this post has been edited.
disclaimer: i am in no way a professional dietitian, esthetician, or otherwise. these are products i decided to buy on my own and try.
hi guys! as i alluded to toward the end of january, i'm trying to grow my hair back out; partially because i'm in two weddings (in december and january) and because i just prefer it longer. after we got back from our honeymoon, i decided to chop off 12 inches for Locks of Love. the following photos are from our honeymoon (in june) and at paul's master's graduation in august, about a month after my haircut...
anyway so around the end of january, i bought rene furterer's fortecia shampoo and since then i'd been using it nearly every other day. ..and when it ran out (it lasted about 2.5 months), i started using folicure from sally's because it's 1/3 the price for 4x the product. uhh, yes please! between the two, i liked the scent of fortecia better, but it didn't lather much and felt a little dry to use. folicure's scent reminds me of pert shampoo and it's a thick, gel-like consistency and lathers up quite a bit. as far as effectiveness of the two: i'm not totally sure, but for the price, folicure is much cheaper at $10 for 32oz vs. $30 for 8.5oz.
i found that, using these shampoos everyday was too drying for my scalp, and i would get scalp/hairline acne and dandruffy when used in excess. additionally my hair was becoming a bit dry because of this process..and heat styling, so i started using a deep conditioning mask (pantene beautiful lengths, macadamia natural oil, [or hair chemist macadamia oil--i haven't actually started using this yet..]) on my fortecia/folicure days instead of whenever i thought about it..which i was bad about before......
on the opposite days, i would use pantene shampoo & conditioner..i usually get the giant ones from sam's. after towel-drying, i'd use various styling products: macadamia natural oil healing oil treatment[/hair chemist macadamia oil hair serum--haven't opened this yet either], or pantene straighten & smooth creme, pending on what i used that day in the shower.
[comparison reviews on macadamia natural oil vs. hair chemist to come later.]
around mid february, i picked up two bottles (bogo free!) of 1000mcg biotin and started taking those, one a day in addition to my one-a-day women's multivitamin...or vitafusion women's gummies (this kind, for real makes me want fruit snacks), whichever i'm feelin for the day. biotin is a dietary supplement *not significantly proven* for healthy hair and nails. i haven't really noticed a huge change in the nail department, maybe they've been growing a bit longer, faster, but they're still brittle. i don't intend to take a higher dosage or buy the higher concentration tablets (5000mcg), as it took my body quite a while to adjust to these.
mid march, i decided to implement folicure's ampule treatment, using one ampule every four days or every other fortecia/folicure shampooing.
edit: i forgot to mention how i use it... so the directions say to shampoo with folicure and towel dry your hair. then take an ampule and shake it, open it and repeatedly pour it into small sections on your scalp. yeah, about that..too much effort! i arbitrarily place it in different areas on my scalp and massage/work it in all over. afterward, you blow-dry and style your hair as normal. also, with the exception of my scalp and hands, if any of the fluid gets on my skin i get a crazy looking rash.. the kind where your skin is all red and puffy, it's itchy and burns to the touch... and then you accidentally scratch it..and it burns like hell for several minutes....... but it does go away..eventually. i've been primarily using this treatment at night so if i do get a skin reaction, it's usually gone by morning.
and the results??
and then we get to today! look at those bangs now! woohoo! [hair is straightened here also]
i'm planning on making a few more hair updates for you guys as the length progresses. anyway, thanks for reading! ~Lin-chan ^.~
*note: i have only gotten my hair cut once since chopping it, and it was before starting this hair growth process. it was a trim to reshape my hair from an inverted-u cut.
No comments
Post a Comment