Hair breakage has many different causes. If you’re experiencing excessive breakage with your natural hair, you are 100% a culprit of one these 5 reasons. Here are common causes of hair breakage and what you can do to reduce it.

1. Heat damage

This has to be the number one culprit. We use heat on our natural hair for styling and drying; using heat on natural hair is fine provided it’s done carefully and moderately. When heat is used incorrectly or too frequently, it will cause damage to the hair cuticle, which results into hair breakage.

Remedy: The best way to prevent overall heat damage is to give your hair a break from heat. Other remedies to minimize heat damage include using a heat protectant, and regular protein treatments before applying direct heat to hair.

2. Dryness

It is no secret by now that natural hair is prone to dryness because of its structure.  Dryness can also be cause by dry weather, heat and low humidity. Dry hair is like brittle spaghetti that will snap when mishandled.

Remedy: Moisturize hair regularly to keep dryness at bay. When I say moisturize, I mean leave-conditioners, creams, butter creams, oil and water. Notice I wrote “Oil and water” because oil/sheabutter alone is does not add moisture to hair.

3. Over-manipulation

Natural hair is so great for all the things you can do with it; you can do curly styles, straight styles, braids, and more! The temptation to try all these different styles is high; however it comes at a cost to your hair. Anytime you put hands in your hair is an opportunity for hair to break.

Remedy: Try to keep your hand out of your hair and opt for styles that last at least 4 days.

4. Bad protective styling

Tight braids, heavy braids, tiny braids, tight ponytails, rough hair tools, leaving your braids in for too long… should I continue? If you do any of these, you are just asking for your hair to break.

Remedy: Treat your hair like a baby, be very gentle and kinds to your hair. Once you eliminate bad protective styling your hair will thrive!

5. Knots and tangles

When your is knotted and tangled, it’s very easy to rip through out with combs, or even your fingers! If you experience insane tangling and knots, your hair will break.

Remedy: Trim those old rough ends because they are prone to knots, it’s hard at first but it gets easier after the first trim. Detangle hair regularly to avoid tangles that will be impossible to remove.

The take away:

There’s no way you stop hair breaking 100%, your hair will break. You should only be alarmed with excessive hair breakage. To me, excessive hair breakage is when you can make a bundle out of what’s broken off.