As you may have noticed, I can’t get enough of Rooibos tea! One of the great things about the ingredients we recommend on spotless is their versatlility. Rooibos is certainly no exception. As I’ve written about recently, along with making a very healthy and tasty drink, Rooibos is great for the skin for a number of reasons and is useful in caring for babies. It also promotes good sleep, eases stomach cramps, is anti-inflammatory and helps protect against cancer. All with zero negative side effects. As if all this were not enough, one of the most rewarding ways to use it is in hair care. It has a number of benefits for hair, and this post is dedicated to sharing them with you.
In brief, Rooibos has the following perks for hair:
- It has been shown to both promote hair growth and reduce hair loss.
- It protects the colour of your hair (whatever the colour, and whether natural or artificial) from fading and damage from sunlight etc.
- It adds smoothness and shine to hair.
- Its many skin benefits also extend to the scalp, making it a good treatment for itchy scalp and dandruff.
- It can also be used to give a reddish sheen to hair, and to add deeper red tones to a henna treatment.
- It helps balance oily hair without drying.
The best news is that it is very simple to use Rooibos on your hair and start benefiting from these great properties. Here are some ways:
- Use it in place of water in your bicarb solution when washing your hair the no’ poo spotless way (especially to benefit the scalp).
- Mix it with apple cider vinegar for the conditioning part of the no’ poo hair wash.
- My favourite: After washing, do a final rinse using a strong pot of Rooibos, cooled to lukewarm. No need to rinse out. It gives your hair a lovely smell and beautiful sheen. (Probably not for you if your hair is a very light colour and you don’t want any reddish tint.)
- Keep cooled Rooibos in a spray bottle and use as a quick spray-on, leave-in hair refresher and conditioner. This is also a very effective way to protect your hair from UV rays after or during sun exposure.
- To red-up a henna treatment, either use a Rooibos infusion in place of water, or add loose leaves (two teaspoons or the contents of two teabags) to the henna powder.