Shampoos I’ve Been Loving For My Relaxed Hair Care

Shampoos are the linchpin or starting point for every hair regimen, at least in my opinion. You can't have healthy hair relaxed if your hair isn't properly cleaned. That might explain why I have so many shampoos in my relaxed hair regimen.

Dirty hair and scalp are breeding grounds for an unhealthy scalp, stunting hair growth and retention. What makes our hair and scalp dirty is the build-up of dirt, oil, dirt, things floating in the hair, dead skin cells, and the products we use on our hair.

Related read: 7 Of The Best Tips For Shampooing Relaxed Hair

Using a good shampoo is the best way to remove those things from both your hair and scalp giving them a chance to start over fresh regularly.

Here are the shampoos that I’ve been using regularly. I'll walk through through why I’m using them, and how I’m using them.

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About a year ago I went a little crazy buying shampoos. So I had several of them waiting for me to use them. Some of the shampoos were what I would call staples. Others were new to me so I wanted to try them out.

Over the last few months, I’ve been trying out some of those new-to-me shampoos on my hair stash to see if I like them and how they interact with my hair product staples.

Design Essentials Almond & Avocado Moisturizing and Detangling Shampoo

I’ve been using this Design Essentials moisturizing shampoo over the last couple of months. I’ve had design essential products used on my hair before. I’ve used a couple of design essentials products at home but most of my exposure to this brand has been in the hair salon. This shampoo claims to hydrate, soften, detangle, and cleanse while replenishing moisture.

I like how clean my hair feels after using it but not dried out. The shampoo lathers really, really well. It is not protein-free as it has Hydrolyzed Wheat Protein in it so it’s not a shampoo I tend to use every week. I can’t say how well it helps with detangling as I detangle my hair before washing it.

Related read: Joico Moisture Recovery Shampoo Review

Joico Moisture Recovery Shampoo

This has been one of my hair staples so I’ve talked it about numerous times in videos, on my blog, and especially in my IG feed.

It’s a really good moisturizing shampoo that I have used weekly in conjunction with a sulfate-free shampoo. It claims to provide 24-hour moisture replenishment helping restore elasticity and lessen breakage.

I plan to keep this shampoo in my product rotation even though I think the design essentials Almond & Avocado shampoo does a better job of cleaning dirt, oil, and build-up from my hair.

TGIN Moisture Rich Sulfate Free Shampoo

This has been my other staple shampoo. One thing that drew me to it is it claims to gently cleanse without stripping strands of their natural oils while reducing breakage and increasing moisture retention.

Related read: TGIN Moisture Rich Sulfate Free Shampoo Review

I will admit I’ve been using it less and less. It does lather well and is protein-free, but since I started using other shampoos I’ve noticed this TGIN shampoo doesn’t clean my hair as well as the others do. Especially when I have a lot of product build-up.

Nevertheless, it’s still a good shampoo and one I may keep in rotation because it’s sulfate and protein-free.

ORS Olive Oil Creamy Aloe Shampoo

Stepping away from moisturizing shampoos, this ORS shampoo is the clarifying shampoo in my hair regimen. I use it sparingly because it’s a clarifying shampoo meaning it gives my hair a deeper clean than the other shampoos I mentioned.

Related read: ORS Olive Oil Moisture Restore Creamy Aloe Shampoo Review

While it deep cleans it doesn’t strip all of the moisture from my hair. Because of that, my hair doesn’t feel like straw afterward like with some other clarifying shampoos I used in the past.

The last couple of shampoos I’ve been using are also used sparingly.

Not Your Mother's Clean Freak Dry Shampoo

I don't use this one often either. It's only pulled out when I can't immediately wash my hair and want to give it a refresh. This is usually after I've been working out in my yard and dust and sweat got on my scalp. Also, after I do a nice sweaty workout, and need to soak up the sweat.

I like that it’s fragrance-free and doesn’t irritate my scalp.

Nizoral Anti-Dandruff Shampoo

This is a special shampoo for me as I only use it when my scalp starts acting up. This typically only happens when the seasons change from warm to cold or cold to warm. The interesting thing is my scalp really only acts up along my front hairline.

When I start seeing some flaking on my hairline, I pull this shampoo out and use it weekly for about four weeks. I apply it only to the problem areas by massaging it in and then letting it sit for about five minutes. This helps to clear up the scalp issues along my hairline until the seasons change again.

Honarable mentions

There are a few other shampoos I used over the last year but am not currently using. The first is the Design Essentials Agave & Lavender Moisturizing Hair Bath. It can be worked into a really thick lather which makes me thinks its really working hard to clean my hair. It is sulfate-free but does have protein. I only stopped using it because I used up the bottle and I'm not buying any new shampoos until I use up the other ones I have.

The other shampoo is the Brigeo Destined For Density Peptide Shampoo. I got this to help with my excessive shedding episode because it has caffeine and biotin in it. Once the shedding got back to normal levels I stopped using it because its not very moisturizing and made my hair feel dry.

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