Gentle Lather Shampoo

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Ingredients

Conditioning Agents
Guar Hydroxypropyltrimonium Chloride

Film Forming Humectants
Panthenol

Gentle Cleansers
Decyl Polyglucose
Cocamidopropyl Betaine
Sodium Cocoyl Isethionate

Verified – Caution
Diazolidinyl Urea
Iodopropynyl Butylcarbamate

Verified – Okay
C 12-15 Alkyl Benzoate
PEG 150 Pentaerythrityl Tetrastearate

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Hair Cleansing Cream

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Ingredients

Conditioning Agents
Guar Hydroxypropyltrimonium Chloride

Humectants
Glycerin

Gentle Cleansers
Decyl Polyglucose
Sodium Cocoyl Isethionate
Cocamidopropyl Betaine
Behentrimonium Methosulfate

Moisturizing Alcohols
Cetearyl Alcohol

Botanical Ingredients – Extracts and Oils
Persea Gratissima (Avocado) Oil

Verified – Caution
Diazolidinyl Urea
Iodopropynyl Butylcarbamate

Verified – Okay
C 12-15 Alkyl Benzoate
PEG 150 Pentaerythrityl Tetrastearate

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Let’s break it down. Looks like they have very similar ingredients with a few differences.

Conditioning agents: Both contain Guar Hydroxypropyltrimonium Chloride, which is very good for detangling but has a higher potential for build-up.

Humectants: They both contain Humectants … Gentle Later has Panthenol which is a Film Forming Humectant meaning it will form a film over the hair and will help resist dehydration. These ingredients are also safe to use in low dew points. Hair Cleansing Cream contains Glycerin which can be helpful or hurtful for retaining moisture based on your climate and dew point.

Gentle Cleansers: Both contain a good amount of gentle cleansing ingredients, but the Hair Cleansing Cream has an additional cleanser: Behentrimonium Methosulfate, which sounds like a sulfate but is not. It is an extremely gentle surfactant and a mild detangling ingredient. It does not cause buildup, and is non-irritating to the scalp, which makes it great for cowashing.

Moisturizing Ingredients: Hair Cleansing Cream has a few more moisturizing ingredients than the Gentle Lather Shampoo: Cetearyl Alcohol and Avocado Oil. Cetearly Alcohol is a fatty alcohol that works as an emollient to soften the hair and Avocado Oil can also help soften the hair and has deep moisturizing, regenerative and strengthening properties. 

Bottom Line:

Both are great products and have many beneficial ingredients for your hair. Hair Cleansing Cream has a bit more moisturizing ingredients, so if you hair craves moisture and can stand the weight of the extra oil – Then the cleansing cream would probably be great for you! If you are looking for a lighter cleanser that has great cleansing properties – give the Gentle Lather Shampoo a try!

Where to buy:

Amazon: Jessicurl Gentle Lather Shampoo | Jessicurl Hair Cleansing Cream

Want to see more product comparisons? Drop me a line or leave a comment on which products you would like me to compare and analyze.

The post JESSICURL Product Comparison: Gentle Lather Shampoo vs. Hair Cleansing Cream appeared first on Is it CG?.

Say no to Sulfates

A sulfate is a cleansing agent and surfactant that can be found in household cleaners, detergents and shampoos. The two biggies that many shampoos contain are Sodium Lauryl Sulfate (SLS) and Sodium Laureth Sulfate (SLES). These and other sulfates create the lathering effect that removes dirt and oil from your hair and scalp. Sounds great, but these harsh sulfates can disrupt the moisture/protein balance by stripping the hair of it’s natural oils. Long-term daily use of a sulfate shampoo can create dry, frizzy and undefined curls. 

Say no to Silicones

Silicones are polymers that are meant to provide slip and shine while taming frizz. Wonderful, right? Unfortunately, these silicones can build up on the hair over time and create a residue barrier, which blocks moisture from reaching the hair shaft. The only way to remove silicones is with a sulfate shampoo, which can strip the hair. Endless cycle begins and no moisture/protein balance can be achieved. 

Always avoid both sulfates and silicones

Scenario 1: Sulfate shampoo followed by silicone conditioner and stylers. The shampoo strips the hair and the silicones block the moisture. This creates an endless cycle leaving you with dry, frizzy, lifeless hair.

Scenario 2: Sulfate-free shampoo followed by silicone conditioners and stylers. The sulfate free shampoo is not strong enough to remove the silicones from the hair. The silicones will eventually create an almost plastic-like barrier – no moisture can get in. Ugh … another formula for dry, frizzy lifeless hair.

Scenario 3: Sulfate-free shampoo and silicone free conditioner and stylers (otherwise known as the Curly Girl Method). Gentle cleansing or cowashing does not strip the hair of natural oils. Moisture can penetrate the hair shaft allowing the moisture/protein balance to thrive and curls become juicy and defined! Yay!

The post Say no to Sulfates and Silicones for juicy and defined curls appeared first on Is it CG?.

1. Analyze the ingredients with the isitcg? app

The first step… know what ingredients are in the products you use. That’s where the isitcg? app comes in handy. This app breaks down all of the ingredients in your products by putting them in categories. This allows you to see if there are any common denominators in your routine. Maybe your hair hasn’t been looking so great and after running all of your products through the app, you notice that a lot of them contain coconut – this could be a culprit. Some common ingredients that have potential to cause problems are coconut, aloe, protein, glycerin, shea butter, polyquats, etc.

2. Use the same products for an extended amount of time

A good way to know how your hair reacts to a product or ingredient is to use those products over and over for an extended period of time. It’s very possible to use a product once or twice and have good results, but if you can get consistent results over an extended amount of time, it’s very likely that those ingredients will consistently work for your hair.

It’s good to note that hair can be finicky and products can just flat out stop working or the weather can change and signal it’s time to change things up. I typically change up my wash and condition routine, but keep my styling products pretty consistent. Also, if you try a new product and your results go haywire … you can compare the ingredients to your go-to products and see if anything sticks out.

3. Add neutral protein filler

Adding neutral protein filler to a protein free conditioner is a great way to determine if you hair likes protein or not. Neutral Protein Filler is a product available at Sally’s beauty supply and Amazon.

First try a wash without the protein filler. On your next wash day, try adding the filler to your conditioner. Mix a small amount of the filler with the conditioner in the palm of your hand and condition as usual. Now compare your results, if your hair perks up on the second wash than you know your hair likes protein. If it falls flat or looks frizzy, protein is probably not your friend.

4. Not so happy accidents … trial and error

So much of this curly hair journey is trial and error and with time and patience, you will start to see a trend of what works and doesn’t work for your hair. Sometimes happy or not so happy accidents can help speed up this process.

For example, I was super excited to try a new line of products. I splurged on black friday and bought a shampoo, leave-in, serum and gel. I thought for sure this was going to be amazing, but unfortunately, I had the worst results ever. I was so disappointed! I tried it again .. same results. I thought to myself, what the heck?!?!? So I checked the ingredients and each product had aloe as one of the first two ingredients and wow! I had no idea my hair didn’t like aloe. So I started to remove the aloe from my routine and wouldn’t ya know … my hair started to snap back and I was having good results again!

5. Use a hair diary to track your results

There are a variety of hair apps available that allows you to track your hair results. You can take pictures of your hair on wash day and log the products you use. This allow you to look back on your results and easily see what products/ingredients produced the best results. HairDays is one app that comes to mind. You can also easily do this with phone camera and photos app by adding a caption to your photos with the details of your washday.

So there you have it … 5 easy ways to help you figure out what ingredients work and don’t work for your hair. I hope these tips help you on your curly hair journey! I would love for you to share some of your experiences with ingredients in the comments!

The post 5 tips for learning what ingredients work best for your Curly hair appeared first on Is it CG?.