4 Tips To Prevent Split Ends For Healthy Natural Hair

Don't you just hate when you're gaining all of this length and then your hair decides to be disrespectful. All the gains in the world mean nothing when your ends are raggedy and falling apart. Length retention has always been way more important to me than gaining length. If you are taking care of your hair the right way it certainly will grow, but retaining is the real trick to those inches.

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I'm all about easy natural hair care. My regimen is simple, the products I use are simple so the tips I'm going to provide below will also be simple. Because once anything gets too complex for me (specifically in my hair regimen... then I'm just not going to do it).

Your ends are the oldest part of your hair and deserve/require some specific attention. So in following one if not all of these tips you are on track to having fewer split ends stop you from being great.

4 Tips To Prevent Split Ends For Healthy Natural Hair

1. Use proper hair tools: You need to make sure you are using the right hair tools in your hair care regimen. For some people the Denman brush is KING and for others it shreds their hair a part. I am one of the people who can not use the Denman brush because my hair is too fine. It is important to remember what works for one person, will not always work for someone else. Choose the right detangling, and styling tools to ensure that your hair is being handled appropriately.

2. Moisturize & Seal Your Ends: Don't just rub oil all over your hair. Seriously... who ever said that you could moisturize your hair with oil has put out some serious misinformation. Do you need oil in your natural hair care regimen... absolutely. But you need to moisturize first (using water or a water based product) and use the oil to seal the moisture into your strands. Moisturizing oils such as avocado oil or olive oil can penetrate the shaft of the hair therefore helping to bring the moisture from your product further into the strand. But the oil itself is not responsible for moisturizing.

3. Use minimal heat: I use heat on my hair 1-2 times a year. Using blow dryers and flat irons can weaken the hair and put some serious strain on your ends. If you do choose to use heat you want to make sure you use the proper tools and use a heat protectant.

4. Regular Trims: This one may be a bit controversial but stick with me because I am on the fence myself. Because I don't use alot of heat on my hair I feel that I shouldn't have to get trims as often as someone who does more things to their hair like heat and or coloring. But... even without doing those extra things my ends can face some serious damage, especially when I'm doing the most. I had to get two really big hair cuts since 2015 because I wasn't keeping up with my trims from a professional hair stylist. By using the search and destroy method I also made my hair several uneven. As a curly girl that doesn't matter because uneven hair is no biggie but when you straighten it you see a whole different picture.

Besides uneven hair you can also see the weak spots in your hair when you get a trim done professionally. So though I don't go every season (3-4 months) I am trying to go every 6 months. I recently chopped off a pretty big section of my hair myself because I could see it was damaged and the ends just wouldn't curl at all. My next professional hair cut is set for February so hopefully my stylist doesn't have to chop off too much since I've been taking way better care of my hair.

What methods do you take to ensure your natural hair is thriving? Share your thoughts with us in the comments below.

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