The Curly Girl Method 6 Months on & My Current Haircare Routine

Last summer, I decided to try the curly girl method on my wavy 2b/ sections of 2c hair. After a couple of months, I sort of gave in and admitted defeat, but wanted to keep certain elements of the routine going and work on my own curly girl inspired haircare routine. That last update was around 6 months ago, so how is my curly girl inspired routine going 6 months on? 

My curly girl routine so far 

For anyone curious as to why this all started and how it ended, you can catch up with my curly girl journey so far in the following posts: 

• I’m trying the curly girl method 
• Does the curly girl method work on wavy hair? 
• Have I ditched the curly girl method?  

My prior hair journey  

Lets go back in time here, because I think it gives important context as to why I do and don’t like certain products.  

I always had great hair. It was easy. I had waves that didn’t need styling, fell fairly effortlessly, it was a little dry but not too dry, didn’t need washing often. Yes, as everyone with curls/ waves knows, it came with extra frizz and tangled and knotted far too easily for my liking, but it was manageable.  

My hair itself was fairly normal, doesn’t get greasy very quickly but also wasn’t that dry, at least not at the root/ near my scalp. However, I have really dry skin and my scalp is no exception to that. It’s very easily irritated and not unusual for it to become dry and flaky in certain areas. Despite having easy hair, I have a really difficult scalp. And those two things aren’t a great combination when it comes to product hunting.  

Switching to sulphate free 

Sulphates massively irritate my scalp and make it incredibly dry and itchy. So, I’ve been using sulphate free shampoos for around 5/6 years now. After a few hit and miss products, I found the perfect shampoo. It contained salicylic acid to exfoliate my scalp, was gentle enough not to irritate but worked well enough to prevent the dry skin build-up.  See, it was perfect. My haircare and I were very happy together.

That shampoo got discontinued about 2 years ago, which is when my relationship with my haircare routine fell apart. I tried several other sulphate free shampoos. While some of them were okay for now, none of them came close to the discontinued one. So, I’d been using a shampoo I felt kinda ‘meh’ about for several months, and decided to try the curly girl routine. I thought the gentle washing routine might be good for my sensitive scalp. And better curl definition and less frizz would be a welcome bonus.  

A build-up of dry skin and an irritated scalp can lead to hair loss. This is always a concern of mine when I’m having a hard time with my haircare. That’s also something to keep in mind for later in this post.  

My curly girl routine 

Well, it started great. By week two, my hair was looking really good, if I do say so myself. My curl pattern was much more even and I thought everything was great.  

Then it all went downhill. As the weeks went on, my hair was becoming greasier and greasier. I switched my cowash to a CG approved shampoo and conditioner and saw zero improvement. My scalp was getting so itchy as the grease was building up each week. It never felt clean. And it was time to stop.  

Hair loss 

I mentioned in my final curly girl update that every autumn, I go through a month or so where I lose a lot more hair than normal. Last year, this happened in September – October, around the time I was coming to the end of my curly girl journey. Now, I said at the time that I lose hair every year, which I do. I didn’t blame the routine, but I didn’t want to start trying new things when my hair was going through a tough patch.  

But I lost a lot of hair last autumn. And the curly girl routine was irritating my scalp a lot with the constant itching. As a result of the greasiness, I was wearing my hair up a lot, which is something I never usually do unless I’m working out. And I don’t think being constantly pulled back did my hair any favours when it came to the hair loss either. I’m still not blaming the CG routine, but I do think it made the situation worse than it needed to be.  

And my shedding season did stop pretty much the same time I ditched the CG method. That could be coincidental as the shedding only ever lasts about a month, but the timing made me wonder. 

I don’t want to be overly dramatic about it. My hair didn’t suddenly become crazily thin, nor did I start finding bald patches. But I typically lose 10-15% of my hair in my annual shed. Last year it was more like 20%, which felt like a lot. Especially because it looked thinner as it was almost always greasy at that point.  

Before we move on, I think I should mention that I have a lot of hairs about 3-4 inches long right now, so regrowth is in full swing and I’m not going bald.  

My current CG inspired routine 

Over winter, I had a lot of dry skin on my scalp. Reminder that dry skin can cause hair loss, and I’d just come out of a shedding season that hit me harder than usual. So, I was determined to find a new shampoo.  

THEN I FOUND A NEW SULPHATE EXFOLIATING SHAMPOO. And yes, it was the most excited I’d been about haircare since the last one got discontinued.  

I’ve been using the Lee Stafford Scalp Love Shampoo, it says it’s for hair loss, as the majority of exfoliating shampoos are. But this one contains glycolic acid. I was slightly worried about that as the skin on my face is really sensitive to glycolic, but I’m very pleased to say that it didn’t irritate at all. And my scalp isn’t itchy for pretty much the first time in two years. I’ve only been using it for a month or so at this point, and we are technically still in winter so my scalp is still dry in areas. But with the reduced itching, I’m seeing less dry skin and I have very high hopes. So high that they were 3 for 2 and I bought 3 of them after trying the first bottle… 

How is that curly girl?  

The miraculous glycolic shampoo is a CG approved product in terms of ingredients. And I’m still only using products that are sulphate and alcohol free. I’m yet to find a conditioner that I’m in love with to a point that I want to repurchase time and time again, and the one I’m using currently does have silicones in, which isn’t CG, but I’m hoping ‘the one’ will be CG friendly.  

Currently, I’m washing my hair roughly twice a week, every 4-5 days. And at that point my hair is getting a little bit greasy but not obviously so. But I run 4-5 times a week, so my hair wash routine is often dictated more so by my running schedule than how naturally greasy it gets alone. Realistically, I’m not sure if the once a week CG routine was ever going to work with that much cardio in my life.  

Other Products 

A few people told me to get a scalp scrubber when I was complaining about the downside of my CG journey. I couldn’t find one in a shop near me, I kept forgetting to add one to my basket whenever I placed an Amazon order and it took me forever to get my hands on one, but I finally bought one. They’re silicone, so they’re gentle, but the pressure is supposed to help stimulate the scalp, which promotes growth, and if used with shampoo, it helps breakdown any build up you have.

If I’m honest, I forget to use this a lot so I don’t experience the full benefit. But when I first started using it, I did notice that some of the dry patches on my scalp had broken down (into my hair which needed washing out), so I do think it has great potential if you can remember to use it properly. And it felt great in the beginning, relieving the itching without damaging the skin with nails etc.  

Another accessory that I’ve been using are these comfort hold hair bands. As I said, I didn’t think constantly having it up was helping. But these make it a bit more gentle. My hair is extremely long, so having it up for any length of time is always painful anyway, but these hair bands do make it more comfortable. They don’t have the strongest hold ever, but it’s enough to see me through a run followed by a dog walk. A ponytail probably wouldn’t see a full day without dropping though.  

My curly girl products 

If you saw my earlier posts, you’ll know I bought a lot of new products for my curly girl routine. Some of them are still getting used, others not so much.  

Cantu Cowash 

Ah. The cowash. So, as you know by how excited I am about my new shampoo, I’m no longer washing with a cowash. However, I did have some left and I do sometimes use it as a substitute for conditioner. And using it that way works a lot better for me than it ever did alone. Using it alongside my shampoo prevents greasiness and build up. And I do have a lot nicer curls when I use this, but it does still make my hair greasier quicker than using conditioner. We’re looking at 3-4 days between washes rather than 4-5 when I use something else.  

Cantu Detangler 

I bashed this product a lot last year. Every single time I tried it, my hair was a new level of disgustingly greasy. Erm so, it’s not that bad. Turns out when I’m using shampoo, and my hair is actually clean, a little (tiny) bit of this does actually work well as a detangler. Who knew having clean hair actually makes a difference?! It will take me about 500 years to use it up, but I am actually using it. I wouldn’t have believed you if you’d told me that last year. 

Noughty Care Taker Shampoo

This was supposed to be gentle, good for irritated scalps. Yeah, that didn’t work. My hair was flat and awful, and I was still itchy. Unfortunately, this is a firm no.  

Noughty Wave Hello Conditioner 

Sadly, another no. I really thought I couldn’t go too wrong with a CG approved conditioner designed for wavy/ curly hair.  It made my hair so dry and took me a couple of months to add the moisture back in.  

Curly Girl Method Going Forward 

I’m interested in maintaining the use of curly girl products, but I’m not fully committed. If I saw something that I thought looked amazing and it contained silicones, I’d still be tempted to try it. I don’t wash my hair any more often than is 100% necessary, although still more frequently than the CG method recommends. My hair only sees a brush when it’s freshly washed, but I think everyone with curls knows a brush on dry hair is pretty much game over.  

So, my routine is still loosely inspired by the curly girl method but very far removed from a strict CG routine at this point. In terms of curls, I’m exactly where I was before. Sometimes I get nice curls, sometimes I get waves. Sometimes I get a complete mess with no structure whatsoever. But here’s what my head is currently looking like. This is day 5 hair, at its worst, ready to be washed.  

Have you ever tried the curly girl method? What was your experience like? And if anyone has any CG friendly conditioner recommendations for me, please feel free to leave some suggestions.  

Until next time,  

Sophie 

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