Baby Steps to Green: Ditching the Shampoo

Recently I decided to ditch my shampoo and conditioner. When I first heard of the “no ‘poo” movement some time ago, I was under the mistaken impression that people were actually no longer washing their hair at all. Unfortunately my initial understanding (and accompanying reaction!) meant that I remained ignorant of the wonders of being shampoo-free! That all changed when I watched this video about creating your own “shampoo.” Go watch it!

Benefits of being shampoo free:

• It’s pretty cheap.
• It’s non-toxic (this was a big reason for me).
• It means that I am reducing my plastic consumption.
• I really think my hair looks better. It was dry and dull before and though I tried a few different products, nothing was helping. This makes sense in retrospect – shampoo strips hair of natural oils.

Things I didn’t expect:

• I really like washing my hair with baking soda – it gives it a deep-clean feeling.
• I sorta miss using conditioner – the ACV works just fine, but doesn’t have the slimy feel of conditioner.
• It was very easy to make! The hardest part was finding suitable plastic bottles – I ended up finding some old water bottles that work just fine. Now I keep baking soda and ACV in my bathroom so I can quickly make more as needed.
• I didn’t expect that I would go through it so fast. Since it mostly water and doesn’t lather much at all, my supplies dwindle quickly. But it’s no big deal – the ingredients are so cheap and it’s so easy to make.

If you need a little more convincing, check out Simple Mom’s article on How to Clean Your Hair Without Shampoo.

Final thought: This was such a painless transition. I should have done it a lot sooner.

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