CO experience thread

DaveDecker wrote: I'm interested in keeping up with your experiment, LadyFrog.  How often have you been washing your hair with shampoo?  And ultimately, how often will you end up washing with CO?  I think this could help me too, but I'm not quite ready to gopher it.

Hi Dave, I was a weekly washer too when I switched first to COW-CC, then to CO. I hope you decide to give CO a try

LadyFrog wrote: Yesterday, I washed my hair and did CO. No particular reason, just felt like it I was expecting my hair to go funny and greasy but...it hasn't! It's possibly a tad greasier then if I's shampooed it but mainly it just feels like silk and really shiny! (See sig pic for proof-taken after CO) Does that mean my hair likes CO and wants to run and hide away from the big scary shampoo bottle or something! I know it's early days yet but it seems to agree with my hair! Well I suppose I barely used shampoo anyway-I'd use heavily diluted baby shampoo. Intrigued...

Hi LadyFrog.  I have been doing CO and heavy dilution for years.  In fact, about 3 years ago I was at a seminar with the woman who wrote the Curly Girl book (Lorraine) and she came up to me at the break and said...you must do conditioning only washing...right?  I asked how she knew and she said...the shine, the softness and how nice my natural waves formed in the back.

I have found that over time I can only do diluted shampoo about once or twice a month.  I tend to CO every 5 days and then maybe on every 2nd or 3rd rotation I do DSO.  Today I did a super heavy dilution with Phytojoba but it was the first time in 3 weeks that I used DSO. My last DSO was with Aveda Shampure and I cut back to 1/2 teaspoon to 1 quart.  Which seemed to be good. 

Most of the time my CO consists of Phytosesame or ARTec Smoothing.  Lately I have been playing with RF Karite and just slathering it on. 

Thanks so much for sharing your experiments.  When I advise people to do either DSO or CO washing, they are very skeptical.  It has been working for me for years and I know it is very good for super long hair.

Hi Folks

We have a lot of acronyms and abbreviations!

CO= Conditioner Only
CWC= Condition, Wash, Condition
COW-C = ConditionerOnly + Wash + Conditioner (which is actually diluted shampoo with conditioner mixed in it, looks like a milkshake)
WO= water only (I tend to call it WO for Water Only because OW tends to be associated with COW)

Other abbreviations I've personally used, a few of which I better explain ..*sheepish.
BSL= Bra strap length
MBL= Mid back length
TB= Tailbone
ACV= apple cider vinegar
BBB= boar bristle brush
SM&H / Suave M&H= Suave Milk&Honey
SCS / Suave CS = Suave Citrus Smoothie
KLG= Kirkland Lemon Gingerroot
SUE= socked-up end, referring to occasions where the end of a braid is sock-curled

Karen, maybe we can start an FAQ thread of some kind...

Karen Shelton wrote: The first year I "freaked" that I was not shampooing full strenght every day.  Eventually my hair "adjusted" and I found that if I did use full strength shampoo my hair felt like total hell.  Now I NEVER use full strength shampoo but it took me some years to get to this point.

That is interesting. I used to wash and blow dry my hair EVERY single day no matter what and now I do it at the most every other day. I always felt either I was not clean if I didn't bathe every day, or that I didn't look my best, but it's simply not true. Now I almost like my hair better the second day -- not always but there are times. I can actually go out in public and do things with "dirty" hair. Ha, ha. It's just so funny because I used to be so uptight!  And I seem to get the most compliments on dirty hair days too.