new thread
I was thinking about stopping washing my hair with shampoo and conditioner and just washing with water. Do you really need to use shampoo anyway or will it smell or something?
Unless you are trying to develop dreads there is no reason to stop using conditioner in your hair. Now to use or not use shampoo is a matter of personal preference.
If I don't shampoo, dandruff builds up and it itches. Water alone can't break up the combination of dead skin and body oil. You need shampoo to break that stuff up. Some people are blessed with a natural ability to have very little dead skin, and to shed what they have so that water is enough. If you are one of those people, great.
If I don't condition, my hair will tangle and break, and ultimately will become filled with frizzy little hairs that were once long but got broken off before their time. This isn't as readily apparent as the dandruff problem--it took 2 1/2 years of growth before I realized I needed conditioner. I'm sure there are probably people that can get away without condtioner and maintain a reasonable, good-looking length. If you are one of those people, great.
A member here tried this a while back, and found out that he only needed to shampoo like every 2 weeks or something, just rinsing with water the rest of the time. It allowed for the natural hair oil "sebum" to get worked down the length of the hair shaft and condition it naturally. My friend uses bar soap and no conditioner, and his is some of the slickest, nicest looking hair I've ever seen.
Anyways, no harm in trying it.
That "Ball" Guy
it's entirely possible, but keep in mind that everybody's hair (and expectations towards their hair!) is different so you can't really be sure that the comments we tell you will apply :)
Just try it and see if it works for you!!
good luck
-vincent
If your scalp is oily, not using shampoo to get rid of the sebum (oil) will result in a bacterial breakdown of the sebum that can cause scalp problems, including increased fall-out.
I know people who don't wash, but their scalps are dry.
JE
Over time I've come to only wash with water. After all, before shampoo came along all of us did, so it is a viable alternative for sure.
The trick with "washing with water" is "balance". You have to learn to balance the amount of water and temperature of the water against how oily your hair is and how much oil you want to remove each time. You also have to put on enough water to move oil down into your ends, but not put on so much you wash it all away.
Balance takes practice. The beauty of shampoo is it is designed to take most of the need to balance out of the picture. You just strip all of the oil out and replace it with something unnatural. So shampooing, one could say, is the easy way out. [grin]
If you want to wash only in water, you will need to EXPERIMENT. That is how you learn to achieve balance.
Good luck with your experiments!
Bill
