5 Easy Ways to Help Prevent Hair Breakage

Whether our dream hairstyle a chic and shaggy bob or to be as long as a proverbial Rapunzel, hair breakage, though it happens to everyone, is never a welcome thing. However, there are easy things to remember to do-- and to NOT do-- in order to keep our locks in tact.

Get More Regular Trims: This is one I have a particularly hard time convincing myself to do because it seems like when it is looking its fullest, longest, and prettiest is when I am do for a seasonal trim. In the long run, however, having your hair trimmed really does make it less apt to break. Trimming gets rid of the split ends and helps to reduce tangles and the breakage that inevitably follows. It also will signal the scalp to start growing more hair, and the fresher the hair is, the stronger, healthier, and more breakage-resistant it will be. How often your hair will need a trim ultimately depends on its length and growth rate. If you wear your hair longer, as counterintuitve as it may seem, it will need to be trimmed more often, as there will be more split ends. Finer-haired people may also need more frequent trimming as their growth rate tends to be faster. Overall, hair should be trimmed ideally every two to four months on average.

Never Brush Wet Hair: Unless you use a brush specifically designed to work through wet hair, brushing when wet is much to harsh. Hair is up to 70% weaker when it is wet and, likewise, much more prone to breakage, Instead, always use a comb, ideally one with widely-spaced teeth on wet hair to work conditioning products down through the ends or to just work out tangles before air drying or using the blow dryer. Also, those with wavy or curly hair types may strongly benefit by never using a brush and only using a comb when necessary regardless if the hair is wet or not. Curlier hair types have a much more fragile hair cuticle than straight-haired people and the hair is also much more likely to knot and break off.

Don't Dry Your Hair With a Towel: Rubbing the hair with the towel to mop it dry creates much more frizz and charges the hair with static, which, again, makes it more fragile. To towel dry your hair, simply wrap it up as gently as you can and let it dry on its own within the towel wrap. Better yet you can also mop and wrap your hair up in an old T-shirt, which has none of the fuzzy fibers of the towel. This way, your hair doesn't get caught between any fibers and break off.

Avoid Elastic Hair Ties: In a perfect world, perhaps we would all wear our hair down and loose 24/7, but for those of us (like myself) who enjoy an updo or need some way to pull our hair back for work, etc. make sure the hair ties you use have little to know elastic. Elastic hair bands pull the hair too tightly and really rip out the hair when you take it down. Instead, opt for the big 90s style scrunchies, or, my personal favorite, spiral hair ties to hold your hair up and in place but do so loosely.

Watch How You Carry Your Bag: Perhaps the strangest and least thought of cause for hair breakage is the purse strap. Think about it. If you wear your hair down and it falls to the same side on which you carry your bag and all the weight of the contents of your bag is pulling down on your hair, then your hair is under stress and strain every place you go and is going to be that much more likely to break off. To remedy this, you can try carrying your bag in your hand or just simply double-checking to make sure your hair isn't caught in your purse before you head out the door.

*** Bonus Tip: Perhaps the most critical step in haircare to preventing hair breakage is conditioning. Conditioner softens the hair and makes it more resistant to tangling, so less hair will end up in your brush when you try to style it. It is important, however, to make sure that you find the right kind of conditioner and method of conditioning for your hair type and texture. As for myself I have very fine hair that has a slight wave that is prone to dryness. My hair needs moisture but because the strands are so fine, conditioners that are too heavy for my hair can add too much weight to my hair and not only make it appear limp but also actually cause the strands to snap even more for the under the weight. This article from Instyle offers some great tips on discovering your natural type and what are the best products to look for to keep your hair (no matter what it is) beautiful, healthy, and strong.

Hair breakage is not something that can be totally avoided and is, in fact, part of the growth cycle of hair. Yet, these simple changes will do a lot to ensure that the breakage does not happen before its time, letting your hair live a long, strong, full, and beautiful life.