Sigh back to where i started

so i started neglecting around the end of may (26th) and i was washing with baking soda and salt with a lemon alternative to thevinegarrinse. I loved it at first. it made my hairclump and dry rather thatsilkywith shampoo. So after awhile i had some irritation and i had so much shedding... i assumed i had breakage aswell from the baking soda. So after awhile i had a lot of oil build up..mostly at the scalp and roots...i tried a fewdifferentwashes butcouldn'tget rid of the oil. so i went out and bought... dr bronners.. sigh.. at first it was great loved the lather and it didnt detangle or make it silky... but after the thirdwash i noticed that gummy white residue i hear about, wasnt washing out even with distilled water and very diluted portions...so i did acouple of baking soda washes with acv rinse but still no effect... icouldliterallyfeel this sticky glue on my hands from it. SOOO i did what most of you will findblasphemousaround these parts.. i brushed my hair :O (but it was wooden aKangha of sort but not so finely toothed more of a brush) to remove theexcessiveshedding hair... did another scrub..and then... real shampoo! (guess i shouldve used regular soap first)(it was mane and tail) the stuff for horses.... now i have the most straight arrow stringy hair ever...back to ground zero. So heres what i want to know for from now on.

Did you have to deal withexcessiveamounts of shedding from neglect?
This was the most irritating, pullingclumps out with my hair tie or anytime i pulled my hair or ran my fingers through it (which i know iscounter productive to dreading)

Did you have irritation/breakage from bakingsoda or dr bronners?
I read Baking Soda even with acv is very damaging to the hair & scalp, are there any alternatives with the same tangling effect?

Ugh ican still feel the dr bronners residue on my hands o.O

And i havent been able to find a soap/shampoo that removes oil without making silky.
dronners made it frizzy and straw like... which im fine with as long as i dont have an oily scalp...which i dont see bs&acv helping much with.

So how do you remove oil?
Did you have to deal withexcessiveamounts of shedding from neglect/natural?
Did you have irritation/itching/breakage from bakingsoda or dr bronners?

much love.

updated by @theohm: 02/14/15 06:11:11AM

What Justin said.

Justin said:

I'm assuming you didn't get much of your information from this site as some of this doesn't really jive with the info given out by members here. That being said, a couple of questions real quick. How often were you washing with the BS and where exactly did you read it was bad for your hair? Also, what recipe did you use exactly for your BS/Lemon rinses?

I haven't really heard of this problem before so I'm going to blame the only thing that stands out as different from your routine as the cause. You should definitely not be substituting any kind of lemon rinse for the Apple cider vinegar rinse. Baking soda is a great cleanser and is used in many different aspects as such. Any claims it is damaging to your hair are false. When you do the ACV rinse you are actually restoring the Ph balance to your head. By using a lemon mixture in stead I'm going to assume this is what is causing your problems. Lemon can not only lighten hair but dry it and cause it to weaken if used too much or not conditioned properly after use. I can also see this causing some of your scalp irritation.

I have personally used the BS/ACV rinses 3-4 times a week for the last 5 months and not only is my hair cleaner than it has ever been, my head feels amazing afterwards. If your getting oil build up you're not washing often enough and if you get a little residue in the beginning of the BS washes you most likely need to strengthen it (add more BS). If doing the BS/ACV rinse properly doesn't solve your problems then I would recommend looking into this shampoo http://shop.dreadlockshampoo.com/

Try looking through this thread http://www.dreadlockssite.com/page/washing-dreadlocks-guide#.UBqDVE... for some good tips on changing up your BS/ACV mix as well as other proven methods for other members.

Lastly, throw away your brushes and stop running your fingers through your hair. Come here and ask around a bit before you go undoing any process. We'll work to try and solve your problem with you while keeping your dreads as they are.

I couldn't agree more. BS exfoliates your skin. If it is not strong enough, t'll loosen dead skin, but not remove it. This produces a white gunk that doesn't rinse out. When your BS mixture is stronger there is enough there to exfoliate and fully remove the dead skin. If you do it too weak many times, it'll just keep building up.

Lemon juice is citric acid. It's completely different than ACV which is acetic acid. They are notsubstitutesfor each other. Citric acid is a strong acid which a pH of close to 1. Actetic acid is a weak acid with a pH of around 3. Lemon juice will go deep into your hair follicles and start to degrade them. In a short time it will break down the hair and cause it to break. This is what is causing all the shedding.

It's probably not the baking soda. It's more than likely the salt and lemon juice. Both things that will dry the crap out of your hair and scalp and force it to produce more oils.

How often were you washing? How much salt and lemon juice were you using?

Logically, if baking soda and acv are bad for you (which I highly doubt as I've been using it for 6 months now and it's cured my dandruff and my hair feels awesome) why on earth would you think lemon juice was ok? Lemon juice is much more acidic than ACV not less.

That said, the sites I skimmed after googling about people saying bs acv are bad are full of speculation from people who have never done it themselves and proclaim that it can't even clean your hair. And the people who have used it and had bad results were putting baking soda PASTE on their hair, scrubbing it around, and not rinsing with ACV. Most of the sites even assumed you mixed both together for a chemical reaction.

All of that is ridiculous. And they all seem to be blogs written by housewives. Not people with science backgrounds. We've had a pharmacy tech explain the ratios. I'd trust a pharmacy tech before I trusted some blog site. http://www.dreadlockssite.com/forum/topics/baking-soda-and-sea-salt-ratios#.UBqYFaNWl8E

The very first site that comes up from my googling claims to be scientific and honest. Then they turn around and say that a woman using BS and ACV to successfully counter dandruff should instead use EXTRA STRENGTH HEAD AND SHOULDERS! What?! That shit is poison and I now have no reason to trust these people to tell me what is good for my hair and scalp. They are full of it.

Be careful where you get your info. SE used the BS and ACV for years and years before he started using the bars from dreadlockshampoo.com. I don't think his dreads would be so long and strong if the naysayers were right.

never use lemon juice lemon juice soaks into the inner layers of the hair shaft where it attacks the pigmentation (the bleaching efdffect) but it also breks down the hair structure basicly dissolving it from the inside

baking soda and acv are good for hair not bad fir it but u dont mix the 2 ever

baking soda without acv will reeduce ouiliess slowly acv will remove oio but will make u produce more use the baking soda alone to shift the ph away from the acidic side (dry hairs 5.5 oily 5.0)

try www.dreadlockshampoo.com best there is

unles u do the bs right wich will work fine

no never had iritation or shedding however some are alergic to bs topicaly so get hives

--
My new book Ban The Taboo Vol 1

Woah all your responses are socritical.. learning from soaring eagle are you young jedi... (or sith...)

First off baking soda is not acleaning agent. it is an abrasive(scratches)... being it does not remove oil.. vinegar is yourcleanser give it the credit itdeserves. so dont put the baking soda on some kind ofpedestal...unless you want to give itcredit for making ur hair brittle and knotty

Most of my information iscoming from personal experience andexperimentation. all the otherknowledge iacquiredcomes from this site..."baking soda is alkaline" "baking soda can be irritating"..was using the lemon todissolvethe excess baking soda and accelerate locking... it wasfreshlemon/juice. i was doing a wash like once twice a week.
as to my recipes or mixture ratios it was 1 part baking soda lots parts water in spray bottle. i choose to beat my own drum. this website isnt the only withcreditable information,don't be so vain.

Btw if i want tocomb andseparatewith my fingers i will if it makes me happy, if it takes me longer to dread so be it, but my dreads will be formedconformed to my behaviors and intentions, so dont get all dread police/political hippie on me.

Perhaps i shouldve voided my story and simply gotten to the point and askeddirectly.
So can youremove oilnaturally? (Without bs acv) (i bet you wish you knew)

Here's what i really wanted to know which none of you were kind enough to answer.
Did you experience excess amounts of sheddingduringthe neglect/natural process?

wheres the love?

I haven't had ACV in a couple weeks so if Baking Soda isn't what is removing the oils then I guess it's just plain water that's doing it! Amazing!

the baking soda washes made me less oily. & i had been really oily. I used the dreadlockshampoos for a while but it kept my hair really soft & silky (but not oily) so I'm going to wait until I have some good knots set before trying it again.

I shed a lot normally, but since I would brush my fingers through my hair it would all just come out as I did that. Now that I'm not doing that it clumps together to fall out, a clump slips to the bottom of the section & I either notice & remove the clump since it's not actually connecting to anything besides itself & it's all loose hair, or It just sheds when I wash. It's gross because I feel like I'm molting lol. It's just the shedding wasn't as noticeable before because only a few hairs would come out at a time & since I was always running my fingers in there they were always being removed. Now they stay around for a while & let other free hair join them before clumping up & shedding at once. It's weird. I don't think it's a big issue at all tho, after things actually start knotting the clumps will start getting stuck in there instead of slipping out & there will be a lot less shedding.

TheOhm said:

Woah all your responses are socritical.. learning from soaring eagle are you young jedi... (or sith...)

First off baking soda is not acleaning agent. it is an abrasive(scratches)... being it does not remove oil.. vinegar is yourcleanser give it the credit itdeserves. so dont put the baking soda on some kind ofpedestal...unless you want to give itcredit for making ur hair brittle and knotty

Most of my information iscoming from personal experience andexperimentation. all the otherknowledge iacquiredcomes from this site..."baking soda is alkaline" "baking soda can be irritating"..was using the lemon todissolvethe excess baking soda and accelerate locking... it wasfreshlemon/juice. i was doing a wash like once twice a week.
as to my recipes or mixture ratios it was 1 part baking soda lots parts water in spray bottle. i choose to beat my own drum. this website isnt the only withcreditable information,don't be so vain.

Btw if i want tocomb andseparatewith my fingers i will if it makes me happy, if it takes me longer to dread so be it, but my dreads will be formedconformed to my behaviors and intentions, so dont get all dread police/political hippie on me.

Perhaps i shouldve voided my story and simply gotten to the point and askeddirectly.
So can youremove oilnaturally? (Without bs acv) (i bet you wish you knew)

Here's what i really wanted to know which none of you were kind enough to answer.
Did you experience excess amounts of sheddingduringthe neglect/natural process?

wheres the love?

ditto

Tied up in knots said:

I haven't had ACV in a couple weeks so if Baking Soda isn't what is removing the oils then I guess it's just plain water that's doing it! Amazing!

your getting all defensive and missing the piint

baking soda is a cleaning agebnt

read the baking soda box

add baking soda to youer laundretp-y to your toothpaste to anything you clean with it cleans its not abrasice it rturns to gasses how is gas abrasive?

when baking soda is added to water it starts to biodegrade imediately releasing gas bi[-ubbles

ever heard of a=oxyclean the oxygen bubbles do the cleaning?

baking soda works bout the same way

acv degreases try=u it doesnt clean dirt only oils baking soda removes dirt

hiowever this is what yiy need to learn about oils

oils are nesacary to scalp health but excess oils are created when you strip the oils too often or too completely

also oily hairs too acidic

so

to reduce oiliness you do not want to remove oils but remove the cause of oiliness

use baking soda alone (temporarily) and reduvce the washing by a day..then 2

when you can go 4 days without being oily till the last day then slowly reintroduvce acv.. wek very weak a spoonful or 2 per gallon

the recipie 1/2 cup baking soda per5 5 cups water

thyme tea or thyme esential oil will also regulate oil production slowly

it takes weeks to readjust the hair

now when u reintri[oduce acv yiur only doing it to rset the ph adter the alkaline bs

btw when u add citric acid to baking soda alkaline and acid reacte you no longer have baking soda you have a seperate chemical you dont want

and again no we didnt have excesive shedding caise we didnt use lemin h[juice

thats whats causing the issues yiur basicly dissolving your hair

--
My new book Ban The Taboo Vol 1