i read most of the post here.. seems a LOT of folks complain that their hair isn't dreading fast enough or tight enough. i didn't wash my hair for at least a month.. it was very tight... not many little loose hairs and dreading quite quickly, but i washed it twice in the past four days.. i've nocited tons of loose hairs and my dreads even seem looser. maybe thats everyone elses "problem" you all are obsessed with trying to stay "clean". i don't think dreads need to be washed every 2 to 3 days. i know that people that have really long dreads have to "plan" when they wash them. i doubt that they are planning this every 2 or 3 days. i'm going to wait 2 weeks before washing mine again. by washing i mean soaping up and rubbing and squeezing the water out of my dreads. i do not palm roll them.. i don't backcomb... seems washing them frequently will make them dread slower. i could be wrong, i'll like some feed back on my "theory" of not washing them so often.
well i used to worry about that, but i realized all my loose-ageness (great word) was just cause i kind of trained m hairs to stay in/on the dread, even if it wastn knotted, so the hair that was just laying there got weighed down by the water and made it look loose, but i dont think people should have too many problems using natural soaps/shampoos, they should remove all oils from the hair, which is good. i think washing too much would be like two washes a day, which would take most oils out of the hair most of the time, but then the production increases, so a reduction in washings would cause more oils... ...i dont even know if iom making sense, just kind of typing here, but yeah it could be helpful
yeah.. i guess it would depend on what type of hair.. and how oily/dry ones scalp is. i noticed all the loose bits after it was dry. :H i use dr. bonners.. so my hair isn't being striped of natural oils. i'll have to investigate this more.
um idk about you but those of us that work, washing once a month is not an option. Come home after rocking a wall for 12 hours and tell me you dont want to shower
i think you may be on to something. i dunno, with my first set of dreads i hardly ever had to wash them but now my hair gets greasier faster. i think its just cause its shorter now. i used to have quite long dreads and they must have soaked up all my hair oil lol. they were also alot tighter from the beginning. my dreads (or lack thereof) are really loose and shitty now. i think many people wash their dreads (or undreaded hair for that matter) too often. im certainly not obsessed with staying "clean" like so many people lol but i do need to wash my hair every week now or its just too icky. come summer, when i can go swimming, i will probably never wash it
i agree with wanderin_blues once a week is good unless u done sometime real dirty n have to wash them. i wash them once a week to me seems enough and feels nice wen u leave unwashed n wash them.. hmmm... but if im involve in a very dust environment or smelly.. i gotta wash them there.
I dunno... I have to disagree. I wash every 4 days. My hair gets greasy and you can just tell that it hasn't been washed if I wait any longer (I also wash pretty vigourously because my scalp gets acne ) . I seem to notice that the day after I wash them is the day they look their best. If I wait too long it seems like they fall out more because my hair is slicked up. My locks are almost 3.5 months old. my $0.02...
I think a lot just depends on finding what works and sticking to it. Your scalp will react, produce oils, etc. after washing. So it starts to feel oily x number of days after you've washed, but if you're washing too often, that number will be smaller - make sense? I say, if you're not worried about external dirtiness that much (as dayusex is) but just an oily scalp, once a week should be plenty. The trick is just to switch it up and wait long enough for your head to adjust. Don't know if any of that made sense, but there it is. Personally, I'm in the "have to plan ahead" grouping. My hair takes a full day to (mostly) dry, and a couple of days before it is reallly dry. In the wintertime, at least. So during the winter I do plan ahead for it by a couple days at least. I usually just go until I feel like I need it, which is usually every 2-4 weeks when it's cold out. In the summer/warm months it easier. I spend a lot more time rolling around the forest floor, working in the yard, etc. and getting myself generally dirty. But under the heat of the summer sun I can get dry in a few hours. Still, I only wash when I feel it's needed, but I don't plan ahead nearly as much and I end up doing it more like every 1-2 weeks. I'm very happy right now that this time of year is just around the corner (that forest floor must be calling to me!)
Hi my hair is quite grey, so if I dont wash it at least once a week it looks dirty. But if you're not grey, I personally wouldnt wash that often.
Bingo! I had to wash mine quite frequently to get it to dread because I had too much oil. Now I'm starting to space it out a bit more because of drying issues.....
ya think its better to use certain shampoos like Dr. Bronner's Magic Soap rather than Panteen or whatever? I have started using Bronners and it works better actually. to me anyway.
ok this is probably a stupid question but what do you meen by “wash”. do you meen like showering without using soap or shampoo. or do you meen not showering period?
I think she just means hair washing. I only wash my hair when my scalp starts to itch, about every 6ish days.
washing.. yeah.. cleaning your hair, by whatever method you use. it seems to loosen up my dreads a LOT.
hmm.........i'm quite sure I could soak my locks in conditioner now for an hour and it would have no effect......just goes to show how much hair can differ from one individual to another.
my dreads are still "new" only stopped brushing my hair in september.. maybe thats why. i have fairly straight hair too.
I have to wash every other day or every 2 days since my scalp gets pretty oily. My hair's knottin up fine though, I actually don't even worry about it. I think folk stress about it knottin up FAST rather than just lettin it happen. Just do what works for you. I do know that realistically I'll have to wash less in a year or two (because of drying issues). It now takes about 8-10 hours to dry (so I wash in the evening and it's dry by morning). The sections that have already dreaded up tight barely get greasy at all... it's just the loose hair sections. So I figure when it's time to wash less I'll need to wash less and it'll all work out in the end
dudenamedrob has a point, when my dreads were about a month old i cut one off and filled a bag with water and conditioner, i put the cut dread in there and shook it up for a minute or two when i showered, i did this every day for about a month or two, and not a hair was out of place, and yea just find something that works for you and stick with it
