Who has heard this hair washing myth?! #haircaretips #skincaretips #dermatology

[Snuzzled]

If moisturizer made your skin produce less oil over time, oily skinned peeps would be slathering on the thickest creams they could find. That alone helps debunk this theory

[tsukinoblossom]

Oh my god, that frequent hair washing myth! Thank you! I have very fine hair and a very oily scalp, if I go longer than two days not only does my hair look gross, it's physically uncomfortable. Whenever someone tells me to wash it less frequently I point out that I had brain surgery about a decade ago and literally was not able to wash my hair for nearly six weeks. Thankfully I'd shaved my head beforehand and was able to use dry shampoo as long as I avoided the incision and halo brace wounds, but if that didn't "retrain" my scalp to be less oily, nothing will!

[jaci]

During Covid I was working from home for a year straight and decided what a perfect time to “train my hair”! I tried to go from daily washing to every other day. I kept this up for almost the whole year and developed seborrheic dermatitis. My hair likes to be washed daily and in fact my hair is quite healthy! Everyone is different! I hate to see people freak out when I say I wash my hair daily 😂

[jade]

I have a strong suspicion that “scalp training” probably came from someone who experienced a difference in scalp oil due to age and thought it was because they stopped shampooing. I was super oily as a teen and now as an adult I have a very dry scalp.

[maryemangum]

Thank you for debunking the oily hair myth. I tried not washing my hair as much and after 6 weeks it still got oily on day two. My scalp feels weird and kind of hurts if I go longer than two days without washing. I just have a super oily scalp like my dad. He had to wash his hair daily!

[faithkelly]

Why does it seem that the less I wash my hair the slower it gets oily?

[B-goblins]

If I had a dollar for every person on the internet who told me my oily skin would disappear if only I moisturized, I’d be rich. It drives me crazy.

[Min-Taro]

Im so happy that derms are on my side😭 i dont care what people say im gonna keep washing my greasy scalp everyday

[BugsyB]

Fine hair here. I can get 2 days if I'm lucky.

[vonnevo]

Thank you for debunking the frequent washing myth !

[Phethephoenix]

My hair balanced out when I stopped washing daily and switched to 3-4 times a wk. Weird hearing that it doesn’t help when so many hairdressers say to cool it on the washing for this reason. But. I guess you know skin well. Still I’m not gonna go back to over washing.

[lizzabug]

Thank you! People look at me like I’m crazy because I have to wash my hair like every other day and they don’t wash theirs for like weeks or even a month, if that works for you ok but I would be a oily dreaded up mess if I did that!

[naminaoberhausen]

I am sure you are mostly right, but I really did notice my hair being less oily as quickly over time when I stopped shampooing so much, and so have others I've seen online. And it's not that I used anything special, I just used water instead when I would have used shampoo.

[tabularasa]

I've never heard that "not washing your hair trains your scalp to produce less oil." This is phrased backwards. What people actually say (and they're correct), is that washing your hair every single day strips your hair of your natural oils, which makes your scalp react by producing excess oil in order to compensate. Do you dispute that? That's how this should have been phrased, and I doubt that you could show that it's incorrect. Shampoo is intense, even the most gentle ones. But for most people, when they switch to washing once a week, or even every few days, their scalp pretty quickly goes back to its natural oil production mode, not excessive, because it's not dealing with constant shampooing anymore. This most certainly worked for me, and tons of others in these comments that I see. Sure there might be some people who are exceptions, and they are commenting here as well, saying that they are very oily no matter what, but that is not the norm. Most people realize that they dont need to wash so much, and their scalp then benefits from it.

So again, this isn't about "training" the scalp to produce less oil, it's literally _allowing it to return to a natural state_ without applying sebum-depriving soap all the time. It's a wonderful thing. I overwashed for nearly 40 years, until I finally figured out that I shouldn't

[Hi_Im_Akward]

As a person who gets greasy hair in less than a 12 hour period THANK YOU. Im so tired of people telling me i shouldn't wash more than once a week. I can go 2 days max and my scalp can't handle more. Plus my job requires me to look professional, and greasy hair is not. I've tried for years to "train my hair" and literally nothing works. My scalp also becomes extremely unhealthy when I try to go to long. I use good shampoo, I don't use a whole lot of product, I don't use heat on my hair, i clean my brushes. It doesn't matter what I do, it just becomes greasy quickly.

[malarkymackeral]

wait i’m curious! i’m not trying to support the myth but what is going on then with the people who have “scalp trained” successfully?

[Sjels]

Thankfull for debunking the hair washing myth!! I tried to ‘train’ so many times. Never works. Just very few an thinn hair

[patfiegener]

The part about washing oily hair everyday is okay is not necessarily true for everyone. I had a friend that had oily hair to the point where by the end of the day it was almost dripping oil. She was washing it every day and it just kept getting worse. Her hairdresser told her she was stimulating the oil glands by washing and massaging her head every morning. When she cut back on the shampooing, the oil production reduced and her hair finally got normal.

[bonneymac]

Thank you for this post! You are the first to say this. I have oily hair and despite the naysayers I’ve always washed it daily

[korok_oaki]

Oh my god, I feel so validated by this! I've had a really oily scalp ever since I was a teenager, but people had me convinced it was because I washed my hair too often! I went over a year shampooing my hair only every 3 days and still ended up with greasy hair, but it was now itchy as hell too. Went back to washing more frequently and it feels so much better!