Why You Should Take Care of Your Scalp

Are you paying attention to the most important reason for your hair’s health? If not taken care of properly, an unhealthy scalp can interfere with hair growth, hair appearance, create dandruff, and become itchy or dry. Your scalp is also responsible for the health of your hair follicles, the holes your hair strands grow out of. Use the following scalp and follicle treatment tips for men to keep your hair looking in tip top shape.

Show Your Grays: Color treating your hair can cause irreparable damage to your hair follicles on the scalp. Every time you dye your hair, you’re burning and severely drying out your follicles. A hair follicle can only be burned so many times before it starts to die. Very often, women start coloring their hair from a young age and realize during mid-life they need to keep coloring their hair forever as it’s been destroyed beyond repair. If you do color your hair, do it as infrequently as possible and try more natural solutions.

Cooler Showers: Almost everyone loves a piping hot shower, especially on a cold day. Hot water however, dries out your scalp and depending on the water temperature, can burn it too. Opt for cooler showers, or only put your hair under the shower directly when shampooing it.

Use a hair conditioner for men: Work a men's hair conditioner into your scalp and hair strands two to three times a week. Hair conditioner is important as it will deliver nutrients to your scalp and hair. Since the scalp has similar properties as the skin on your body, keeping it moisturized is paramount to its health.

Don’t Pull the Roots: Avoid wearing tight hats as they can cause "traction alopecia," a condition where hair is pulled out of the scalp. Once a hair root has been permanently ripped out of a follicle, it will never grow another hair strand again.

Avoiding towel drying your hair: This is one of the easiest preventative hair loss solutions for men. When your hair is wet, it is highly susceptible to breaking and having the root pulled out of the scalp, so avoid vigorously drying it with a towel. It’s best to let hair air dry as much as possible and if towel drying is necessary, do it gently.

Avoid Hair Tools: Don't use a brush on wet hair, when it is most vulnerable to breaking. When combing through wet hair, use a wide-toothed comb and gently work out any tangles if you have longer hair. Blow dryers should also be avoided for the same reasons as a hot shower; they’ll dry out and potentially burn the scalp.

Exfoliate Weekly: Once a week, remove dead skin cells and build up from clogging your hair follicles with an exfoliating scrub. A men's face scrub is gentle enough to be used on the scalp. We only recommend this for guys with short or fine hair. Longer and thicker hair will be too thick to allow the scrubbing particles to reach the scalp effectively.

Scalp Massage: Ask your barber for a scalp massage (or find a place that offers them) as it promotes blood flow to the scalp, stimulating the delivery of nutrients to the scalp, as well as hair growth. On top of it, a scalp massage feels damn good as well.