Does cutting your hair frequently, make it grow healthy and long?

August, 2000
Hair News Magazine
by: Damien R. von Dahlem

As I am sure you have heard, if you cut your hair frequently, your hair will grow in faster, longer, and healthier.

Gobbledygook!  This myth came from the observation of men's facial hair.  As they shaved, the facial hair would indeed grow in thicker.  Its called, 'puberty.'
 
This is because certain male hormones affect facial hair in that manner.  They do not affect the hair on your head in the same way.  
To the contrary.  Male hormonal activity is what leads to hair thinning and loss on certain parts of the head, but not all.  Hence the familiar balding pattern known as 'male pattern baldness.'  This same hormonal activity also affects women, but not until much later in life, and in a different pattern.

Cutting your hair only makes it shorter, does not affect the growth rate one iota, and cannot determine the length that your hair will grow to.  Maximum hair length is determined by the shape and width of the hair shaft, and that is determined genetically and is not alterable with current technology.

Lastly, hair is neither healthy or unhealthy.  It is in fact, dead.  Else, it would really hurt to cut it.  It is the health of the hair follicle below the outer skin that requires nutrients for good health, and no adverse hormonal activity.

So, unless you have split ends or chemically damaged hair, the only need to cut the hair is for the look that you want.

A few things that you can do to ensure that your hair follicles remain healthy and your hair is undamaged, are:

1.  Take an inexpensive daily multi vitamin such as 'One-A-Day' or even 'Flintstones.'  Your hair likes zinc and biotin and both of the above mentioned vitmins contain ample amounts of these.  Don't waste your hard earned money on 'super vitamins.'  Your body only requires so many vitamins per day and simply discharges the excess.  You can't put twenty gallons in a ten gallon tank.  In some instances, over dosing on supplements can actually be fatal.

2.  Do not over brush your hair.  With every stroke you damage your hair more.  Brush only as much as you need to style the hair, then stop.

3.  Buy a good quality brush or comb without sharp plastic or metal ridges.  This is one of the common factors leading to split ends, as is over brushing.

4.  Don't be penny foolish.  Buy good quality salon products.  The chemicals used in many if not most of the over the counter shampoos and conditioners, contain very harsh ingredients such as 'ammonium laurel sulfate' which can actually dry your hair out and cause breakage and split ends.  Even worse, many contain a 'bad' form of silicon, and that can be very nasty on your hair.  'Pantene' is the worst of these in our opinion.

5.  Don't constrict your hair with tight bands, hats, braids and the like.  These also lead to split ends and hair breakage.

http://www.hair-news.com/hair-grow-long.html

When I was a kid that was the myth I would hear. Everyone knew I wanted long hair and would always tell me it would grow much longer if I cut it...so ridiculous. :-X :-[

I used to feel like my hair grew faster when I was getting small trims every 5 weeks.  It was actually just that it kept the ends looking nicer so I didn't have to do a big trim every 3 months.  Once I learned to take care of my hair better I stopped needing such frequent trims.  

Hallelujah!

wrote on Feb 19^th, 2005 at 2:29am:

I used to feel like my hair grew faster when I was getting small trims every 5 weeks.  It was actually just that it kept the ends looking nicer so I didn't have to do a big trim every 3 months.  Once I learned to take care of my hair better I stopped needing such frequent trims.

VERY TRUE ... BLESS THE SCIZZZORS!!!
i am going to trimm nearly monthly now (according to the morrocco lunar chart). just a few mm every time, ends always look tidy and fresh without loosing a traumatizing amount of hair.

Styg--are you trimming yourself, or do you have someone help you?  

excellent article BB! thanks for posting it  :)

wrote on Feb 21^st, 2005 at 11:36pm:

Styg--are you trimming yourself, or do you have someone help you?

i trim entirely alone now. i just do the second step in feye's method for straight across cut: devide hair in two and bring each section over the shoulders. i hold each section between index and middle finger and go straight down while watching my eyes in a mirror. then  i bring each section up, held tight between the fingers and trim a tiny bit. i verify if both sections are equally long by going through them again at the same time at both sides with the same two fingers.
i found it's the only way to just trim off a few mm and i cannot do the first step alone and will always end up with unequal ends and i always end up trimming more.

I would trim my own hair, just after washing it.  I would part down the middle, bring over my shoulders and comb it to stick to my skin.
I'd look in the mirror(not moving my head) and trim what I wanted off right across, both sides, look to make sure even. I didn't move the hair up as I thought the cut could be a little un-even.  When I was done I put it back on the back and comb to see if even, most of the time one shot and I was done.

Brad

yes, that's basically what i do, but i wouldn't be sure i could cut very straight now my  hair is getting close to the hips, so i hold it tight and bring it up.

I'm glad I read this now or I would be asking my mom to trim it at this moment.

Quote:

yes, that's basically what i do, but i wouldn't be sure i could cut very straight now my  hair is getting close to the hips, so i hold it tight and bring it up.

That would be hard to do with longer hair.

Brad