Shifting Strands - Three factors that can change the quality of your hair over time.
Do you ever look at your fourth grade picture and wonder what happened to those shiny healthy locks? Turns out your hair (like the rest of you) changes over time. What was once thick and bouncy can turn dull and limp as the years wear on. Some of the causes are predictable (harsh products, styling, chemical treatments) while others are less so.
Here are three unexpected factors that can contribute to hair deterioration.
Anemia or vitamin D deficiency 🌿
Vitamin or mineral deficiency can cause hair follicles to stop working, interrupting the hair growth cycle and thinning hair. If you’re iron deficient, especially, your body can go into survival mode, sending oxygen to support vital organ function instead of hair growth. So, make sure your diet is high in both vitamin D and iron – you can even add dietary supplements to boost 🚀 levels.
Postpartum 🍼
If you’re a mother, you probably enjoyed thicker more lustrous locks while you were pregnant. Less enjoyable is the precipitous drop off in the postpartum stage. That’s because, thanks to elevated estrogen, you loose far less hair during pregnancy 👶. After birth your estrogen levels fall causing the extra strands you grew and held onto during pregnancy to fall out. But not to worry – shedding will slow down and thickness will be back to normal in about 6-12 months after birth.
Stress 😰
Short term, everyday stress will not cause you to lose hair. However, an event that causes huge emotional stress can trigger physiological changes in your body thereby putting a large portion of your hair into a ‘resting phase’ (as opposed to a ‘growing phase’) prematurely. That hair will then fall out 3-4 months later. Unless you have a crystal ball 🔮, there is not much you can do about event stressors, unfortunately. But rest assured, the hair should grow back in time, once your body has fully recovered.
While these factors may not be entirely avoidable, the effects can be offset with the comfort of awareness, a little extra TLC and high-quality, natural hair care products, like T’zikal.
We make remarkable products for hair and skin by harnessing the transformative oil of the Ojon Palm Nut 🌱 and incorporating innovative European skincare science.
Learn more and shop the collection at T'zikal.
