That evening I shown this post about how people took care of long hair before the invention of modern hair care products and techniques. It was an interesting read, especially since my hair is now down my back to the bottom of my shoulder blades.
One of the links at the bottom of that post was the Long Hair Community, which was just the type of thing my fatigued brain was looking for. I read some of those articles for an hour or so. Later, my wife recommended the Beauty Brains website as well.
I quickly realized that women "geeking out" about long hair was as much a specialized form of communication as scientists or computer gamers "geeking out" about their topics, in both abbreviations, jargon, and habits of speech. The most humorous example was how it took me a moment to realize that CO meant "conditioner only" instead of "carbon monixide".
A lot of what I read I did not understand well, which I attribute mostly to the specialized language, but also ascribe some guilt to the exhaustion induced by the allergy shots.
I did get a few ideas to try. None of these will be surprising to most people with long hair. But I'm just a guy whose wife wanted him to grow his hair out, and no one ever taught me these things.
- A wooden comb is nice for long hair. Unlike a brush with plastic bristles, it does not collect hair and that grey lint stuff. Since it is wooden it has no seams, and thus does not snag.
- I was shampooing and conditioning my hair most mornings. This is not necessary. These days, conditioners are almost as good at removing gunk as shampoo. Now I am trying shampoo once or twice per week to get rid of oil and grease, and the other days using conditioner in the manner of shampoo. I shed a lot less hair in the shower this way.
- From what I read, wet hair is more fragile than dry hair. I should minimize brushing/combing my hair after my shower, doing my thorough brushing/combing before. I'm willing to try this, but cannot tell any difference over the past few days.
