Does washing your hair make it less greasy?

You might have heard that washing your hair too often can strip the hair off its natural oil. This causes it to produce more oil. This is not possible because sebum secretion is a natural process.

Now by ‘natural oils’ we mean sebum. Sebum is the only natural oil produced in our body and they protect the skin. It is also important to remove excess sebum from your scalp, as sebum can trap a lot of dirt and dust. All of this can lead to an unhealthy scalp.

So does washing your hair make it less greasy. The answer is no. This is because the sebaceous glands function to secrete sebum continuously onto the scalp and the skin cannot detect the amount of oil it has on it.

Everyone produces sebum in their skin, but the amount of sebum they produce depends on the age, gender, hormones, and genetics.

People who have oily scalp with a high secretion rate should wash their hair more often.

It’s often said that you shouldn’t shampoo the lengths (not near the root) of the hair too often. Why is that?

Here it’s saying the length of the hair and not hair scalp. The hair is partially coated with sebum and also contains fats that form a barrier around the hair. This helps to prevent penetration of foreign objects and prevention of moisture. When we shampoo our hair, the sebum present in our hair will be washed away and will replenish, but the fats or internal lipids, which are not made from sebum can be removed from the hair during repeated washing with strong shampoos. This will leave the inter-cellular region more susceptible to breakage.

How to avoid this?

You can wash your hair using a mild shampoo and focus on washing the hair near the scalp and not the ends. You can also apply a bit of oil at the ends to prevent damage.