Day 1: Your Hair

When I was three I drew a picture of my great-grandmother Nana Kathe in pre-school.  I proudly brought it home to show her.  She asked in her thick German accent “Vas ist das?” as she pointed to tiny black dots I had drawn on the lower half of her crayoned face.  Well, I didn’t know what they were, only that I got zapped by them whenever she tried to kiss me.  Electric eels on her face?  No.  Thick hairs that punctured my skin?  Yep.

Hair is complicated.  It’s never quite the style you’d like.  You may have too little…or too much.  Maybe you don’t know even know what color it is sans intervention.  But today, we’re going to look at the facts and see if we can shed a little light into what hair is all about.

First, it’s important to know that humans have three different types of hair:  terminal, vellus, and lanugo.  Lanugo hair was the hair you had in utero, which is all gone now. Vellus hair are those tiny hairs that you have all over your body, the peach fuzz.  Terminal hair is the type of hair you most likely think about when you think “hair”.  Head hair, armpit, and pubic hair are all terminal hair.  Chances are, that may be gone now too, with or without your consent!

The purpose of hair isn’t known, although there are a few theories.  In addition to making you miserable about one day a week (really…you’re going to stick up like that?), hair has been touted as a heat-maintaining mechanism, friction reducer, and heat conductor.  All that being said, different races and different genes give us different quantities of the stuff, so whatever hair is supposed to do, its purpose is probably not that simple.  Because hair is generated from the skin it grows from, the better the circulation to the skin, the healthier the hair.  How do you get healthy skin?  Increase the circulation to the muscles just beneath it (you knew there was going to be a muscular solution, didn’t you?!)

Head hair is a multi-million dollar industry from both an aesthetical point and medical point of view, as hair loss has become an increasing problem in the US affecting both men and women.  What are some of the biomechanical factors?  Friction.  Excessive friction (think putting a hat on every day) can cause hair follicles to inflame and potentially decrease rate of growth.  On the other hand, a lack of circulation to the muscles of the head can also decrease hair production.

Research shows that stress, tension, and anxiety are major contributors to hair loss.  Why?  Firstly, terminal hair development is affected by certain hormones.  Stress levels can raise and drop hormone levels, often in an instant.  But let us also consider the tension in the facial muscles when our stress loads increase (think Grand Canyon sized-crevice between the eyebrows).  Neck, shoulder, head, and face tension will also negatively impact blood flow to the head muscles, skin, and HAIR muscles.

Wait, did I say hair muscles?  You bet I did.  For every hair you have on your body (vellus and terminal) there is a small muscle (arrector pili) that can move the hair as well as pump oil from the oil glands at the base of each follicle to keep hair protected, which also helps hair maintain its strength. Hair strands themselves can be pretty strong in terms of tensile strength if your daily mineral intake is correct and you aren’t over-using minerals to deal with bone, stress, and muscle tension issues.  Thin and unhealthy hair may, in fact, be a good indication of mineral and metabolic issues that are happening at deeper layers of the body.  Ayurvedic science uses hair diagnoses to discern correct mineral, vitamin, and nutritional prescriptions.  Studies measuring tensile strength (how hard you can pull before it breaks) and mineral content of horse mane hair found that dietary intake changed the mechanical and chemical properties of hair after a few months.  The chemicals in shampoos can also alter the tensile strength of hair.  The more frequently you wash and heat-blast your hair, the weaker it gets.  Am I saying wash your hair less?  Yes!  We in the US wash our hair more than any other country, with the motivating reason being the smell of accumulated oil and cellular waste that comes out through our head’s sweat glands.  Don’t like the smell?  Your diet most likely contains items that your body cannot break down into usable units of energy and secreting waste through your sweat glands is a fast way to get rid of it.  Ew, I know.

Quick tips for stronger and more abundant hair:

1.  Clean up your diet, limiting processed and mineral-altering substances like diet sodas, and get your daily required minerals (see a nutritionist for a good understanding of your particular needs).  This will get you the correct building blocks to better hair and reduce your need to wash your hair daily.

2.  Gently massage face and entire head daily to stimulate blood to the skin and muscles that support healthy hair follicles.  A gentle hair brushing is a great way to relax your partner, child, or self at the end of the day (but it’s way better if you can get someone else to do it…)

3.  Keep neck and shoulders loose and try to relax your face when you feel tension come on.  Don’t cut off optimal flow to the head muscles with muscular tension just below!

4.  Reduce stress.  (Great tip, I know.  And specific too!)

5.  Don’t be so sure that your hair loss is explained by your genes or your menopausal state.  Until you have removed the junk (that means diet and regular soda) from your diet, aligned your head, neck, and shoulders, and increased blood flow to the skin of the head, there is no way to tell!

Ok.  Day One down on our 30-day commitment to learn more about our human machine.  Tomorrow, we head South.  Who’s excited??