Hair Trauma Story and What I'm Doing About It

Hello everyone, welcome to the Heal, Nourish, Grow podcast. Today I wanted to do another quick intro because I've been doing some weird things with this hair episode that is about to be played for you. I first recorded the first one on May the 20th, which is right after the trauma to my hair happened, and I believe that I go through the timeline in that I had gone in to get a highlight in my hair on April 11th, and at that time Um, also convinced myself to try hair extensions for the first time, which turned out to be a massive mistake. And I talk more about that in the May 20th one. But so that was April 11th when this trauma kind of first started. And then 5 weeks later, which I believe was a, a couple days before I recorded on May 20th, um, I had the extensions removed and really had this terrible, uh, trauma left to my hair. So you'll see that in the upcoming video. And then I recorded another episode as a follow-up in June, and then now it is August 1st, and I'm still just about to finally put out the podcast, uh, actually tomorrow. And so I wanted to record this, uh, beginning part so that you have an idea. What I've said about this is I am going to continue to do like a little bit of a hair health series, uh, but I didn't want to overwhelm at the beginning. That's why I decided to combine all of these. But going forward, I'd like to find some hair health experts to kind of talk about some of this stuff and just give you personal updates on the things that I'm trying. Because at this point, I haven't told you what I have been doing to try to have my hair recover, but you can kind of see the difference in between the first video that I made on May 20th and then what I look like now. So, um, and then this is probably— I think, when did I wash my hair? Today is Tuesday. I think I washed it Sunday. But anyway, let me back up a little bit. So so that if you're watching this on video, you can kind of see. So you can see now that obviously my hair has grown. I have retained some of the length. It is still very thin at the ends because I've been losing a lot of hair, but it is definitely retaining length now doing the things that I have been doing to improve my hair care. What I've done in the past, I've had long hair for almost my whole adult life, so I can't believe there are some of these things I never really thought about or I never really considered because I never had this problem before. I could just kind of wash my hair and dry my hair and it would be long and it would be fine and never had to worry. Well, the last several years, uh, it's really probably been going on for maybe 5 years now where I've noticed it's over time has been slowly getting thinner. And then I would say the whole pandemic situation, I definitely noticed. And after having, uh, the virus. I have it— I've had it twice that I know of, that there was definitely hair loss after that. That is now a well-known side effect of having the virus. And then the stress of moving, and then this stress that I did making this poor decision with— and I think I described in the first video the lady that I found in the new city, and the way that she did the highlights was very different than what my old person that was much longer processing. I just think it was really damaging to my hair, and then the extensions then on top of it— not a good way to deal with hair loss. So I've been doing all the things to hopefully have it get a little bit healthier. And also, in addition to that, when I will talk about this on the next one, when I talk about the things I've been doing, I had a full thyroid panel. Unfortunately, that is not showing anything that would indicate that I should be having issues with hair loss. And I say unfortunately, I mean, I'm happy that they're in in range and all of that, but it's not giving me any answers as to why I might have some hair loss. And then additionally, I also went to the dermatologist recently to talk about that. And again, I will talk about that in a follow-up video where I touch, share with you all the things that I've been doing to improve my hair health. But so I just wanted to back up so you could see the difference between this video here on August 1st and the first video I made about this, which was on, like I said, May 20th. So I'll put up maybe a piece of the video in here so you can kind of see more of a comparison side by side. And yeah, so that's— that'll be what is coming up here on this podcast. So if that sounds like something that you have no interest in, then obviously you can just wait for the next episode. But I think it will give you some just ideas about things to think about, just in case you've been experiencing this problem too, or things that you want to avoid in the future, such as possibly extensions. They've become so very popular now. And of course, anyone that sells them will tell you that hair loss is not a thing with them and that they're totally safe and, you know, all the things. And I did a lot of research and I found what I thought was a good person. And still, when they were taking out, it was, it was quite traumatic, the difference between my hair when I went in, which I already thought was very thin and was depressed about, and then what I actually have, what I'm actually left with now, is far worse. So, um, if nothing else, it's a cautionary tale to maybe, uh, avoid those and to really just focus on getting to the root cause of why you might be losing your hair. And obviously it's so weird to me that I'm so focused on this in every area of my life but that I did not approach this in that way. Um, so lesson learned. And as I go forward, I'll be sharing anything that I learned that works or again finding some experts to talk more about this because I definitely have, uh, based on what I've seen online, a lot more people are dealing with this. I think as a result of mostly, uh, the pandemic-related stress and the virus itself, and then also just, um, aging and everything else. So anyway, these will be kind of all put together. They won't probably totally flow exactly properly because I'm sure I didn't remember exactly what I said 1 month in between each of them. But so you now, you know the timeline. So the first one I'll play is going to be from May 20th, and then the next one I'll play is the update that I did in June. And then again, like I said before, this one's August 1st. So that's the lay of the land for this episode, just to give you some more information. So hopefully you don't get too lost and you understand what is about to come up here. So anyway, I will, um, you on the podcast next week, or you can hear it if you listen to it on the, um, audio-only version. But it's always over on YouTube if that's ever anything of interest. Sometimes nice to see who the guests are when I have them on. And, uh, always you can obviously play that in the background even if you're not able to watch it. But I always like having the traditional podcast version too, because if you're like me, you listen to them when you're on your walk or your workout or something like that. So until next week, I have another great guest for you coming up. I think I have at least 2 more episodes recorded and, uh, 2 more scheduled for next week. Actually, I do have something really exciting to share. I found a coworking space here in Utah that I went to. It's actually like an entrepreneur, um, kind of, wow, what do you call that? Um, not percolator, incubator, an entrepreneur incubator, uh, through Salt Lake City Community College. And I went to visit the space. The space itself, it's very— it's nice, but it's not like a bougie, um, you know, coworking space or anything like that. It's very functional. But the thing that got me so excited when I was reading about it is they have a professional podcast studio there. And so I already have that booked for the couple of, uh, episodes that I have scheduled to record. I believe it's next Wednesday. So I'm gonna get to be in that new space and be in this really cool, like, podcasting booth. So that's going to be really fun. And so I think, um, hopefully you'll notice— I mean, hopefully it's worth it, right? Because if you don't notice any difference in the sound quality, then maybe it's not worth it. But I think it will be worth it, and I'm excited to share that with you. So that's where I will mostly be recording the podcast from here in the future. Hopefully I can get the space whenever I need it. And then on top of that, just, uh, makes me get out of the house, you know, because I still don't really know people here in Utah. I think I've shared that before. So anyway, we'll get on to the recordings now, and I'll talk to you next week. Hi friends, if you're new here, welcome. I'm Cheryl McColgan, founder of Heal, Nourish, Grow. And if you were a listener of the podcast in the past, I apologize because I kind of went on an unintentional hiatus. I published an episode every single week for a year, and then kind of went radio silent. So what today's show is going to be about is not really about that, although I am inspired now to start podcasting again. As you can see, I am in a much different setting. I am in my new house in Utah, and I haven't found an amazing place to record yet. So right now I am just set up in our guest room, which is kind of a bigger space. And so you might notice some difference in sound quality. I do have my mic set up, but, uh, before in general for sound, if you're in a really small room and it's padded and has some acoustical tiles, that's really the best. I might have to take over a closet here or something to get the same effect, but hopefully this sound quality will still be sufficient. So anyway, that's why you may notice a difference, because I have a much bigger room here. Before, I— if you remember me talking about this before, I recorded in the little gun safe under the stairs, which had a ceiling height of almost exactly 5'7" because I could stand up and my tip of my head would just touch the ceiling. Um, so now obviously this is much bigger room, but back to the podcast and what we're actually talking about here today. So if you're joining me on YouTube, you'll be able to see me in person, and, uh, that will be relevant for some of the stuff going forward, but we're not quite there yet, what I'm about to share. Um, but so today we're talking about hair health and you might be thinking, well, how, you know, Heal, Nurse, Grow is all things health and wellness. So of course your hair quality and your hair health is actually something that falls in that category. Uh, I think a lot of people, men and women included, their hair is a big part of their identity. If they start losing it or having trouble with it or having issues,. And a lot of people have had that in the last, you know, 3 years because of the word that we're not allowed to say on YouTube anymore, lest we get banned. But, uh, if you've had any sicknesses or viruses or, um, surgeries or anything like that, you might know that you have had, um, a big problem with losing hair after that. And it's been in the media a lot as a side effect of having that virus. Um, And some, you know, famous people have shared that their struggles with it about losing their hair and hair falling out after being sick. So anyway, all that is to say, I'm just gonna give you a little bit of background on my personal health history and my history with my hair. So if you have known me for years, you will know that I have pretty much almost had this exact same hairstyle with very little variation over the years, and That's in part because the times where I have cut my hair shorter, it didn't actually— sorry to be distracted, but there's a beautiful butterfly right outside my window. I'm looking at this lovely scene on the side of my house while I'm podcasting with you guys. There's a nice big window in the background, so it's quite lovely. So apologies, the butterfly has now moved on. But when I'd cut my hair short, and this happened one time I was visiting in Paris, and I thought, oh, wouldn't it be cool to say I got my haircut in Paris, and I thought I had communicated with the hairstylist very well. At that time, I had hair that was probably a couple inches longer than what it is now, and then when I came back home, I had hair that was above my shoulders, so quite short. And it just doesn't suit my face. I have a very round face. I tend to have extra weight in my face, and so whenever I have short hair, it— I just don't feel that it looks good on me. Um, in addition, I've, I've noticed definitely some changes over the years in my hair. So when I was younger, I used to have very, very thick hair. And, um, one of my hairstylists even said I was like a troll doll. I had so much hair. I was never that big and frizzy or anything, but I just had a lot of it. And then over the years that started to change. So if you know some of my other history, you'll know that I had a whole bunch of surgeries in a short period of time. And that was about, I would say 12 to 15 years ago at this point. And it was a surgery on each shoulder for some damage that was there from golf. And I was having a lot of pain. And then I had at some point a partial hysterectomy. And then about a year and a half later, I ended up having 3 other surgeries because I had had 14 tumors implant all over my abdomen. Went to the Mayo Clinic. Um, they were not cancer, fortunately. Uh, but that was, I don't know, 5 or 6 surgeries in a very short period of time. And, uh, what I noticed after that is that my hair had, uh, was quite a bit thinner. And so when I did some research on that, I learned that anesthesia can sometimes, um, affect your hair and, and make for hair loss. And so yeah, that's kind of just how it was for years. I didn't think too much about it cuz I still had a decent amount of hair and, um, I just kind of accepted, that that was part of getting older. And then in addition, you might know that anytime that you have a lot of weight loss or have calorie restriction, that also puts stress on your hair and can cause some hair loss. So if you're not aware of that, if you're trying to lose weight, that's just something to be cautious of. And so another, yet another reason why you shouldn't be restricting yourself to only 1,200 calories a day. I mean, that's just ridiculous. I don't know where that number ever came from. If you can reduce your calories more gradually, you're much less likely to shock your body and then produce kind of hair issues that go along with that. So anyway, I had had, and I didn't do it super fast and I wasn't ridiculously restrictive, but I had gained some weight and this was, so this is like probably 7 or 8 years ago now, 'cause I've been thinking how long I've been low carb and keto. That's how this all started. I had been going through a divorce and I was super stressed out, and so I started losing some more hair even then. And, uh, it's just kind of progressively over the years started to be thinner and thinner, and that has definitely been something that I have thought about, have struggled with, have not been happy with about my hair. And but up to this point, I still had enough hair that I Didn't stress out too much about it. And I wasn't really significantly changing anything that I do. Cause I was just kind of accepting it really, because I'm thinking, okay, I get plenty of protein. I'm not deficient in any B vitamins, which are the ones that are really important for healthy hair. Um, in the last year or the last 4 years, I've been taking collagen every morning in my Keto Cream, which the link is in the bio. It's delicious. Um, so, but I didn't feel like that maybe it was significant enough. Amount of collagen. And the more important, um, the more things I've read about that, the more I've realized that that is very important. And so in addition to getting collagen in the meat that I eat, I've also been supplementing collagen much more religiously. So every morning in the Keto Cream, and then additionally I use the Joint Health Collagen from Vital Protein— or not Vital Proteins, um, from Sparkle Wellness— and also the Skin supplement from Sparkle Wellness. And so part of this, I'm not going to go too much into the, uh, products I've been using and stuff in relation to this. I might do a whole video just separately on that at a later time where I can show you each individual product and kind of why I chose them and what I've been doing with them. But just know that I've been adding extra collagen even more religiously for the last 2 to 3 months. And because this is something I really noticed this year being in Utah, Um, you know, change in water. I had to change my hairstylist. I've been going to the same hairstylist for 25 years. Um, so a lot of changes and just the stress from move itself, of course, can affect your hair because stress affects the hair follicles and, um, can cause some hair loss. So I'm getting there. I'm just trying to give you all this background so you can see how I got to where I am exactly today. Um, and I'm going to add some photos into this video, probably right around now. So if you're just listening to this on the podcast and you want to see what has happened, to my hair, you'll need to pop over to YouTube. But, and then, you know, braiding my hair for snowboard season, I could really tell like, wow, my braid is getting even thinner. And so I found, it took me a while, but I did a whole bunch of research online and was looking for a good stylist, a good, well-rated salon in the area. And I found someone who was on Instagram. I'd seen her work, really beautiful hair. And you know, just talked to her about it, told her my situation that I just moved here and I was nervous 'cause I've had the same hairdresser for 25 years, but my old hairdresser did give me sort of the recipe for my highlights. And that is also another stress that I put additionally on my hair over the last several years because for quite a while there, I was really going much more natural with my color. And if you look right now, you can kind of see my roots, it's not normally this blonde, it's kind of more like a dirty blonde, even into brown. And for years I had kind of gone way more natural, let it grow out, only get highlights maybe once or twice a year, and kind of go with this like balayage situation. But then the thing that we shall not speak of happened a few years ago, right? And I think like many people, when this— by the time we were finally like able to go out again and start kind of, you know, resuming some semblance of a normal life, the first thing obviously I wanted to do is go get my hair light highlighted. And just the stress of the world and the time. And, you know, also, I think I forgot to mention, within the same time frame, I believe it'll be 3 years ago, uh, this summer that I lost my dad. And the whole time that the pandemic was going on, I was traveling back and forth, um, probably within the first 6 months to a year of the pandemic. So right around March of 2020, I was going back and forth from Baltimore to do a stem cell transplant for my dad. So not only was the stress of the pandemic in general, but also the stress of that time in my life with my dad still battling cancer. And, um, yeah, so all that is to say that obviously there is a lot going on. So it's hard to attribute any one thing necessarily, but when I got to Utah, and so I'd been, I'd definitely been highlighting my hair more often, probably like every 8, 9, 10 weeks instead of 12, 15, longer than I've been doing before and just felt the need to brighten, just wanted to feel sunny and happy. And for me, that is highlighting my hair. I know, I know a lot of people can relate to this because, um, it's how you, you know, help change your mood, how your appearance is, and if you're feeling put together and if you're feeling like you are taking care of yourself. So, um, so that was some additional stress, probably, um, highlighting my hair more often. And then I went to this new stylist. And the one thing that I noticed when the first time I went, I was pretty overdue since I had moved. And, um, you know, it took me a while to find somebody cause I was nervous. And I went and had my hair highlighted with her, did a full head. And one thing that I noticed afterwards is it seemed like my hair was extra fuzzy and I kind of chalked it up to, okay, I'm adding on a lot more collagen lately. I kind of thought all these little short hairs sticking out all over my head was probably new growth and hadn't given it really a whole lot of thought at that time. Although the one thing I did observe was she left that on my hair for way longer than my old stylist did, and it was taking her so long to even do the foils. At one point she took some of the ones, the first ones that she had done on my head, which I think was on the bottom, took those out, rinsed it while the rest continued to process. But I really think it was just overprocessed altogether, um, and did notice that my hair seemed a little thinner, but just, you know, like I said, this has been kind of progressively going on, so didn't give it too much thought and just thought I had done my research. I, you know, trusted her and kind of chalked it up to like, oh, these are baby hairs. But now in retrospect, I'm thinking like, that was definitely breakage. And then, um, had my 50th birthday in April and was thinking about just, you know, again, not happy with my hair, even though it was long. And if you would've seen it before now, I would definitely would've, you know, at this point I would like to have that hair that I thought was bad back. But started thinking about extensions. So where I live in Utah, and this is kind of shocking because a lot of people equate Utah with being Mormon. And one thing that I was not aware of when I moved here is that part of that religion is really like keeping up with yourself or your appearance, which is kind of an odd thing to me in relation to religion. But I don't, I don't really know too much about it or what the thinking behind it is, other than the fact that it's like you're expected to kind of look a certain way or take care of yourself a certain way. And so what I've noticed about being out here in Utah, there are tons more places that do plastic surgery and do like mommy makeovers and hair extensions and all those kind of things. And just about, I don't know, every actress, all the people that you see on social media have this long mermaid luxurious hair and all that's extensions for the most part. There are plenty of people that have naturally long and luscious and thick hair, but many, many of them now are extensions. And so I was just kind of getting that in my head, like I'd always wanted to try them. I had considered it because I met a girl in Cincinnati that did it and was— she's really good about, you know, going to all kinds of trainings and keeping up with her certifications. And so I've been thinking about it for a while. And then this person, like I said, that I went to in Utah, she happened to do it here as well. And then we were going on our trip for our 5th anniversary over to Greece, and I thought, oh, wouldn't it be nice to just have really nice, carefree long luscious hair while I'm in Greece. Like, that would be so great. So against my better judgment, I mean, I have the, the Instagram conversation. I went back and forth with her several times just saying I was so nervous and, you know, I didn't want my hair to get any thinner. So this was like a conversation that we had had, and, and, you know, I trusted her to say to me, you know, if she thought it was going to be harmful to my hair, to say that. And course, that's always at odds when you're paying for a service, right? Are they really going to tell you the truth or not? Uh, so I got the extensions and they were tape-ins, and she said that's the best for fine hair, it's the best for thin hair, they're so lightweight, that's what she wears, and she has very— already had thin hair. And so I got them. Well, the first thing I noticed was that my head just hurt so much, and I didn't know if it was because I wasn't used to them or if it was because they were installed a little too close to the head. That can be a thing. But I got them about a week before we were going out of the country and then had them on the whole time we were there. And I just continued to have headaches the entire time. I had contacted her as soon as I got back saying, is this supposed to still keep hurting? And she's like, I don't know, I've never experienced that. And then meanwhile, I was reading online that can be like some things like improper installation, or it can just be that you have a sensitive head. And there's a thing called traction alopecia. So alopecia is hair loss and traction alopecia comes from, you know, tugging on your hair. So it could be tight hairstyles. It can be extensions. It can be anything that just like pulls on your hair for an extended amount of time. So of course in the back of my head, I'm worried about that. Well, finally I made it to week 3. And at that point it finally was, my head was better. And so I thought, okay, I made it to, about 3 weeks and you're only, you know, you're only going 8 anyway before you have to do something with this. I'm like, okay, I'll make it to the end and I'll still have them in while we, you know, have some events to go to and whatever. But then it just kept in the back of my mind, it kept bothering me, my head kept hurting. And then this was the, this was the last straw. And I'd done nothing but treat these with, I mean, I bought the products that were just for extensions, all the things that people recommended, only washed my hair twice a week. I mean, I was so I was so gentle and careful with these things and they started tangling like crazy. So I would, you know, wash, dry the roots, like I said, every, you know, 3, 4, or 5 days. And it would start out and it would be okay. And then I think because my hair was so long underneath and a relative amount of thickness that it was just, I don't know if it was just tangling with the fake hair, but it was intense.

I'd wash it.

I'd literally go out and just be sitting here like I'm sitting now and the entire back of my head would be tangled. And then I was having to, you know, get these tangles out all the time. So if you know, if you have long hair, you brush from the ends very— and here's the thing— gently, which by the time these were getting so tangled all the time, I was getting really frustrated. And so I know I was probably a little more aggressive with detangling my hair. But that was it. That was the final straw. We had been away. We had gotten back from Greece, and then we had just driven up to Jackson for the weekend for our anniversary. And yeah, it was like, it was just a mess. So I came back and got them out, and now we're where we're to the point in the story you're like, oh my God, Cheryl, you are taking so long with this story. Um, you can always, by the way, did you know this about podcasts, that you can actually listen to it on a faster speed? So if that helps you get through with that, I should have said that more at the beginning. So today's Saturday. I had them taken out on Tuesday. That was exactly at the 5-week mark. Uh, I'll show them to you next time.

I—

she actually sent them home with me. She's like, well, we might decide to put them back in. And I'm thinking like, no, there is no way in hell I am ever putting these back in my head. But I brought them anyway just to whatever. So, um, since I had them removed, I was even more devastated because my hair was so much worse than when I had them put them in, which is absolutely ridiculous. And that's why I have had my hair back this whole time, because I'm kind of leading up to where I'm going to actually show you what has happened here.

Um, yeah.

So ever since Tuesday, I've been doing so much research about how to take care of your hair, how to grow it. And this is coming from somebody who has had long hair literally almost her entire life. And there are some things that I learned about hair care that I have been doing wrong. There are some things I learned about, you know, the highlights that should have been a tip-off. Um, so many things that I'm going to be doing differently going forward. And I'm, like I said, going to share all that with you because now I am apparently on a hair regrowth journey to try to fix, uh, what has happened here. And I think You know, if I would like to continue to have long hair, it is going to take a while because, uh, really no matter what you read or what trends you see on TikTok or any of these hair growth hacks, ticks and tricks, um, that didn't quite come out right, but you know what I mean? You'll know that, I mean, obviously my hair is growing because you can see where I last had highlights. It is, hair is growing outta my head. But the thing is, is the hair that grows outta your head translate into a length. So if you have an inch up here, does that translate into an inch longer on the ends of your hair? And the— and this is why most people have trouble growing out their hair, because the things that you do that have the ends of your hair break off— it's the oldest hair on your head, it's the most delicate. And so there are some things I'm going to be sharing with you how you can better take care of the midsection of your hair and the ends so that any hair that actually grows that happens translates into longer hair on your head. So that is going to be a new thing here. But now I'm finally ready to show you. And like I said, I'll put some photos to compare. But of course I didn't take any serious comparison photos because I didn't have any idea in my mind that this was what was going to happen. Because, you know, when I did all the research, there was a lot of question if extensions can damage your hair. And the problem is most of the articles that come up first on a Google search about hair extensions and whether they harm your hair are actually from hair extension companies. So I'm going to do my best to write about my experience with hair extensions and try to get it to rank as high on Google as I can so that people can get a perspective from just a person. Now, I will say my experience may not be the same as experience as someone else. There might be, and I'd love to hear, in the comments whether you've had hair extensions, uh, if you've had damage from them, or if they were great for your hair. Because one of the things I had kind of convinced myself about in this process was when you get tape-ins, it basically sandwiches your hair in between two pieces. And so if you're getting extra length on your hair, which I was from the extensions, theoretically the fake hair— or not fake hair, but the donor hair— is covering your hair ends and protecting them. So I kind of convinced myself even that it was a way that might help me finally be able to grow my hair longer. If only I had done the hours of research that I did this week before I did the extensions, I could have learned like how maybe I could just improve the actual hair that's on my head. Because if you'll look closely here, I mean, if you can see in my part, my part is not getting, uh, significantly wider, or that you can see my head a whole lot or anything like that. I mean, it's pretty, you know, pretty dense still, even though I've lost at least since I put the extensions in, I'm estimating that I've lost about 30% more hair than I've had just before I started this process of the extensions. One thing over the years that I have noticed is that my hairline is receding. And so I'm gonna put this so you can see because we can check later and see if we notice any new hair growth, but you'll notice that my hairline is kind of far back and definitely thinner right here at the temples. And I never would have thought too much about this before, except for my ex used to say that I didn't have a forehead, I had like a three-head, because my hair when I was younger was so close to my eyebrows. And so if I put, you know, the— I guess it is not as bad, but you know, it's definitely higher than it used to be. I mean, I could barely before get maybe 3 fingers, 2 fingers. It was like a lot more dense around the hairline. So now I'm going to show you. This is what has happened to my hair. So if you're not watching on YouTube, it's just— you're going to see this sad little state of affairs. So that is literally all of my hair pulled forward, and you can see how very, very thin it is at the ends. And let me turn around and show you the back. So if you see the back of my hair, you'll see that it is super, super thin on the ends. And then now if I put it in a ponytail, I mean, that— look at this, sad in comparison to where it was. I mean, obviously I realize that there are plenty of people that have hair loss that is much worse than this. And, um, so if that's you, I'm hoping some of these things that I learned might be something that can help you, um, to grow more hair, to have a chance to get some of it back if that is your desire. But yeah, this is real sad here. And if you compare to previous podcast videos, one thing that you'll notice in the podcast videos from before is if I linked in YouTube, I actually— and let me say one more thing about this. So I did, I did wash it today and I did a treatment, and I kind of went a little overboard with the hair oil, but I'm trying to really just keep all of this that is still on my head really healthy. And one of the things I learned about that is always using leave-in conditioner and always using hair oil. I'll talk more about that on a different thing, but yeah, this is what I'm left with. But so you can tell, it's like, looks a little more oily maybe on the ends just because I went a little overboard with that. But one thing you'll notice from previous podcast videos is that my hair on many of them looks nice and thick. Well, if you'll notice in the notes underneath that I was linking Glam Seamless hair extensions. And so that is how long this has bothered me, is how I would— whenever I would get on camera, I always felt like really self-conscious about my hair. Again, like even saying now how silly that is, because now I'm wishing that I had the hair I had before this whole mess started. Um, but the clip-in extensions, I would use those when I would do to podcast interviews or whenever I was on camera for the podcast. So I just had some extra fullness and some extra density in my hair. So you'll definitely notice that if you are looking at this video now compared to previous podcast videos. Uh, so yeah, so that is the story about my hair and my— what is about to happen is I'm going on this little hair journey. Um, there is another podcaster that has been talking about this recently cuz she actually did a fitness competition. And if you know anything about those, you're doing a cutting phase leading up to it, severe calorie restriction. Again, what I was talking about before, uh, when you do that, you are going to affect your hair, uh, possibly. And that is what happened to her. She had a lot of hair fallout after the event. And so she's been, um, talking about her whole hair loss journey as well. Her name's Dr. Fit and Fabulous. Uh, she is a medical doctor. And so a lot of the things that I have, uh, implemented into my routine recently are based on some of the things that she has been doing with her hair routine. And interestingly, she has also been using extensions to kind of bridge the gap. Now I know she has a different kind that's like a sewn-in weft, so I'm just curious for her if she's noticed that that has put any additional stress on her hair. I haven't seen her talk about that, so I think whatever, you know, she did, the type she's using, or the person that put them in. Hopefully she's having good success with that. Uh, but yeah, so that is the story of how my hair got in this state. And as far as what I'm going to be doing going forward from here, I will be sharing that on another episode. I can't promise you what is going to happen with the podcast going forward. I would love to start putting it out again on a weekly basis, but it takes quite a bit of, uh, effort and time on my part. And it's just been a challenge because I'm torn about it. I love the interviews that I've gotten to do. I love the information that people share. I love talking about health and wellness, but the actual production of it for the time invested and what I'm getting back out of it, uh, is pretty abysmal. So, uh, if you have a strong opinion on whether you would like to see this podcast keep going, let me know. Also, if you happen to know anyone who offers very inexpensive podcast production, that would be great. I used to have my interns helping me with producing the podcast, and that was awesome. They were paid interns, but they were paid nothing like what a podcast producer would be paid. But I was able to teach them, since I usually do that for myself, I was able to teach them how to do it. And so that was working pretty well.

For a while.

But now I don't, I haven't decided to take on interns because that was its own kind of piece of work, having extra people to account for and to teach and to help them along the way, which I really enjoy. But right now I'm actually doing some extra project work in my old field, which is event production. And so by the way, if you happen to know of anybody that can use help with events, also open to hearing from them. Yeah, so that's the whole catch— well, part of the catch-up, the catch-up on my hair anyway. So I think the next recording that I do is going to be all about how to properly care for your hair, the products that I'm using, um, and we're just gonna start tracking this and see what happens. I haven't figured out the best way to figure out like the growth or it's getting longer. I mean, we'll notice here the shirt I have that's says eat well, work hard, love truly. I mean, I have a tiny little bit of hair going into that third line basically, and I did take a photo of the back of it this morning, um, kind of with my bra strap maybe as a measure. So I'm going to try to figure out some way to track it. The other thing I need to do to show you guys at some point is I have, um, a little picture of me from snowboarding this winter, and I had done 2 braids, which I don't normally do. I normally only do 1 French braid for snowboarding, but it kind of shows the, uh, the thickness of my braids really well in that picture. So I'm kind of curious to braid it like that again and do a comparison so that we have a good starting point. But when you see the little braids from before, it's— my hair was definitely, you know, thinner to start with, but it was nowhere near as thin as it is right at this moment. Um, so it's been a bit of a challenge this week for me to wrap my head around this, like what I did to myself, the poor decision that I made, um, the poor decision I continued to make after the second time I got highlighted by this, uh, stylist and had sort of the same thing, noticed it even thinner, noticed it seemed like there was more breakage. So, you know, don't ignore these things when they happen. Put some more thought behind it. And just don't go along your merry way, keep doing what you're doing, 'cause if you keep doing what you're doing, you get the same results. Isn't that a definition of insanity? I think, and I was guilty of it, so. But anyway, it's been nice chatting with you guys again. I hope you're doing well. If you have any questions about keto, about yoga, about health and wellness topics, my inbox is always open, as you know. You can just send an email to info@healnourishgrow.com. Or check in with me on social media. I am on Instagram every day in my stories. So if you're wondering what is going on or you want to check in on the hair in a live version, I don't— I'm going to try to start going back on camera again, even and especially now that I've talked about this, because it's kind of one of the reasons since I've been here in Utah, I've just gotten more and more shy about being on camera, which is ridiculous. Because that is the point of these things and sharing this kind of information so that people don't feel alone, so that people know that they're not the only one. If I go back to the virus and say about the hair shed and that and all that stuff, I mean, I forgot to mention that like most of us, I have had it, I think, well, 2 times that I know of. I was never very sick either time at all, but that could be contributing to all this too. So, um, yeah, anyway, I will talk to you again soon. And like I said, please get in contact if you have any questions or could use any help or need coaching. I'm always available. So have a great rest of your weekend. I don't know what day I'm going to be putting this out now that I just said that, but I'll talk to you soon. And oh, also let me know any topics or any people that you want to hear Hello everyone, welcome to the Heal, Nourish, Grow podcast.

Today I'm going to do a little follow-up on my hair situation, which is kind of, um, definitely a different topic for this podcast, but you know, your hair is part of your health. Things that are happening to your hair can indicate some either health problems or struggles or things you're going through, and it's certainly something that people people are having a lot more trouble with since this particular virus that we don't like to talk about on social media lest you get banned. But any virus and any illness can really affect your hair. And so since more people are struggling with this, I feel like that this is something that I'm just going to go ahead and let you follow along with. All of the future episodes, I think, around hair will have that in the title. So if you're not interested in learning hair health, you're not interested about updates on that stuff, I completely understand and it won't offend me if you skip over those. But I might also talk about some other random things when I do these episodes. But for now, I wanted to check back in because it has been— let me just look at my notes here really quick so I can give you the timeline again. So it's officially been 5 weeks since I had the extensions taken taken out of my hair. If you did not hear the first episode of this, I will give you the very brief version. My hair has already been thinning for a while. It's actually been something that's been going on for a few years, and just recently I had this idea that I thought I'd get extensions for a little while. We're going on vacation. I thought it seemed like a fun idea, and it was probably like the worst decision I've ever made, as it turns out. But had those removed 5 weeks ago. I got them 9 weeks ago. And then I also shared during that last episode about this that I had, um, you know, I've moved to Utah recently, which is one reason that the podcast was on a brief hold. Well, it wasn't so brief. It was a few months, but it's back now. And, um, during that time, of course, I had to find a new hairstylist. So the first time I had my hair colored with this new person in Salt Lake, was fully 4 months ago, and that is really when I started to notice kind of a significant difference in what was going on with my hair, but just kind of chalked it up to, you know, the stress of moving and also just, you know, maybe I hadn't paid as much attention to this before, but I think that also the stress of getting these highlights with the new person and having her do them quite differently than what I was used to processing a lot longer, which is, you know, pretty damaging for your hair when you're getting highlights that are this light. That probably had some effect too. But anyway, all this in combination has left me with pretty much this. I have all my hair pulled to the front. This is far, far thinner than it has been in the past. And even if you go back and watch the video that I did last time when this all first happened, I put in a bunch of photos of of my hair over the last few months before that had happened, and it definitely was, you know, I can tell at the ends it was significantly thinner or significantly thicker than it is right now. So I know that I got some serious damage. I also, um, had worn the same shirt on that last video, so I'll kind of insert that here so you can see what has happened. But since the last video, um, when I first had them taken out, I have been doing regular treatments. So I've learned a lot about hair that I didn't know quite recently because I've been doing a little bit more of a deep dive since this all happened. And as a person who's basically had long hair my entire adult life, you would think I would know some of these things, but I never really— I never really had to think about it that much before. When you're younger and you, you know, if you're, if you're not thinning, losing some hair by doing bad practices, is not going to affect you as much because you still have plenty hair on your head, and so you're not going to notice. And so if you're harsh with your hair or you're doing treatments on your hair or not doing treatments on your hair that you should be, um, and you're getting some breakage, it's just not as obvious because you've got so much more hair to cover it up. But as your hair gets older and thinner, you're going to notice these things much more, so it's much more important to be careful with your hair. And I will do another episode where I share kind of more of the practices about overall hair health and things that you can do to improve that. But I'll just share like just a couple of things briefly that I've been doing. You can kind of see the condition of my hair now compared to when I first had the extensions taken out 5 weeks ago. And so one of the main things is you can actually repair your hair, which is shocking, I know, but I did learn this and I looked at all the research. And there are actually treatments you can put on your hair that repairs the bonds in your hair. It kind of goes in into the internal structures of your hair and actually repairs them, which makes your hair stronger. And you should— if you do any kind of color treatment to your hair, you should be doing this on a regular basis because every time you get your hair colored or highlighted, it breaks the bonds in your hair. Like, that's part of the way that it works. Or if you do any kind of like wave treatment or keratin treatment, those things go into the structure of your hair, change it, and can damage it. So doing these kind of bond repair treatments are very important. And the one— this is the one that everybody knows and has been so popular for years and years and years— is Olaplex. However, there is a better one that works on more structure of the hair. And after doing a bunch of research and reading a bunch of people's— or watching a bunch of people's reviews on it on YouTube, it's K18. So that's what I've been using. They recommend— they you do 6 treatments in a row. So every time you wash your hair, you do this treatment afterwards, and it's quite convenient, much more convenient than Olaplex because you just do the treatment right after you wash your hair. You don't condition, and then you let it set for 4 minutes, and then you leave it in, and you're pretty much done. But so it repairs the hair, and so I think that since the video that I did 5 weeks ago that my hair definitely looks a lot healthier. It feels a lot stronger. Stronger. It just feels more resilient. So I do think that that has definitely been working. And then in addition, I've been doing protective hairstyles at night, which I've always known about, but I— again, I had plenty of hair. I didn't really have to worry about it that much, so I never did it. Um, and so yeah, so like I said, at some point I'll do another, um, episode that's more like totally things that you should be doing with your hair health, just in case you could use those kind of tips. But one thing I did want to do— first of all, I don't know what I'm gonna do with my hair long-term. So if you're not seeing this on video, it's quite thin at the ends, which I've already alluded to. But obviously getting them— getting cut at some point could be a good idea because it would make it look a lot thinner because the stuff that's left at the ends is just not that much. But by the same token, having it a little longer like this, on occasion I do curl it or something, it just gives it a little something something to still work with and still look longer. Um, and also as I go through this process of really trying to grow my hair all over, not just length, of course, you know, obviously I have long hair and I want it to eventually look thick again, so that's going to take a while, but just getting the hair all over my head to grow again hopefully is kind of the goal. Um, So the other thing that I want to mention that I just started and why I brought this tape measure up here to kind of measure my hair growth is because I've been doing some research on MSM, which is— I should have brought the package up here so I could read it to you, but it's like methyl something sulfate. Obviously I will put that in the notes below, um, but there are some studies that show that it is good for hair growth and a lot of videos on YouTube where people said they've experienced an insane amount of, um, like the speed of the hair growth really increasing. So that would be amazing because obviously if you can get your hair to grow faster, then you repair all of this damage a lot more quickly and, you know, get the density in your hair really, um, a lot higher again. So one of the things that— since obviously since I've had highlights, this makes this a lot easier. So kind of one of the things I wanted to look at is what is the amount of growth that I've had. So it's been 9 weeks, um, since I had a highlight, and it's hard to tell in the camera, but I did this downstairs and I'm right about an inch, maybe just a little bit over. Um, and that's pretty typical. Your hair generally grows a half an inch a month. Now people will say, and I used to, I used to be guilty of saying this too, and I knew this wasn't actually true, but this is the way people say it. They say, my hair's not growing. Well, your hair is growing because if you get highlights or anything, you can see that the hair is growing out of your head. You can quite literally see that it has grown. What they really mean to say is it's not translating into length on the ends of their hair. And I did learn some things about that. I'll save that for later as well. But just for now, all I want to do is like do do this check-in where we are, you're kind of seeing kind of the density and the thickness or lack thereof, but also figure out some way to measure this a bit so that we can see since I started this MSM, if I check again in a month, is it going to be more than an inch that it grew? Is it going to be the same? But if you compare this, and I don't have the video up from last time, but I'm gonna just kind of try to pull pull this down because I have these words on my shirt and kind of compare this from last month to this month, and then we'll see. It's been 4 or 5 weeks since I recorded that video, and yeah, so we'll have to look at where the— where my hair was on the words in that video. But in this video, it's kind of just coming to the top of "love truly" on the one side. I don't know, I can't quite get it evenly, evenly looking. I think that's also part of the thing is that I lost more hair on one side of my head than the other. But it's definitely like past, far past the work hard. It's right at the top of this love truly, at least on one side. So that'll be one measurement that we can use. And then I'm going to use this tape measure. And watching these crazy hair growth people, this is kind of how they were doing it. So I do have these shorter. I thought this would be interesting because I have underneath, there's definitely some hairs that are much shorter. And if I try to just get the very— this is so weird doing this on camera. If I get the shortest part that's kind of on the very inside here, measure that to get an idea. Oops. Okay, well, this is not going as well on camera. These people that do this all the time, I'm like, how do they do that and make it look so effortless? I'm not on YouTube, but I have actually decided that I think I'm going to do more content on YouTube. Um, so this underneath part, I don't know, it's not coming out how I want to. Okay, so let's try this. So we're going to go right over the ear here and take a measurement. And this is what makes it so hard when people do these like hair growth hacks and stuff. It's like, are you really getting the same piece of hair. I don't know. But anyway, that's like around 13. I'll do this off camera and I'll do it more precisely when I'm not having to try to look at myself and talk at the same time and try to make some kind of sense. But I think this shirt is a somewhat good gauge because at some point when, you know, obviously when it's down below Love Truly, we'll know that there's like a couple more inches of growth there. And I'm gonna let these highlights grow out for a while because obviously this has been so stressful on my hair. The last thing I want to do is go in and do another highlight right now. I mean, it's been 9 weeks, so it is kind of looking a little crazy, but I'm gonna go let it go for as long as I can stand it. And what I also am going to try to do is wait till I can go back to my hairstylist in Cincinnati because she knows my hair and I trust her, and I don't feel like I ever had nearly as much damage when I was going to her. I went to her for like 22 years. So that's my plan. And then I think on my last video too, I actually turned around here, so we'll see. Um, it'll be difficult to tell obviously because I don't know if I made any kind of measurement last time, but it is actually a little bit below my bra strap. I have no idea if this is the same one I had on last time, but again You can kind of see how the ends are very, very thin, and I don't even know if you can hear all that since I was turned around, but basically I was showing you the back. I can do obviously a little voiceover on that if needed, but anyway, so that is probably enough, um, belaboring of the hair. Again, in a future episode I'm going to write down everything that I've been doing. I'm going to probably wait another month to kind of share some of those things so I can see if I've seen any difference, know if they're at all effective before I share them with you. Um, but it's some supplements and it's a lot of vitamins and it's a crazy head thing that I've been wearing on my head that has to do with lasers. Um, so yeah, that's the story. And I just keep kind of— I try— I never do this on camera really, but I'm just playing with my hair so you can really see like what is going on here. I also think I pulled my hair back last time and this I just washed it today so it's very, very clean and you can see kind of the density on the sides. Definitely a little bit thin near the temples but you know again if you look at those pictures from the previous video you'll see that it's obviously changed significantly since even just a few months ago when we were on the Vagabond Tour. And I know some of my pictures I had it all, you know, kind of pulled over to one side. So again, if you're not watching the video, you're not getting the full effect here. Um, it's on YouTube obviously, but yeah, if I have it all pulled over to one side, like, that's the thickness. And I have other photos like that from literally just 6 months ago where my hair was at least a third thicker, if not more. So the thing that I'm doing in the next month is taking— it takes a long time to get into new doctors, right? But I am going to get a full thyroid panel because at this point, the amount of hair I've lost— I mean, I know I've said a lot of it is probably due to mechanical damage of my hair, just all the things that I described over the last 6 months. Um, getting my hair highlighted twice by a new person where it was left on to process a really long time, and then also the majorly stupid decision that I had to do extensions for a little bit. Even though I only had them in for 5 weeks, I think there was a significant amount of damage because my hair was far, far thinner when I had them taken out. And it wasn't just the shock of, um, you know, getting them out of my hair, because like I said, if I go back to photos, I can really tell that this is far, far thinner now. Just feeling it, I mean, it's just so pitiful. I think the other thing I did in the last video too was showing my ponytail. So that's just, that's a very sad state of affairs. But the lesson learned here is if you start seeing this in yourself at some point, I think, you know, like I said, this has been going on gone for a few years. And it just never got bad enough, thin enough, that was bothering me that much because I thought, okay, it's just, you know, I'm getting older, this is somewhat normal. But I think that these things really aren't normal. And again, I mentioned, you know, the virus at the beginning of this. I think, you know, multiple, multiple people that have had that, and it's been well documented that people are like losing a lot of hair after having had that. So that really could have accelerated this process as well. And I don't know if we know enough about it yet to know if, you know, if it comes back, it's just the stress on the body, especially since it's a new novel illness or virus that, you know, maybe it just takes time because after you lose so many of the hairs, like from the follicle, obviously those of us with long hair, it's going to take longer for it to look normal again because you've got to have all this hair coming and get to some kind of length that gives it, you know, fullness at the top. And then, you know, if you want it to be thick at the bottom again, I mean, it's going to be a good 2 years from now, right, before we ever know if it gets back to a thicker level because the ends are always going to look thin for a while until, you know, it's like start cutting it back up and hopefully the rest of the hair is filling in. So it'll be a while, but, um, the point is don't wait, go see a doctor, get some things checked. I know my thyroid has been an issue in the past, and since we moved and since we were on the Vagabond tour, I haven't taken my thyroid medication now for probably a year. So I mean, that's definitely factoring into this, and I wasn't too worried about it because it was never very bad. I was always on a very low dose, that also changes over time. And, you know, being under stress for the last year, that can affect your thyroid levels. So just stress in general, getting some hair fall, and then on top of that, possibly, you know, having a thyroid that was worse than it could be because my sister has Hashimoto's. My mom always had hypothyroid. My dad had thyroid cancer. So there's definitely a history of that in my family. And you would think as focused as I am on health and wellness that one of the first things I would have done when I got here is to find a doctor and get back on that, but I did not, so sad. But hopefully you can learn from my mistakes. So anyway, um, that is the hair update for this month. I'm kind of thinking maybe I'll do it once a month, something like that, um, but I do think it'll be interesting. I'll let you know what I learn along the way. I'll also share if I find anything health-related that's been causing this, and also if some of the products that I'm using are working. Because like I said, one of the products that I'm trying is pretty interesting. It's a helmet that's kind of like an LED and laser therapy. And this makes a lot of sense because if you have listened to some of my previous content in past, there's a lot of evidence that red light therapy, laser all that kind of stuff can really help with mitochondrial health and repair, uh, your cells and give you more energy. So all of this totally makes sense in relation to hair repair. So the problem is it's a very long-term thing. It can take a while. I started using the helmet about a month ago now, so I'm going to give that a couple months before I have any commentary. And of course I'm doing all these other things at the same time, so it'll be interesting to see if I can pinpoint one that seems to be helping more than the other. But I think the thing is probably is a combination of all of them together hopefully will help. And then of course finding out if there's any health issues that I need to be concerned about in relation to that. So anyway, again, I'll wrap it up now. That's the hair update. I'm gonna be more organized in the future, have the things I'm trying, let you know what I think. And yeah, we'll just see how it goes. And have a wonderful rest of your day. Talk to you soon.