Thursday, May 2, 2024

How Hard Water Affects Hair & Products To Minimize The Damage

hard water hair

When you use soft water on your hair, you don’t have problems caused by mineral exposure and buildup. Using soft water on your hair can rinse the hard water minerals and leave your hair feeling smoother and looking shinier. Though the effects can depend on your hair type, hard water buildup usually leads to hair that’s flat, lifeless, greasy, and dry, along with a host of scalp issues. “Hard water can coat curly hair with a film of mineral buildup that leaves the hair feeling filmy, straw-like, and also stretches curls, causing them to go limp,” says de Leon. When washing your hair, be sure to notice how you apply your shampoo.

Add a Filter to Your Shower Head

hard water hair

Before you switch up your whole haircare routine, be sure to check what your hair type actually requires. “There’s no need to change your shampoo – stick to one formulated for your hair texture,” says Kingsley. The best thing you can do to address your hard water problem is to get an in-home water test from professionals that can test the level of hard minerals in your water. Testing your water regularly is essential, and Aqualite’s water experts can help you identify potential water problems and how to solve them.

Washing with Hard Water

While hard water doesn’t technically turn your hair gray, periods of rapid hair loss from the damage can cause those silver strands to emerge more quickly. If you’ve ever noticed spots on the dishes after you wash a load, then you have seen these minerals first hand. You might also notice a murky film on glass shower walls along with lower water pressure from the deposits building up in the pipes and shower heads.

hard water hair

Moroccanoil Clarifying Shampoo

Let’s discuss hair health and our approach to hard water hair treatments. When there's a buildup of minerals on the hair, it can lack shine and the ability to retain moisture, causing the hair's natural luster to fade. Hard water can also cause your color and highlights to fade fast and turn brassy. Split ends are also problematic since the hair's protective outer layer starts to slowly break down, causing the hair to split and break. And the scalp can feel tight or itchy due to the residue left behind. There's also a connection between excessive exposure to hard water and hair thinning.

Oils can also help to protect against heat and minimise flyaways, so they’re worth adding to your haircare routine even if you’re not directly looking to fight against frizziness. However, if you have experienced any of these symptoms in your hair and skin, there are several steps you can take to combat the damage and improve your hair and skin health. Other ways to repair the damage that hard water has caused your hair include the following options.

Hair Masks

"It contains numerous natural cleansing agents to remove toxins and impurities like citric acid and sodium cocoyl glycinate to deep clean while also protecting the scalps natural barrier," says Lee. Plus, it works with all hair types, so everyone can get in on the benefits. The slightly acidic pH of apple cider vinegar makes it a great chelating agent—this means it breaks the bond between your locks and minerals found in hard water—that grabs ahold of metal ions in hair. This shampoo from Aveeno captures the power of ACV using a natural formula that's made with colloidal oatmeal extract.

It’s also a vegan-friendly option and doesn’t include any parabens or sulfates. Instead of using EDTA, it contains apple fruit extract, aloe vera leaf juice, and tamanu seed oil for nourishment, strength, and cleanliness. It’s often said that once you go natural, water should no longer be avoided like the plague. While the premise of that statement is ultimately true, there are a few things about water that you should be concerned about even after you go natural. A strength tester was then used in order to determine how tensile and elastic each hair strand was after its corresponding treatment.

Dry, Brittle Hair

But perhaps most annoying was that I didn’t even realize what was happening at first. Hard water isn’t necessarily an overnight evil—it can take weeks or months of quietly messing with your hair before you’re one day left with more breakage than a month’s worth of blow-drying without heat protectant. So to save you from the same potential hair hell I went through, I chatted with an expert and broke down exactly what hard water does to your hair, how to identify it, and, most importantly, how the hell to fix it fast. Additionally, there are also chelating shampoos, which include compounds that are meant to break the bond between your locks and minerals found in hard water.

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In this article, I want to give you the BEST tips on how to naturally remove hard water from hair. Be sure not to use hot water when washing your hair to avoid stripping the sebum from your scalp. Wash your hair with lukewarm water, and after conditioning, be sure to do a finishing rinse with cold water to close (or smooth) the cuticle. Various forms of EDTA provide a high pH level that will get rid of mineral buildup and impurities in the hair.

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The best way to do this is by installing a water softening system or a soft water shower filter. In the short term, you can look after your hair with leave-in conditioner products and wash your hair carefully to avoid further damage. Make sure you buy a shower filter that offers proven water softening benefits. Most shower filters are only designed to remove chlorine, which is great, since chlorine is another cause of dry, dull hair.

Additionally, in a study with 70 guys, they discovered that when their hair encountered hard water instead of deionized water, it lost its strength. And you know what happens when hair is weak and prone to breakage? Kenneth Byrd, with a BS in Accounting and Management Information Systems and an MBA from the University of Alabama at Birmingham, has over 15 years of experience and is a recognized authority in hair care.

Hard water characteristically has high levels of calcium and magnesium, which can really have negative impacts on your hair – leaving your hair feeling dull and lifeless. I spent most of my life believing my hair was a dry, tangled, and brittle mess, only to move away from home and realize that it wasn't my hair—it was the water. Hard water can result in less-than-favorable results on the hair front, but can it also lead to hair loss? Utilizing special hair treatments or adding a showerhead filter are the fastest methods.

Water with high mineral content affects shampoo by reducing its lathering abilities. Because hard water contains calcium and magnesium ions, when mixing shampoo with hard water, it forms insoluble salts that cannot be rinsed off the hair. These insoluble salts build up on the hair after multiple shampoos. The more often you shampoo, the more buildup occurs and the harder they are to rinse away. Some shower filters are also designed to remove hardness minerals from water.

Ahead, learn everything you need to know about managing hard water and hair health. So if you have low-porosity hair to begin with, you’ll notice more issues with regular hard water use. Imagine the scaly buildup you see on your faucet encasing each strand of your hair.

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How Hard Water Affects Hair & Products To Minimize The Damage

Table Of Content Add a Filter to Your Shower Head Washing with Hard Water Moroccanoil Clarifying Shampoo Best Shampoos For Hard Water, Teste...