Let me first start off by saying that this wasn’t something that I was exactly thrilled to do. I didn’t wake up one day and think, “you know what I’m going to do today… I’m going to stop washing my hair.” As a matter of fact, I have friends who only wash their hair once a week and I think they’re completely ridiculous. However, I am a strong believer in the old saying “don’t knock it until you’ve tried it”. So here we are.
The real reason that I wanted to try this “challenge” is because my hair grows SO slowly. And it just so happens that I had been watching YouTube videos on how to make your hair grow and one of my friends recommended a video of these two twins who are actual HAIR GOALS. They both have crazy long hair (think mermaid hair) and they had just posted a video explaining their “secret” to their long hair. Obviously I watched the entire 17 minute video and the one thing that they mentioned is that they only wash their hair once a week, sometimes twice a week. And since we are in quarantine after all, I decided that I was going to give it a try.
NIGHT BEFORE: SUNDAY
In preparation for my week of no shampoo and conditioner, I took an extra long shower on Sunday. I washed my hair using Neutrogena’s anti-residue formula shampoo and then carried on with my regular shower routine (shampoo + conditioner).
Had I’d been doing this on a regular week of no quarantine, I probably would have followed with some more products post-shower in order to try to tame my mane for the week to come but since I wasn’t planning on seeing anyone except for my roommate, I left my hair au natural.
DAY ONE: MONDAY
First day of this challenge and my hair looked ok. I didn’t style it because I didn’t want to use any hot tools so it was a little blah looking but it wasn’t greasy… yet.
DAY TWO: TUESDAY
Normally by day two, my hair is already oily. This is one of my biggest hair concerns because my hair is so thin, it tends to get ridiculously oily which is one of the reasons that I was scared to try this in the first place. Well, no surprise here, my hair was oily so I added a little bit of dry shampoo. Not too much because after all, I was trying to keep my hair in its most natural form for this experiment.
I kept my hair up all day just because I couldn’t stand how lifeless my hair looked and to be fair, I like having my hair up.
DAY THREE: WEDNESDAY
By day three, I usually wash my hair because I can’t stand how oily it looks and feels. I didn’t want to use any more dry shampoo because I had already used some the day before and I didn’t want any product build up considering I wasn’t washing my hair for another four days.
So instead of using products, I jumped in the shower and got my hair wet. No, I didn’t use any shampoo or conditioner but I felt the water might make it look better (ish). It didn’t. Water and oil really don’t mix.
I kept my hair up again because the oil on my scalp was so visible, I was afraid to let it down and scare my poor roommate. I’ve never been so happy to be in quarantine.
DAY FOUR: THURSDAY
If you had seen my hair on Wednesday, you might’ve ran away. The oil on my hair was so visible you could spot it from a mile away. It literally looked like my hair was wet. At one point, my roommate asked me if I had just taken a shower because he noticed how “wet” my hair looked. You should’ve seen the look on his face when I told him that was my natural “oil”.
My hair had zero volume but I wasn’t too concerned because I was hiding in my apartment binge watching Real Housewives of Beverly Hills and I had already scared my roommate, how much worse could it possibly get?
P.s. throughout this entire week I continued to brush my hair. This was apparently VERY important according to the Finn twins since it helps distribute your natural hair oils to the ends of your hair.
DAY FIVE: FRIDAY
I spoke too soon. It got much, much worse.
Remember when the whole “slicked back” hair was a thing? Like… an actual trend? It probably took multiple bottles of hairspray to achieve those red carpet looks. Well, I didn’t need any hairspray because MY HAIR WAS SO OILY IT WAS NATURALLY SLICKED BACK.
I kept my hair up for the remainder of the week.
DAY SIX: SATURDAY
On day six, I was seriously contemplating saying “SCREW THIS” and jumping in the shower and dumping an entire bottle of shampoo on my head. Luckily, I came to my senses and after a 5 minute melt-down, I decided to push through.
It’s worth mentioning that by Saturday, my hair started getting itchy. I’m not sure if this is just coincidence or not but let’s just say, I don’t usually have an itchy scalp. I also noticed that I was starting to get dandruff… my scalp felt dry which I found SO weird considering my hair was so oily.
DAY SEVEN: SUNDAY
I woke up that Sunday morning and immediately jumped in the shower. But not befoe observing the current state of my hair which was kind of hard to look at it. It was DRENCHED in oil. It legit looked like someone had rubbed butter all over my hair as a sick joke. To be honest, I’ve never been more excited to take a shower in my life.
Right after my shower, I let my hair air dry because I truly wanted to inspect it and see if I noticed any changes in my hair. I mean, I had just gone through a full week of not washing my hair. This had to have been worth it…
THE RESULTS
So you know how they say that if you have oily hair, you have to just push through and not wash it as often because washing it actually does more harm than good? How you’re supposed to just leave it greasy and that eventually it’ll get to a point where it’s no longer greasy? Well, that didn’t happen this week.
In fact, my hair just kept getting greasier and greasier. My scalp was itchy, I developed dandruff which I’ve never really had and it was just really hard to look at myself in the mirror whenever I let my hair down.
However, I will say, it wasn’t THAT hard of a challenge. Despite how horrible my hair looked when it was down, I was kind of digging the fact that I didn’t need any hairspray to keep my hair up whenever it was in a ponytail because the natural oils were already keeping everything in place. Am I gross? Probably.
I did notice that my hair was a little bit longer, or at least it seemed longer. I don’t know if this was some sort of placebo effect, the fact that I wanted this challenge to desperately work, but I did feel like my hair was a little longer.
Overall, is this something that I would do weekly? Probably not. But I do think that there is something to be said for not washing your hair every single day. For example, since I didn’t wash my hair that week, I didn’t really style it except for putting my hair up which means that I used very little products and zero heated tools. Long term, I think this would really benefit your hair. As for the dandruff.. I’m not sure what was going on there.
Would I recommend you try this out? Honestly, you do you. I think you should always try something for yourself to see if it works for you. We’re all different, we all have different types of hair. As for me, I’m going to try to limit my hair washes to twice a week which is two days less than what I’m used to but only washing my hair once a week… let alone once every two weeks… yeah, not for me.
Check out the IGTV coverage of this here.
No products in the cart.