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Should We Skip Shampoo?
Plus: the biggest cause of back pain, and how to fix it
The 10almonds Team
October 25, 2024
Today’s almonds have been activated by:
Do you a) drink alcohol and b) have a menstrual cycle? If so, the alcohol will hit harder, volume for volume, during the luteal phase (second half of the cycle) than the follicular phase (first half of the cycle).
By “will hit harder”, we mean in all respects. You’ll enjoy it more, and/but it’ll do more harm. So while you may be more tempted to reach for a bottle, the “cost” in health will be worse!
In A Rush?
Today’s 30-Second Summary
If you don’t have time to read the whole email today, here are some key takeaways:
“No-poo” has been a trend on-and-off for some years now (notwithstanding the misleading name, it’s about skipping shampoo), with proponents saying it is better for hair
Today’s main feature examines whether that’s true, what is actually going on with hair and hair oils (natural oils and otherwise), and how best to balance “I want my hair to be neither brittle nor greasy”!
We know that 10almonds readers don’t just want to look younger, but ideally to be younger, biologically speaking.
Today’s sponsor, Qualia Senolytic, are offering a potent supplement product that targets and eliminates senescent cells, meaning the ones that get copied forward are the younger cells.
Today’s featured book is for those of us who’d like to improve our heart health in the most sustainable way that doesn’t feel like a chore!
Read on to learn more about these things, or click here to visit our archive
A Word To The Wise
Watch and Learn
The Biggest Cause of Back Pain (And How To Fix It)
Will Harlow, specialist over-50s physiotherapist, shares the most common cause (and its remedy) in this video:
Prefer text? The above video will take you to a 10almonds page with a text-overview, as well as the video!
Q&A Thursday
It’s Q&A Day at 10almonds!
Have a question or a request? We love to hear from you!
In cases where we’ve already covered something, we might link to what we wrote before, but will always be happy to revisit any of our topics again in the future too—there’s always more to say!
As ever: if the question/request can be answered briefly, we’ll do it here in our Q&A Thursday edition. If not, we’ll make a main feature of it shortly afterwards!
So, no question/request too big or small 😎
❝What's the science on "no poo"? Is it really better for hair? There are so many mixed reports out there.❞
First, for any unfamiliar: this is not about constipation; rather, it is about skipping shampoo, and either:
Using an alternative cleaning agent, such as vinegar and/or sodium bicarbonate
Using nothing at all, just conditioner when wet and brushing when dry
Let’s examine why the trend became a thing: the thinking went “shampoo does not exist in nature, and most of our body is more or less self-cleaning; shampoos remove oils from hair, and the body has to produce more sebum to compensate, resulting in a rapid cycle of dry and greasy hair”.
Now let’s fact-check each of those:
shampoo does not exist in nature: true (except in the sense that everything that exists can be argued to exist in nature, since nature encompasses everything—but the point is that shampoo is a purely artificial human invention)
most of our body is more or less self-cleaning: true, but our hair is not, for the same reason our nails are not: they’re not really a living part of the overall organism that is our body, so much as a keratinous protrusion of neatly stacked and hardened dead cells from our body. Dead things are not self-cleaning.
shampoos remove oils from hair: true; that is what they were invented for and they do it well
the body has to produce more sebum to compensate, resulting in a rapid cycle of dry and greasy hair: false; or at least, there is no evidence for this.
Our hair’s natural oils are great at protecting it, and also great at getting dirt stuck in it. For the former reason we want the oil there; for the latter reason, we don’t.
So the trick becomes: how to remove the oil (and thus the dirt stuck in it) and then put clean oil back (but not too much, because we don’t want it greasy, just, shiny and not dry)?
The popular answer is: shampoo to clean the hair, conditioner to put an appropriate amount of oil* back.
*these days, mostly not actually oil, but rather silicon-based substitutes, that do the same job of protecting hair and keeping it shiny and not brittle, without attracting so much dirt. Remember also that silicon is inert and very body safe; its molecules are simply too large to be absorbed, which is why it gets used in hair products, some skin products, and lube.
If you go “no poo”, then what will happen is either you dry your hair out much worse by using vinegar or (even worse) bicarbonate of soda, or you just have oil (and any dirt stuck in it) in your hair for the life of the hair. As in, each individual strand of hair has a lifespan, and when it falls out, the dirt will go with it. But until that day, it’s staying with you, oil and dirt and all.
If you use a conditioner after using those “more natural” harsh cleaners* that aren’t shampoo, then you’ll undo a lot of the damage done, and you’ll probably be fine.
*in fact, if you’re going to skip shampoo, then instead of vinegar or bicarbonate of soda, washing-up liquid from your kitchen may actually do less damage, because at least it’s pH-balanced. However, please don’t use that either.
If you’re going to err one way or the other with regard to pH though, erring on the side of slightly acidic is much better than slightly alkaline.
If you use nothing, then brushing a lot will mitigate some of the accumulation of dirt, but honestly, it’s never going to be clean until you clean it.
Our recommendation
When your hair seems dirty, and not before, wash it with a simple shampoo (most have far too many unnecessary ingredients; it just needs a simple detergent, and the rest is basically for marketing; to make it foam completely unnecessarily but people like foam, to make it thicker so it feels more substantial, to make it smell nice, to make it a color that gives us confidence it has ingredients in it, etc).
Then, after rinsing, enjoy a nice conditioner. Again there are usually a lot of unnecessary ingredients, but an argument can be made this time for some being more relevant as unlike with the shampoo, many ingredients are going to remain on your hair after rinsing.
Between washes, if you have long hair, consider putting some hair-friendly oil (such as argan oil or coconut oil) on the tips daily, to avoid split ends.
And if you have tight curly hair, then this advice goes double for you, because it takes a lot longer for natural oils to get from your scalp to the ends of your hair. For those of us with straight hair, it pretty much zips straight on down there within a day or two; not so if you have beautiful 4C curls to take care of!
For more on taking care of hair gently, check out:
Take care!
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This Or That?
Vote on Which is Healthier
Yesterday we asked you to choose between beetroot and sweet potato—both very worthy options, but we picked the sweet potato (click here to read about why), as did 48% of you!
Now for today’s choice:
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Click on whichever you think is better for you!
Bonus (Sponsored) Recommendation
Birdie is a free lifestyle-and-wellness newsletter that goes out every few days, with life-improving thoughts, tips, and information. If you're open to small things that can uplift your daily life, this could be one for you—check it out here!
One-Minute Book Review
The Power of Self-Care: Transforming Heart Health with Lifestyle Medicine – by Dr. Sunil Kumar
First, what this book is mostly not about: bubble baths and scented candles. We say “mostly”, because stress management is an important aspect given worthy treatment in this book, but there is more emphasis on evidence-based interventions and thus Dr. Kumar is readier to prescribe nature walks and meditation, than product-based pampering sessions.
As is made clear in the subtitle, the focus is on heart health throughout, but as 10almonds readers know, “what’s good for your heart is good for your brain” is a truism that indeed holds true here too.
Dr. Kumar also gives nutritional tweaks to optimize heart health, and includes a selection of heart-healthy recipes, too. And exercise? Yes, customizable exercise plans, even. And a plan for getting sleep into order if perchance it has got a bit out of hand (most people get less sleep than necessary for maintenance of good health), and he even delves into “social prescribing”, that is to say, making sure that one’s social connectedness does not get neglected—without letting it, conversely, take over too much of one’s life (done badly, social connectedness can be a big source of unmanaged stress).
Perhaps the most value of this book comes from its 10-week self-care plan (again, with a focus on heart health), basically taking the reader by the hand for long enough that, after those 10 weeks, habits should be quite well-ingrained.
A strong idea throughout is that the things we take up should be sustainable, because well, a heart is for life, not just for a weekend retreat.
Bottom line: if you’d like to improve your heart health in a way that feels like self-care rather than an undue amount of work, then this is the book for you.
Penny For Your Thoughts?
What did you think of today's newsletter?We always love to hear from you, whether you leave us a comment or even just a click in the poll if you're speeding by! |
Wishing you a glowingly good health today and every day,
The 10almonds Team
