How often do you wash you hair?

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  • troytroy11
    troytroy11 Posts: 180 Member
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    My daughter works out Max 30 five times a week to a sweat fest, and washes twice a week but uses dry shampoo on the last two days before washing so like twice a week for that too. She is going to cosmetology school and said that washing it every day can be damaging, yes.
    So the general idea is if you work out daily, the sweat does not have as strong an odor and won't be as oily as it does that first couple days after a long break. So she can go longer without even rinsing her hair as long as she continues to sweat daily.
    When you go for a longer period without a good sweat workout, or anything that produces sweat, then after that first day is when you should wash your hair, and then go from there depending your routine, diet, and other factors.
    Also recommends Paul Mitchel Tea Tree line if your hair is already damaged.

    For me, I still wash daily with short hair but between the answers on this thread and my daughters advice, I'm gonna have to cut back.
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  • KiyaK
    KiyaK Posts: 519 Member
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    I have thick, curly hair. Wash it twice a week. Scrub my scalp with fingernails and condition daily. I used to have mild psoriasis & since not shampooing daily & using a "shampoo" without sulfate (the chemical that causes suds) I no longer have it.

    Give not shampooing daily a try. If you don't like it, go back.
  • sympha01
    sympha01 Posts: 942 Member
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    Psht. I work out every day and run about 18 miles a week, and I sweat like a glistening badass in a gatorade commercial. I have medium-long thick hair. I just rinse my hair with water and conditioner 2x a week (swim days, can't avoid it) and I use shampoo a 3rd time. Every Saturday -- whether it needs it or not lol. Blow dry the sweat out the other times if it needs it, flat iron it to smooth the frizzies out the other times. Looks and smells fine.

    My hair and skin both tend to dryness though.
  • robininfl
    robininfl Posts: 1,137 Member
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    I am kind of shocked by this thread.
    My hair is very curly, short and I wash it every day. I have always washed it every day, and I will be 65 next week. Too late to worry about over washing.
    My hair is not dry at all. I have to have it cut every 5-6 weeks and I always get comments from the hairdressers, on how nice my hair is.

    I can't even imagine how gross I would feel without washing my hair daily.

    Probably doesn't get damaged because it's short - it is getting cut off before it gets damaged. When I used to bleach mine I had to keep it very short, that was fine, but older hair would be in terrible shape. Every time you shampoo, a wee bit of hair is stripped, only a little. So depending on length and texture, it doesn't add up to much...More if your hair is porous, or fine textured, and less if it's coarse and resistant. Mine is coarse and extremely resistant, but I just don't need to wash often, it's not oily and doesn't stink, so no reason to wash until I want to restyle. Doesn't feel gross at all.

    And, as everyone says, scalp will overproduce if dried by shampoo every day, so the 'grossness' is sort of a self-perpetuating problem.
  • DresdenSinn
    DresdenSinn Posts: 665 Member
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    I'm a 45yr old man and have had a full head of long hair for a very long time, and although a shower every day I only "wash" my hair/body 2x/week, the other 5 days is just a rinse off. As I've understood it for a long time washing your hair/body too often strips it of essential/protective oils. I've upheld this practice for years and even though I exercise and sweat a lot I have never been told that I smell/stink.
  • linarex
    linarex Posts: 10 Member
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    I wash every other day. I got a good dry shampoo that I like that I use on the off days. I also am sure to pull my hair back off my face, which helps quite a bit.
  • eat4dathealth
    eat4dathealth Posts: 40 Member
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    I wash mine every day that I exercise. The shampoo I use is always sulfate free because sulfate makes my head get sores. My hair dresser always comments that my hair is very soft and hardly has any damage when I go in to see her. When I don't exercise I don't wash my hair I put on a shower a cap. I exercise about 4 days a week at least so all of those days I'm washing my hair.
  • tcay584
    tcay584 Posts: 55 Member
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    subakwa wrote: »
    Every day. Your hair is dead, it cannot be nourished, moisturised or stripped of anything.

    Respectfully disagree about the moisurized and stripped part. The teak wood on my boat is "dead" too, but if I don't oil it it dries out and looks like dooky. The state of being alive has nothing to do with it. Agree with the nourished part. That always annoys the ever living love out of me when I hear it on commercials. It's keratin for heaven's sake.
  • mom22dogs
    mom22dogs Posts: 470 Member
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    I'm really surprised at most of the responses in the thread. I have to wash my hair every day, even if I don't work out, because I have fine, thin hair, and laying on it causes the front of my hair to be stringy and greasy, and after laying on it all night, it sticks out so that I can't get it to lay down. I've tried just rinsing it, and it still looks greasy and stringy, and has no body and lays flat on my head. I can't imagine going several days without washing. Once you sweat, your hair smells. Period.
  • BinaryPulsar
    BinaryPulsar Posts: 8,927 Member
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    This is just silly that people don't know that different people have different hair types, hair thickness, etc. Some people have fine and thin hair. Other people have very thick and/or curly hair. And everything in between. Some people don't sweat a lot. I usually wash my hair at night, go to bed after it dries, and I wake up to clean and pretty smelling hair. It stays that way for at least two days. And as long as it stays clean and my husband is saying, "Your hair smells so good" five times a day... then I don't wash it. I wash it before it ever looks dirty. And it never smells bad. I have a lot of white hair. I don't want to over wash it. And I don't want to wait for it to dry every day. Because I don't need to.
  • johnneedhamSr
    johnneedhamSr Posts: 223 Member
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    I wash mine 2-3 times a day. When I wake up pre-work, when I get home from work, and after the gym on gym days.
  • Chef_Barbell
    Chef_Barbell Posts: 6,644 Member
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    mom22dogs wrote: »
    I'm really surprised at most of the responses in the thread. I have to wash my hair every day, even if I don't work out, because I have fine, thin hair, and laying on it causes the front of my hair to be stringy and greasy, and after laying on it all night, it sticks out so that I can't get it to lay down. I've tried just rinsing it, and it still looks greasy and stringy, and has no body and lays flat on my head. I can't imagine going several days without washing. Once you sweat, your hair smells. Period.

    Because everyone has different hair textures and hair needs... I am surprised you don't know that. :noway:
  • gojaqs
    gojaqs Posts: 471 Member
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    Once a week. It just gets sweaty the next day anyway.
  • robininfl
    robininfl Posts: 1,137 Member
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    mom22dogs wrote: »
    I'm really surprised at most of the responses in the thread. I have to wash my hair every day, even if I don't work out, because I have fine, thin hair, and laying on it causes the front of my hair to be stringy and greasy, and after laying on it all night, it sticks out so that I can't get it to lay down. I've tried just rinsing it, and it still looks greasy and stringy, and has no body and lays flat on my head. I can't imagine going several days without washing. Once you sweat, your hair smells. Period.

    Yours, maybe.

    Fiance can stick his nose right up in my hair and say it smells good whenever it's dry, even if I sweated in it earlier. I had a long and sweaty dog walk this morning and just sniffed the ends of the hair, they still just smell like shampoo or gel, very lightly, definitely not stinky. It does eventually get dirty, but that takes a few days. Mine is very coarse in texture and not at all porous, when I stand under the shower the underneath hair doesn't get wet right away, I have to lift the other hair out of the way, and even then sometimes it doesn't feel WET until I put some shampoo - so it takes awhile for water or sweat to actually penetrate the hair - it's wet on the outside of the hair, not wet through the hair. Once really wet, it takes a very long time to dry, too. 4-6 hours, and it's pretty short now.

    The main reason I wash my hair is to restyle it, every few days (3-4 days) and usually it doesn't even feel dirty by then. When it was super long it was once a week, no problem.
  • robininfl
    robininfl Posts: 1,137 Member
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    subakwa wrote: »
    Every day. Your hair is dead, it cannot be nourished, moisturised or stripped of anything.

    It most certainly can be stripped of things. Bonds inside can be broken, cuticle can get shredded, pieces of the cuticle can fall off, ends can split. Gentle treatment can prevent these things from happening. Nothing to do with being dead or alive. If you have a wool or silk sweater, and wash it in hot water with shampoo every day, it will not be the same as if you don't.

    Again, if you keep it really short, it's not so important to treat it gently, you will be cutting off the hair before it has time for the damage to add up.

  • BinaryPulsar
    BinaryPulsar Posts: 8,927 Member
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    You can count on mfp to find people getting their panties in a bunch because they just found out that everyone in the world doesn't wash their hair everyday. People are always getting upset because we aren't all exactly the same with the same exact thoughts and lifestyles. But, this?
  • jennifer_417
    jennifer_417 Posts: 12,344 Member
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    About 3 times a week. What I'll do when I've gotten sweaty but don't wanna wash is use conditioner like I would shampoo and scrub my scalp with my fingertips, then rinse as usual. Leaves my hair super soft!
  • Karb_Kween
    Karb_Kween Posts: 2,681 Member
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    I do mine every other day.

    It really depends how much you're sweating but yeah you should wash your hair after an exercise if it smells bad or something
  • Dannigreen31
    Dannigreen31 Posts: 557 Member
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    I wash my hair every day. I'm 31 now and have done since I was at school. Never damaged my hair and everyone always comments what good condition it is...
  • ladymiseryali
    ladymiseryali Posts: 2,555 Member
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    I wash mine twice a week because I dye my hair crazy colors, so the less I wash it, the longer the color lasts.