pre-pool (how to prep hair before swimming)



PROTECTING YOUR HAIR

chlorine and salt water can be very damaging to the hair, they cause dryness and increase porosity. but this doesn't mean you have to skip out of the fun of water during the summer! there's a proper way to prep your hair to help shield it and minimize the damaging effects of chlorine and salt water.












this is just like a pre-poo treatment, except you saturate your hair in fresh water before you apply your oil or conditioner. simple, right? think of the hair cuticle like a cup with a sponge in it. if you go straight into chlorine or salt water the sponge will absorb that damaging water, but if you pour fresh water first the sponge will absorb that and there'll be no room for the damaging water. putting a layer of oil over the sponge will make it even harder for salt/chlorine water to penetrate. that's why I prefer to use oil, rather than conditioner, to prep. it also helps to make sure your hair's porosity is low as it'll make it harder for water to penetrate your strands. remember,

WHAT DO I USE?

I was on vacation to Cayman Island a few weeks ago. I decided to use my miniature luster's pink glosser spray as my pre-pool oil. and I rather liked it, it seemed to get the job done. in the future, when this runs out, I'm going to try to use shea butter oil or other products with shea butter. I choose luster's pink glosser because...

1. I had it left over from when I first started my hair care journey and wanted to get rid of it 
2. it was small and convenient sized
3. though it says it's non greasy, but from my memory it was greasy but light
4. it had shea butter in it. in my past experience, using shea butter in a deep conditioner left a very heavy barrier on my hair, like 5 times the power of a sealing oil. it was so bad that it felt like the shea butter prevented moisture from entering my hair, and I hadn't even used much of it in the deep conditioner!
5. the ingredients look pretty good: C9-11 Isoparaffin, C14-16 Normal Paraffin, Isoeicosane, PPG-14 Butyl Ether, PPG-40 Butyl Ether, Shea Butter Extract, Vitamin E, Jojoba Oil, Wheat Germ Oil, Kola Nut Extract, Eucalyptus Extract, Aloe Extract, Papaya Extract, Chamomile, Henna Extract, Lemongrass Extract, Hydrocotyl Extract, Safflower Oil, Castor Oil, Mink Oil, PPG-3 Benzyl Ether Myristate, Ethylhexyl Dimethyl PABA, Fragrance, Benzyl Benzoate, Hexyl Cinnamal, Benzyl Salicylate, Citronellol, Amyl Cinnamal, Butylphenyl Methylpropional, Eugenol, Hydroxyisohexyl 3-Cyclohexene Carboxaldehyde, Hydroxycitronellal.

so after applying my pre-pool products, I usually tie my hair in a single indian braid or a high bun, it depends on how active I'm going to be in the water. here is a picture of me in Cayman Island, before  heading to the jacuzzi.