No-Poos?? Anybody tried this?

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Hmmm, seems like it could have it's drawbacks, but then again, I try not to rush to judgement without trying it. I'm actually working on a cleansing conditioner product, but never even thought about a dry product. :)
 
That doesn't sound like a bad prodict but not for everyday use. All the dry shampoos I've tried were really icky feeling but I do occasionally use talc, seems these would be better.
I don't know if I'd want coco powder in my hair though There has to be a better option for dark hair.
 
Dry shampoo has been around a long time. My mom was a hairdress for a zillion years and use to visit clients and family members in the hospital and used dry shampoo when they weren't able to shower as often as they wanted to. She actually just used it herself when she was in the hospital for 2 weeks. But was not allowed to get up and shower for 1 of them. It's great for short term use but I wouldn't use it frequently.
 
Dry shampoos have been around for many decades, maybe hundreds of years, usually made of clays, starches and other powders. I used them back in the late 60's when the leather brace for my fractured neck didn't allow showers. Shake the powder on, massage it in, then brush brush brush it out. But back then, hair was easier to clean with dry poos because shampoos were mostly soap-based anyway, with a lemon or vinegar rinse.

Nowadays, shampoos and conditioners have a lot of silicones and other chemicals designed to stick to your hair, so powder poos may not work as well. I've gone no-poo for 5-6 years and my hair is better for it... I just rinse with water, maybe a little damp baking soda if it's extra-dirty for some reason, then rinse with diluted white vinegar or lemon juice. My very fine hair has a lot more body this way.

It does take a while for your hair to recover from all the commercial products, though.
 
I've been wanting to try the "no poo" method for a while now, and have just never got around to it. But the method I'm considering is not a dry shampoo, it's what sagehill mentioned. I saved these instructions from somewhere online.
"Here's how it goes: Take one tablespoon of baking soda to 1cup of warm water (240ml) and dissolve.
This recipe can be tweaked to suit your needs..sometimes I use a little more bs, sometimes a lil' less. Go figure.
You'll need a squeeze bottle of some sort or just save an empty shampoo bottle which allows you to use this mix more readily. Also combine two to three teaspoons of lemon juice or apple cider vinegar to one cup of water and fill that into another bottle. Wet hair, work your baking soda mix into your scalp, rinse. As you rinse it out, it'll also wash the rest of your hair clean. Follow with lemon (or) apple cider vinegar rinse and work through hair. Rinse again. That's all."

And yes, I've read that it takes some time for your hair to get accustomed to this method, and that it can feel weird for a while, but many people seem to love the way it makes their hair feel. I'm intrigued. And I like the idea better than dry shampoo. Sagehill, I also remember the dry shampoo of the 60s. And we used to use baby powder too, if I remember correctly. I didn't like the feeling of the residue that was left afterwards. So I think the wet no poo method may be the one for me, too.
 
This is certainly interesting and gives me a thought to try to reverse engineer a dry shampoo that I actually like for:

1. freshening my thin hair right after work if I have something to do
2. fixing my heavy handedness with oily products when I'm under time constraints
3. making me feel less icky for a long drive home/dinner out after being outdoorsy all day

So far the only commercial product I like is http://www.amazon.com/dp/B002GKMSNO/?tag=skimlinks_replacement-20 It is a bit spendy though a bottle lasts over a year for me. I just turn my head upside down, floof it into my long hair, wait a minute and brush it out.

I don't think the no-poo at all thing could work for me, I dye my hair and it is way too thin to go without washing. Plus, i like washing my hair. Who doesn't like to wash their hair?
 
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I would be interested in giving it a go, if it weren't for the fancy-pants powders. Would 1/4 cup Baking soda and 1 cup cornstarch with 20 drops of EO be a very basic, no-frills option?

I wouldn't put baking soda on your scalp. Hair does not like alkaline. I have found arrowroot, rice, kaolin even tapioca to be better than corn starch. I conditioner wash and i only wash my hair once a week. I use dry shampoo once maybe twice a week. I love dry shampoo i used to use some nasty stuff but i make my own now.
 
I wouldn't put baking soda on your scalp. Hair does not like alkaline. I have found arrowroot, rice, kaolin even tapioca to be better than corn starch. I conditioner wash and i only wash my hair once a week. I use dry shampoo once maybe twice a week. I love dry shampoo i used to use some nasty stuff but i make my own now.

Thanks for the "heads" up! (couldn't resist it)

So the second recipe on that link is not a good one?
 
I wouldn't use it. I don't know if it is bad but I don't know why bs is in it. For odor control? If your hair smells it should be washed. When I use dry shampoo i sprinkle it on my roots, leave it and then rub it in. Baking soda is probably going to be abrasive to the scalp. YMMV.
 
I hope you didn't think I was being snarky or anything with the last question - I am genuinely interested to get to the roots of this.

So can I ask what you would look at? Just arrowroot alone or clay alone, or is a mix best?
 
No no, not at all. I just didn't want to seem as though I was calling someone else's work bad. Especially when I haven't tried it. I don't think clay would be great on it's own. Arrowroot alone will work fine though. I use clay at no more than 25% any more than that I have found it absorbs too much and ends up looking cakey. There are alot of great recipes on line this is the one I tried first: http://wellnessmama.com/5047/dry-shampoo/
 
I don't really like the idea of using baking soda either, its alkaline and abrasive. Since I use CP shampoo bars, I don't need any extra alkaline on my hair.

I'm going to try making this some time but I'll use mostly arrowroot and maybe a bit of ground rosemary or other nice smelling herb that has some astringent properties.
 
"...Take one tablespoon of baking soda to 1 cup of warm water (240ml) and dissolve...."

The methods that use baking soda in water may saponify some of the fats in the hair, thus making a type of soap. That might be why this method works better than one would think at first glance, especially if you have oily skin/hair.

If your skin is at all sensitive, I'd not skip that acidic rinse, however. I've found that my scalp can sometimes be very itchy if I don't do an acid rinse after shampooing with soap. Same would be true with baking soda, since it is also alkaline. (Ditto for heavily chlorinated pools -- I use an acid rinse after swimming too.)

I would be leery of a dry shampoo with baking soda, since you cannot completely remove the soda from the hair. The lingering alkaline contamination could be troublesome -- much like the homemade "natural" deodorants with baking soda that cause major skin irritation. Some people are more sensitive to it than others, so YMMV on this....
 
My daughter tried the whole baking soda to wash with followed with a acid rinse, I've never seen her hair look so gross. Even after a few weeks, it didn't get better. She doesn't have oily skin but it looked like she had rubbed oil through her hair. Its also stank, a lot. Great that it works for some people but I'll stick with my natural CP shampoo.
 
Dry shampoo has been around a long time. My mom was a hairdress for a zillion years and use to visit clients and family members in the hospital and used dry shampoo when they weren't able to shower as often as they wanted to. She actually just used it herself when she was in the hospital for 2 weeks. But was not allowed to get up and shower for 1 of them. It's great for short term use but I wouldn't use it frequently.
Ask your mom if she remembered using Vapon? It is still used as a wig cleaner but in the sixties it was used as a dry shampoo for the hair. Was not put on the scalp. Vapon is a type of dry cleaning fluid. After State Board decided Vapon could not be used on hair only wigs cornmeal became popular for absorbing the oil. One must keep in mind this method does not properly clean the scalp.
 
I love batiste dry shampoo, works great on my fine hair. It's basically rice starch in an aerosol can that you spray in and brush out.

With the no poo baking soda thing, I think if you use a commercial shampoo/conditioner with waxes silicones you would need to wash out all the residue from your hair before you started with the baking soda regime or you would suffer 'funky hair syndrome' the same thing people suffer when they start using shampoo bars.
 
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