Lifestyle Habits That Are Causing Your Hair Loss

Take a step back, assess your lifestyle and see where you need to bring in the change.

While genes and hereditary traits do play a part in your hair’s health or lack of it, much is accelerated by your daily lifestyle habits. Dr Apoorva Shah, trichologist and founder, RichFeel, shares some daily habits that cause serious damage to your hair.

1. Smoking
Smoking is one of the fastest accelerators for hair loss, especially in those who are already predisposed to the condition. Smoking affects the normal oxygen saturation levels, restricts blood vessels throughout the body. Hair follicles need a fresh blood supply to stay strong & healthy. Slow flow makes hair regrowth harder. So when hair falls off, they do not grow back. Further, the tobacco enters the skin, bloodstream and the hair follicle leading to hair thinning and eventually hair loss. To put it simply, quitting smoke can save your hair and life.

2. Unhealthy Diet
Skipping meals, intake of insufficient nutrients and unhealthy eating habits affect our hair and overall health. Things that are not easily detected in your health, shows first on your hair. So, we may feel quite healthy, but if we find our hair suddenly looking dull or falling excessively, we should not ignore it. Since our hair is primarily made up of proteins, make sure you include enough proteins in your diet. Our hair also requires minerals like zinc, magnesium, iron etc. in the right proportions. Hair foods and supplements as directed by a trichologist can help maintain healthy hair.

3. Beauty treatments
Hair cannot cope with some of today’s beauty treatments and most of the commercial procedures can ruin your hair. Hot rollers and dryers destroy the hair’s elasticity and strength. Having hot showers and mishandling wet hair ruins your hair. Permanent chemical dyes damage hair by breaking through the cuticles. Chemical processes such as colouring, bleaching, straightening and perming, remove all protein and moisture out of hair, leaving it fragile and brittle. The scalp gets irritated and flaky, thus damaging your hair.

4. Mental Stress
Hair follicles are surrounded by and invaded by a network of nerve cells. Any adverse chemical activity in the nervous system might send unwanted signals to the hair follicles. Sleep deprivation is also a key factor leading to hair loss. Stress leads to sleep deprivation in many and hair loss thereon.