Feb 20, 2014

The Hair Chronicles: No Shampoo Dandruff Treatment

For those of you who don't know, I don't shampoo my hair ever. If you want you can catch up here if you wish.

I said a little while ago that I was going to start trying out some natural hair treatments. The first thing I wanted to try was something to fix my dandruff. I don't normally have dandruff but the baking soda seems to by drying out my scalp a bit. The first hair treatment I read about was using tea tree oil as a dandruff treatment, so I tried it about 2 weeks ago. I waited until now to see if the results would last.

I think I am reusing images but I'm lazy. This is the tea tree oil I used. It is a brand called Hollista and I just bought it at my local drug store.

To use it, I washed my hair first with the baking soda and then used my apple cider vinegar as a conditioner. Then I shook a few drops of tea tree oil into my hands and started rubbing it into my scalp, trying to avoid my hair as much as possible. I had to do this about 4 times to get it everywhere on my scalp. After I had it rubbed all over my scalp I sort of massaged my head for about a minute, still trying not to rub much into my hair, but that was hard. Then I let it sit for another minute and rinsed it out. You have to do this step at the end so that you don't wash out all the oil.

When my hair was all dry I noticed a few things. The first thing I noticed was that I definitely smelled like tea tree oil. Like a lot. I don't really mind smelling like a crazy strong herbal scent, but some people might. This smell hung around for about 2 days, which is kind of long to me. The next thing was that my hair did look a bit greasy very close to the scalp. I had just put oil into it without washing it out, so I kind of expected that. This just meant that I left my hair up until my next shower, which I don't mind.

The final thing I noticed was that my dandruff was gone! It had really worked! It has been 2 weeks since I did this and my scalp is still dandruff free, but I have a feeling I will need to do this again soon. Anyone who suffers from more severe dandruff might need to do this slightly more often than me.

I am really excited about how well this worked! My biggest issue was the scent. I didn't mind it much but whenever I went anywhere I worried that I stank to everyone else. If I have to put up with that for 2 days, I don't really mind if it means flake free hair!

What do you think, would you try this?

10 comments:

  1. Oooh. This is great to know in case I ever have dandruff.

    And I definitely know what you're talking about with the scent. Sometimes I use it as a spot treatment and my entire face smells like tea tree oil. I have to apologize to my housemates when I enter the living room.

    Tea tree oil is great though.

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    1. I'm going to have to try it as a spot treatment next

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  2. Hey Kat, good for you! I shampoo but I don't use sulfates and I am sure I don't have to tell you why! I stopped about 2 yrs ago and never looked back. I do shampoo with either a sulfate free moisturizing shampoo or I clean with a cleansing conditioner. I focus more on adding moisture and deep conditioning. My hair is so weird, when I wear it naturally curly it tends to get dry and on the rare occasions I flat iron it gets oily when straight.

    -Erica

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    1. Well that's weird. Your hair is so gorgeous though. You have such perfect, even curls that don't look out of control or anything.

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  3. It's awesome that it worked! I'm planning to go 'poo-free when my jumbo bottle of Pantene FINALLY runs out. I'll keep this in mind in case I have problems. I actually really like the smell of tea tree oil :)

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    1. No 'poo was the best decision I ever made! I had to wait until my giant herbal essence bottle ran out too lol.

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  4. I have never heard of using tea tree oil as a dandruff treatment but it sounds like such a great idea and I'm so glad it worked for you! Will be trying it out too- thanks for sharing dear! xx

    Beautee Beauty

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  5. I'm so glad you posted this, Kat. My friend loves natural hair cleansers, so I showed this to her and she loved it! Thanks for the great post, xoxo
    CanvasOfAFace

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