A lot of people, including myself sometimes, tend to treat our hair the same way in the summer as we do in the winter time. While it is true that your hair needs TLC, especially during certain times, in the summer and the winter, it may need special attention for drying and sun damage prevention in the summer that may not be needed when the temperatures are cold outside.
The one thing that a lot of people don’t protect their hair against in the summer time is the sunlight. Sun’s rays can be particularly damaging to your hair. Not only can they dry your hair out, but they can also quickly fade that nice dye job you just got, or they can also make your highlights look too light or too drab and dried out. So, to protect your hair from the damaging UV rays, I recommend you use either a protective spray, or a special color protectant conditioner.
Most color extending or protecting conditioners and leave in products contain a sunscreen that helps screen out those damaging UV rays. One of my favorites in this category is the L’Oreal line of Color Vive products that contains UV in a lot of the line, including the conditioner. It coats your hair in protection so that the light cannot fade your hair too much. There are also a few protective sprays that not only protect against the heat of styling tools for you hair like curling irons and flat irons (see our Sedu page), but they also contain tiny microspheres of UV protectant as well.
You should really be mindful of protecting your hair against chlorine damage as well. Remember, chlorine is a chemical that is very similar to bleach, and we all know how harsh and drying bleach is on the hair, so if you take a dip in that chlorine saturated pool, then make sure you do a deep conditioning later on, and make sure you rinse your hair with nonchlorinated water soon after it is exposed so that you can avoid much of the damage and discoloration it can cause.
Humidity is another huge factor that we have to be mindful of in the summer. Humidity basically gets into our hair, and expands it, making it appear large and bushy. Mine really reacts to humidity this way, while some people’s hair actually gets flatter. Mine gets fatter – way fatter, and I have to use good anti humidity hair care products to keep the humidity from turning my hair into a huge spectacle.
