have quit while my hair was yet to adjust to the new routine and turn into that movie star like tresses. But I freaked out, no other reason. I was struggling with hair loss and crazier looking hair freaked me out. That's all.
After much thought, time and browsing the net, I came across various blogs that discussed what would happen when switching to a more natural hair care routine. Some links: http://www.overthrowmartha.com/2014/03/shampoo-bars-are-they-better.html, a product website http://www.chagrinvalleysoapandsalve.com/idascorner/shampoo-hair/success-with-shampoo-bars/my-hair-is-having-trouble-adjusting-to-the-shampoo-bars and many others google would come up with. So I decided to take the advice and give it a more earnest shot.
And oh, Mr T stuck with Dr Bronners and discovers more uses for the liquid every now and then. But he has had a persistent flaky scalp. After much prodding, he has agreed to try some other products.
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