The Hair

DRY HAIR

If you have dry hair, you probably also have to deal with a dry scalp, split ends and unmanageable hair. You may also have dandruff. Exposure to sun?whether from sailing, skiing or a day at the beach?can also dry out your hair and scalp: Protect them by wearing a hat or scarf. All hair, but especially dry hair, is fragile when wet, so wait to brush it until after it is dry. Hair can stretch to nearly double its length when it is wet, and this can be very damaging.

To understand how best to care for dry hair, it helps to know how hair is constructed. Each hair on your head has an outer layer that holds in moisture and protects the hair shaft. This outer layer is made of transparent, overlapping fibers like shingles on a roof. When these shingles are tight, they give hair a smooth, shiny appearance that reflects light. Chlorine, permanents, hair dye, blow drying, excessive sun exposure and alkaline shampoos all take their toll on dry hair because they strip away the natural oils and lift the shingles, causing a frizzy, flyaway look.

Unfortunately, most shampoos dry out hair and turn it alkaline. If you have dry hair, you should use a mild shampoo containing fatty acids, protein, balsams and moisturizers, and use only as much as needed to get your hair clean. All sorts of protein-rich ingredients, such as milk and egg yolk, have been used to condition dry hair and are still used in modern conditioners. Look for conditioners that contain comfrey?this high-protein herb will help your dry hair. Because hair is made up of dead cells, protein cannot directly feed it, but it can temporarily glue down the outer layer. This not only protects hair, but also helps hair reflect light for a look that is smooth and shiny instead of dull and dry. Hair will also seem thicker, at least until the protein coat wears off.

Herbs that combat dry hair include burdock, calendula, chamomile, rose geranium, lavender, rose, rosemary, cedarwood and sandalwood. These herbs not only encourage healthy hair, but also smell great! But no matter how good your herbal shampoo may smell, it does little for your hair in the brief time it remains in place. To really help your hair, turn to herbal conditioners?and leave them on for a few minutes before rinsing. For dry, wispy ends, put a drop or two of sandalwood or rosemary essential oil on your fingers and gently rub it in.

A hot oil treatment smoothes down the hair shaft to give damaged hair some shine, although it cannot always restore hair's flexibility and bounce. Hot oil also helps treat a dry hair and scalp. The treatment, although simple to prepare, can be a little messy to apply. However, it is usually worth the effort.

Mary's story serves as a good example. Her hair was anything but a crowning glory?it was dry and wispy, and seemed to have a mind of its own when she tried to style it. She took to wearing hats because it was easier than dealing with dry, unmanageable hair. Mary does look good in hats, but it was not a solution to her problem. It took herbs to provide that.

She began with an herbal conditioner and a weekly hot oil treatment, but then became so involved in her work she had little time to think about her hair. Two weeks later, she finished a major project and decided to go out and celebrate. Just before she put on her hat, she paused to look in the mirror. She was amazed?her hair no longer fell in thin streams exposing her scalp, and it actually had some body. She was so encouraged by how well the herbs had worked that she asked me if I knew of anything else that might help.

I told Mary that she should also look to her diet to make sure she was getting enough essential fatty acids. If your diet alone is not providing these, one way to supplement it is to take evening primrose oil or some other oil that contains GLA, such as flaxseed oil. Mary thought that her diet was fine, but she tried a GLA supplement anyway. Since diet and supplements affect only new hair at the roots, it took a few months before she noticed that her hair was growing in with more shine and body. Not only that, she was certain that it was growing faster than usual.

Another thing you can do to improve dry hair is to drink a tea made with equal parts oat straw, nettle and horsetail (or take these herbs as a tincture or as pills). These herbs are high in silica and other minerals that are important for hair growth.

Sulfur is also important for producing thick hair. It binds with the protein in the hair, making it stronger and more flexible. You can get sulfur in your diet by incorporating garlic, onions and members of the cabbage family and also by dining on nasturtiums, which you can add to your salad. The French recommend nasturtiums for all sorts of problems that result from having dry hair, and even claim that it prevents premature balding. They also add this flower to hair rinses. As an old country cure for brittle hair, they rub raw onion juice on their hair roots before shampooing!

Dandruff can be a problem with either a dry or an oily scalp, but these dry flakes are most common if you have a dry scalp and dry hair. If dandruff is a problem, use a conditioner that contains burdock and sage. In Asian countries, ginger root is used to stop flakiness and is even said to keep hair from falling out.

Herbal Conditioner for Dry Hair

1 pint boiling water

1 teaspoon each burdock root, calendula flowers, chamomile flowers, lavender flowers and rosemary leaves

1 tablespoon vinegar

Pour boiling water over herbs and steep for about 30 minutes. Strain and add vinegar. Pour over scalp and hair as final rinse after shampooing. Leave on without rinsing out. For dandruff, add 6 drops sage essential oil; shake well before using.

Oil Treatment for Dry Hair

2 ounces aloe vera gel

2 ounces castor oil

6 drops each rose geranium cedar (or sandalwood) and rosemary essential oils

2 drops ginger essential oil (optional)

Combine ingredients. Warm oil slightly. Comb and part hair into different sections, then massage oil into scalp. Cover head with a towel and leave it on for 1 to 2 hours, then shampoo out. Although I use castor oil because it is partially water-soluble and washes out of the hair better, other vegetable oils can also be used?the Italians have long used olive oil for hot oil treatments. In India, hot oil hair treatments are done with sesame oil, the oil of choice in traditional Indian Ayurvedic medicine, and freshly grated ginger. An easy way to add ginger to hot oil is as an essential oil. I like to use Tibetan cedarwood oil for the cedar essential oil.

OILY HAIR

As is true with skin, having too much oil on your hair can be a problem. A little oil makes hair shiny because it smoothes out hair shafts by filling in minute abrasions. But too much oil makes your hair dull and lifeless?because the oil makes the hair heavy and causes it to attract more dirt, which can eventually lead to dandruff. Brushing and scalp massage stimulate circulation and hair growth and help to distribute the oils.

Cedarwood, cypress, lemon, lemongrass, sage and patchouli discourage excess oil production by the scalp. You can add a drop of one of these essential oils into a small amount of shampoo, al-though you should first make sure that you like the fragrance! A vinegar hair rinse discourages dandruff and rinses excess oil off your hair. It also cuts soap and shampoo residues, leaving hair shiny, smooth and soft. Don't worry about smelling like pickles afterward; vinegar's odor quickly dissipates. A rinse of sage tea also helps to reduce dandruff and excess oil.

If you have oily hair, be sure to use a mild shampoo?the harsh detergents found in many shampoos dry hair too much, encouraging the scalp to manufacture even more oil. A good shampoo cleans your hair without stripping away natural oil or irritating your eyes. Avoid protein and balsam shampoos, which tend to increase oiliness, make hair heavy and attract dirt. Baby shampoos, which are generally made from olive or soy oil, are the mildest and are usually pH balanced. If they are not pH balanced, make them more acidic by adding a teaspoon of vinegar per cup of shampoo.

Many natural cosmetics books give recipes for making shampoos with herb teas and castile soap flakes, but I find castile too alkaline, and it leaves my hair stiff and dull. I prefer using a gentle, nondetergent, unscented shampoo as a base, then adding my favorite herbal ingredients.

Herbal Shampoo

2 ounces unscented shampoo (available at any drugstore)

10 drops lavender essential oil

2 drops chamomile essential oil (optional)

Combine ingredients and shake well before shampooing.

Herbal Rinse for Oily Hair

1 pint boiling water

1 teaspoon each burdock root, calendula flowers, chamomile flowers, lavender flowers, lemongrass and sage leaves

1?4 cup vinegar

Pour boiling water over herbs and steep for about 30 minutes. Strain and add vinegar. Pour over scalp and hair as final rinse after shampooing. Leave on without rinsing out.

BEAUTIFYING HAIR

One old-fashioned, natural way to give your hair extra body is to use a setting lotion. Sixteenth- and seventeenth-century herbals boast of rosemary's ability to keep hair curly. Other traditional favorites were lotions made with quince, flaxseed, gelatin, agar, Irish moss or lemon. All of these give thin hair more body and can even be used if you have thick hair like mine.

I do not set my hair very often, but once, inspired by pictures of a local historic beauty, Lola Montez, I decided to go to a fair in her honor, wearing a nineteenth-century dress with my long hair in tight curls?helped by a natural ingredient, of course. I made a solution of agar, a jellylike seaweed thickener used in cooking. I poured this over my hair, which I set in little ringlets all over my head. The next morning, my hair was indeed curled, or rather set. It even shimmered and jiggled when I walked. While this technique proved successful, I find that setting my hair with lemon gives it a much more natural look.

Lola Montez actually wrote her own book, The Arts and Secrets of Beauty, in 1853. One of her many interesting recipes is for Honey Water, which she says fashionable ladies all over Europe used as a "celebrated" hair rinse to beautify their tresses. Although the original concoction did indeed contain honey, as well as some other, rather questionable ingredients such as sand, Lola adapted the formula, leaving out the honey but retaining the name. I have turned it into a more modern recipe (see page 330) in case you would like to try beautifying your own hair with a formula that was popular among nineteenth-century beauties.

Another way to perk up hair is by changing the color. Unfortunately, permanent hair dyes, tints and bleaches force open the hair shaft so that they can penetrate inside to alter the color. As a result, your hair may take on the frizzy appearance associated with bleached blondes, particularly if it undergoes repeated dyeing. Commercial natural dyes have become increasingly popular and also more sophisticated, offering a wider range of colors. Because natural hair dyes gradually fade, you do not have to worry about touching up the roots. Be sure to read the list of ingredients carefully, since some companies "cheat" by combining plant dyes with strong chemical dyes.

The color variations offered by natural products are achieved by combining different herbs. Brown and amber colors are usually created by using henna combined with black walnut hull and sometimes iron oxide. For black and dark brown shades, indigo is added; clove, sage and coffee are sometimes used in dark hair dyes. Neutral and blond henna are not really henna at all; most often they are another herbal hair conditioner: Lyzifus spinachristi. Chamomile, calendula, turmeric and lemon can be used to increase light highlights. The basic red henna may include safflower or hibiscus to soften the color. If you have light-colored or gray hair, be careful when using pure henna. It may turn your hair carrot-red or a brassy orange. Also, do not mix henna with one of the temporary chemical rinses. This combination can cause Technicolor streaks.

henna has been used throughout India, Egypt and the Middle East for more than 8,000 years to give hair a red highlight and condition it. It coats dry hair with a vegetable protein that makes it shiny with extra body, and it is drying to oily hair. (Because of this, use henna to treat dry hair no more than once every few months.) Because some people are sensitive to henna, do a patch test on your inner arm before trying this herb on your hair. I have actually seen people get welts on their skin from henna.

Lemon Setting Lotion

2 ounces lemon juice

5 drops rosemary essential oil

That's right, there are only two ingredients to combine in this recipe! Buy unsweetened lemon juice or squeeze and strain your own and use right away since it will not keep. The rest is equally simple?comb it onto your hair before setting. Although using Lemon as a setting agent is good because it conditions your hair at the same time, there is also a downside: It often makes your hair feel a little sticky.

Lola's Honey Water

5 ounces white wine

5 ounces distilled water

4 ounces orange-blossom water

8 drops bergamot essential oil

4 drops clove essential oil

Combine ingredients. Rinse through hair after washing.

henna Protein Pack

1­2 cups warm water

1 egg (optional)

1 teaspoon olive oil

2 tablespoons honey

24 drops lavender essential oil

2­3 ounces henna (for medium-length hair; use more or less, depending on length and thickness of your hair)

Wear a shirt you do not mind staining and keep a cloth handy to wipe the henna paste from your skin (there is always a chance of a stray drip). If you try this inside the house, also protect your floor. Apply salve or cream around your hair line. Put on thin latex gloves to protect your hands from being colored. Mix all wet ingredients and add them to henna, pressing out any lumps. The mixture should be the consistency of cake batter; it should not be too wet or else it will drip. It is better to make more than you need than not to have enough to cover all your hair.

Thoroughly wet your hair, part hair in sections, and apply the henna pack from scalp to hair ends. The mixture will be thick and globby, so expect it to feel a bit strange. Cover your head with a plastic bag or a shower cap, then wrap it with a towel to hold in your natural body heat, which breaks down henna and intensifies the color. You can also use a hair dryer or sit in a sauna or the sun. The longer you leave henna on, the deeper the color will be. One hour is usually sufficient, but up to 2 hours is fine as long as the henna does not dry out. Rinse with lukewarm water. (Do not use hot water?this will cook the egg.) Rinse well?it will probably take a few rinses?and follow with a shampoo and a conditioner. Dry and style as usual.