In our haircare routine, it’s easy to practice the same hair habits day after day without even realising that some habits are actively causing damage to your hair, making you prone to breakage and, eventually, thin, unhealthy ends. One of the most common mistakes many of us make is not brushing with care and intention, and generally, using the wrong type of hairbrush. Whether we’re brushing wet or dry hair, or if we’re brushing while styling and blow drying, we must be aware of how we are caring for our hair. Otherwise, we may be causing unnecessary damage and breakage. Every part of your haircare routine – your products, your habits, styling preferences and your hair tools – plays an important role in your overall hair health results, which means we must focus our attention on all steps to support our healthiest scalp and hair for many years to come. To help you avoid unnecessary damage and support strong, thick, healthy hair, we’re discussing five of the most common and crucial mistakes made when brushing hair. These mistakes are simple and can be quickly adjusted within your routine, but because they have such a great impact on your long-term hair health results, they must be addressed.
Mistake 1: Using the wrong hairbrushes
The most obvious and crucial mistake is simply using the wrong brush for your hair. There are a range of factors to consider when choosing the right hairbrushes. Of course, you must first consider your hair type and specific needs to ensure you invest in a brush that is best suited to your hair. You also need to select your brushes taking into consideration their purposes. Everyone needs a detangling hairbrush that is effective in brushing out knots in wet and dry hair. But, depending on your style preferences, you may need additional brushes for hairstyling and blow drying. Once again, the shape, size and type of brush will depend on your hair needs and how you enjoy styling.
Finding the best detangling hairbrush for you truly is a vital step in every haircare routine, so let’s discuss what you need to consider. When detangling knots or matting, the most important features of your brush are the shape, size and material of the bristles. Many hairbrushes can lead to pulling, tugging, static and hair damage without effectively managing knots. However, the best detangling brush will allow hair to glide through the bristles, gently removing knots. Our Sozo Detangling Hairbrush has been intentionally designed for both wet and dry hair to assist you in detangling knotted, matted hair, especially after washing. The specific bristle design helps to limit breakage and damage to support healthy hair long term.
Mistake 2: Brushing dripping wet hair
Hair damage not only occurs when using the wrong brush but also when brushing wet hair. Our hair is known to be most fragile when wet because water can cause the hair’s protein structure to weaken, often leading to breakage. Knowing this, we can see how brushing, especially when not taking the proper care, can so easily cause significant damage on a regular basis. So, for most hair types, it is vital to air dry your hair, use a blow drier on low heat or use a microfibre hair towel to absorb the excess water from your hair before picking up your brush. Our Sozo Bamboo Microfibre Hair Towel is designed to be absorbent, soft and also lightweight for faster drying times and comfortable wearing, while also limiting friction to the hair shaft to promote smoother hair.
Once again, it is important to understand your hair type because, although damage can so easily occur for many when brushing wet hair, brushing damp hair can be safe and less damaging for some, for example, those with curly hair. Because curly and textured hair can be very difficult to brush when completely dry, causing breakage and frizz, it can be more effective to carefully brush curly hair when it is still slightly wet. It can also be easier to influence curl shape and definition when the hair is wet to encourage more defined curls as the hair dries. As we all understand, our goal needs to always be to reduce and prevent breakage whenever possible, so ensure you practice what is best for your hair type.
Mistake 3: Brushing your roots first
For many of us, it is natural to start brushing our roots first in an attempt to detangle knots. However, this can lead to tugging and pulling your brush through your matted, knotted hair. Once again, this is a perfect opportunity for breakage. What you need to be doing instead is brushing your ends first, then slowly work up to your roots as you remove knots. For all hair types, but particularly for hair that is prone to knotting and matting, it is also important to brush your hair in small sections. This will make detangling easier and less painful, while limiting damage as much as possible. By brushing one small section of your ends at a time, brushing will become simple and less harmful to your hair.
Mistake 4: Brushing too aggressively when your hair is full of build up
As we’ve already established, we want to avoid all aggressive pulling, ripping and tugging when brushing. But being gentle with your hair is also extremely important if you are brushing hair that has any build up of styling products, including hairspray, dry shampoo or texture powders. These types of products can be useful when styling, but often have negative side effects. With regular and consistent use of dry shampoo and styling products containing alcohol and harsh chemicals, a build up is likely to accumulate on our scalp, often making it difficult to maintain a clean, nourished scalp. Products like hairsprays can also coat and weaken the hair, making your hair extremely vulnerable to breakage when brushing. Avoiding excessive use of these styling products on a regular basis is a great way to maintain your best hair health results. But if you do decide to use styling products, always be careful not to brush aggressively or cause breakage.
Mistake 5: Not cleaning your brush frequently
It can be easy to forget about cleaning our brushes on a regular basis. And although it may seem insignificant and unimportant compared to other steps in our haircare routine, cleaning our hairbrushes must not be overlooked. When we neglect to clean our brushes, a build up often accumulates and, I’m sure we can agree, no one enjoys the thought of running a brush full of product and old hair through our clean scalp, roots and ends that have been freshly washed. The quickest and easiest way to keep your brush clean is to remove any loose hair stands caught in the bristles after every use. Removing the hair from your brush every single time you use it will help to prevent a build up from accumulating. If you do find there is a build up in your brush that needs more thorough cleaning, you can also rinse and wash the bristles with our Sozo Hair Health Shampoo. After washing and cleaning, allow your brush to dry completely and enjoy using a fresh hairbrush.
Bonus Tip: Use a weekly, all-natural hair mask to detangle knotted hair
If you’re someone who is prone to knotted and matted hair, or your hair is particularly knotted after wearing a certain hairstyle or maybe even going to the beach, the best thing you can do to make detangling your hair easier when brushing is to apply an all-natural, silicone free hair mask treatment when washing. By shampooing and applying a hair treatment like our Sozo Hair Health Mask that is deeply conditioning and helps to smooth, strengthen and detangle hair, brushing will be more manageable after washing. Our Australian made hair mask can be used in place of conditioner at least once a week, or more often as needed, to target and enhance both your scalp and hair health for your very best results.
Whether you’re brushing dry or wet hair, we are all susceptible to breakage and damage if we don’t take the proper care. Consistent pulling, tugging and damage to the hair can leave us with thin, spiny, brittle and unhealthy ends. But by being intentional in the way you brush and the types of hairbrushes you use for your specific needs, you can limit and prevent unnecessary breakage to support strong, healthy hair long term. Practicing gentle brushing, especially when trying to detangle knots, is absolutely essential in your haircare routine and plays an important role in your hair health for many years into the future.
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