#Squish to condish sciencey how to

If you use too many moisturising products for your hair, after a while, your hair can become overmoisturised. Curly hair that is healthy, naturally fine, soft or low porosity (once healthy) doesn’t need all that much moisture. And, while it’s true that curly hair needs more moisture than straight hair, not all curly hair needs the same level of moisture. That’s because it’s been ingrained into us that curly hair is dry and needs moisture. From my experience, it’s pretty easy to overmoisturise the hair. Moisture overload is when you have too much moisture (from conditioning products) in the hair. Deep conditioning treatments generally contain lots of moisturising ingredients, which can send your hair even further into overmoisturised territory.

Rice water rinse (contains some protein and inositol, a carbohydrate with protective benefits) *vegetarian option*Ī deep conditioner or hair mask that contains protein is not a protein treatment.

At home beer rinse (contains protein from grains and yeasts) *vegetarian option*.

Botanika The Mender (contains hydrolyzed collagen).

Aphogee 2-step Protein Treatment (contains hydrolyzed collagen).

DIY Gelatine Treatment (partly hydrolyzed collagen) *my fav as it’s cheap and easy*.

Protein treatments for curly hair include: Some people may need to do monthly protein treatments, while others may rarely – or never – need to. Protein treatments contain a higher concentration of protein, so make sure your hair definitely needs protein before doing one, or you could end up with protein overload (more on protein overload below). If using protein-containing products isn’t working out for you after a few wash days, you may need something stronger, like a protein treatment. If they do, take note of where in the ingredients list the proteins are so you can determine whether it’s high or low in protein. Take a look at your existing products and see if any contain the protein ingredients mentioned above. This can be through any hair product, including: If you want to introduce protein into your routine, start by using products that contain protein. The main ways to give hair protein are to: Also referred to as conditioning or softening ingredients ( more on that in the ‘what is moisture?’ section )

When referring to moisture and moisturising products in relation to protein moisture balance, we usually mean ingredients that make our curls feel soft and smooth.

With all the moisturising curly hair products on the market these days, it’s fairly easy to overmoisturise some hair types – especially once your hair is healthy or if your curls are naturally fine or soft.

A product that contains protein can be moisturising – it may contain lots of moisturising ingredients (e.g.

It’s possible to need both protein and moisture at the same time.

Everyone’s hair is different, so will need a different amount of protein and moisture.

There’s a few things to keep in mind when thinking about protein moisture balance: We get strength from protein and softness from moisturising/softening ingredients (more on that below). texture/thickness and porosity).Īs described by Science-y hair blog, protein moisture balance is a balance between strength/stiffness and softness. But the amount you need of each will depend on your hair type (i.e. In fact, our hair is made up of a protein called keratin. Let’s dive into the deep deep depths of protein moisture balance…Īll curly hair needs protein and moisture.

#Squish to condish sciencey how to

How to re-balance your hair when it’s in overload.How to maintain a balance of moisture and protein.How to identify moisture in curly hair products.How to identify protein in curly hair products.

Do I need to worry about protein moisture balance?.I’m going to be splitting this guide into the following sections, which you can jump to: If you’ve ever wondered why your fine curls suddenly started falling limp and feeling really soft after deep conditioning twice a week, or why your coarse hair feels straw-like after using ‘strengthening’ products, this post is for you! It’s certainly a topic that took me a while to get my head around when I first started looking after my curls, but now that I’ve got a better understanding of it, I wanted to put a guide together that you can refer back to. But what exactly does it mean? And, how do you know if your hair needs protein or moisture? If you’ve spent any amount of time among the curly hair communities of Instagram, Tik Tok or even YouTube, then chances are you’ll have heard of the term ‘protein moisture balance’. Ahh, protein moisture balance – the biggest curly hair mystery of all!