COMMON PROBLEMSIN CHARLOTTEWATER QUALITYWhat Chemicals in Your Water Contribute to Hair Loss?

June 9, 2022
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If you’re seeing hair loss, you probably want to know if there’s anything you can do to stop it. There’s what you use on your hair, nutrition, products you can try and more. What about your water? What’s in the water you use every day could be the major factor in the health of your hair. What chemicals in water may contribute to hair loss?

Tap water, especially if it’s hard water, may be the root cause of the problem. The chemicals and minerals in water may cause or worsen thinning and loss. There are changes you can make to your home’s water which can help against hair loss and give more benefits.

What Could Be in Tap Water?

To keep public tap water safe, it is treated with chemicals like chlorine. While this eliminates microorganisms and more hazardous bacteria, it can be rough on your scalp.

Along with chlorine and chloramines, your house’s tap water may have a high level of certain minerals. These are largely calcium and magnesium, though various other minerals might exist depending upon the location. If this is the case, you have a hard water issue.

Hard Water Leading to Hair Loss

When trying to figure out what’s causing hair loss, the water you shower in all the time is a likely factor. The answer isn’t stop using your tap water. Treating the water to remove most or all of the “hard” particulates in it is a main option to consider.

What is Hard Water?

Hard water is water with high degrees of minerals like calcium and magnesium. As water is pumped through underground pipes, it may contact mineral deposits like limestone. The mineral bits are in the water when it runs out of one of your faucets.

There are various degrees of water hardness. The four general categories are soft, reasonably hard, hard, and extremely hard. The higher the mineral content, the harder the water. In some areas, it is impossible to prevent hard water. The water source and area’s water system mean the sanitation steps for water are necessary.

What Hard Water Does to Hair

In most cases, the trouble with hard water is with hair weakening and breaking. This gets worse, going into

What Chemicals in Your Water Contribute to Hair Loss?
What Chemicals in Your Water Contribute to Hair Loss?

thinning and loss.

When you wash your hair with hard water, a film stays on the hair. It becomes hard for moisture to pass through the hair strands. This causes dry, weak hair that is prone to break.

The mineral film gets onto the scalp, too. This buildup clogs pores and leaves you never feeling really clean. At the same time, now hair has a more difficult time growing or being as strong as it was before.

Hard water can cause more problems with skin inflammation or dermatitis. Hard water can even leave residue on cleaned laundry, then skin damage or inflammation when clothes, towels and sheets are used.

Softening Hard Water

While you can’t control the water source or municipal water treatment, there are some ways to soften hard water. There are ways to improve the results of using hard water.

Soft Water

It is best to deal with the problem at the source. This means you may look into replacing old, wearing pipes or even rerouting pipes.

Unless you have a well, you can’t regulate the source of your water. The bright side is there are multiple ways you can soften water before or after it enters your house.

The best option is to install a filter to your home’s plumbing for whole home filtration. All the water from the public source will go through the filtration system. Prior to doing this, you should have a test of your plumbing done to guarantee there are no mineral or deposit problems in your own pipes. Or else, the filter will not be effective as you’d expect.

You can also use filters at individual faucets in your house. The drawback to this option is decreased water pressure, but the benefit is the major decrease in mineral level in your water.

Chelating Shampoo

If hard water is a problem and you are unable to treat it, you can use specific hair shampoos that help to negate most of hard water’s harsh effects.

A chelating hair shampoo is made to eliminate minerals, metals, and other accumulation from your hair and scalp. It is more powerful than a typical shampoo. Chelating shampoo should not be used every day as the formula is severe. Instead, you should use it no more than two times a week.

Wash Your Hair Less Often

Along with a chelating shampoo, you can try washing hair less often. This could have two advantages. Initially, it minimizes your hair’s contact with hard water. Second, it will allow your scalp’s natural oil to work which will lead to a healthier scalp and hair.

For some people, say with an oily scalp, you might think it is impossible to reduce how often you wash your hair. However the more you wash your hair, the drier your hair and scalp end up being. When the scalp is dry, the sweat glands actually produce more and it could be what’s creating an oily feeling scalp.

To break the pattern, you can gradually decrease your shampoo frequency. If you wash your hair on a daily basis, for example, change to every other day. After your scalp has become accustomed to the new pattern, decrease regularity a little more. The regularity with which you shampoo your hair will rely on lots of variables, including skin and hair type and daily activity. It is necessary to experiment with different regularities until you find one that benefits you.

 


South End Water Filtration specializes in HALO Water Filter products including the HALO H2 Zero Whole Home Water Filter. HALO systems solve hard water problems, give your family clear, great-tasting water and are totally maintenance free. We’re just a click away to help and answer any questions. South End Plumbing and South End Water Filtration will give you a free estimate. Call us at 704-486-1988 or contact us online to schedule a visit.