Damaged Your Hair with Bleaching? Here's What You Need to Do

All bleached hair is damaged because damaging your hair is what bleaching does. This process literally breaks down the very substance of your hairs leaving them brittle and dry. There’s no avoiding that outcome regardless of whether you get the bleaching treatment from a highly qualified and experienced professional or if you do it yourself at home with sub-par materials from a store.

However, if you are doing the latter, or if you are getting your bleach treatment from someone poorly qualified to do it, the damage to your locks can be extreme.

So, while it’s true that bleaching will damage your tresses by default, if you do it right, you’ll have reasonably healthy blonde locks in the end. But if you don’t get proper treatment, you might end up with your hair in a state so bad, it literally falls off. This is no joke, you are risking massive hair loss or locks burnt so badly they break in your hands. If that happens, you must seek professional help immediately, and that includes a visit to a dermatologist as well as a stylist. However, if the damage isn’t on that scale of bad but noticeable, you can try the following treatments.

How to Restore Hair Damaged by Bleaching

Cut and cut mercilessly

If your locks are a tangled mess that looks like a cross between a bird’s nest and a fluffy dandelion head, you need to chop off all the split ends. They won’t miraculously glue back together into silky smoothness even if you smother them in deep conditioning treatments. Those hairs are well and truly broken, so the only way to remove the ‘nest effect’ is to cut out the parts that cause it.

Good news is that the actual extent of irreparable physical damage is usually not as big as it looks. Therefore, with the help of a good stylist, you should end up with a beautiful layered haircut that will make you an even more attractive blonde.

Stock up on tinted hair care products

One of the most important parts of restoring your locks after a bad bleach is reducing future damage. This is assuming you want to remain blonde. If you do, you need to cut down on the frequency of colouring treatments, which means using tinting shampoo and conditioner. These products will prevent your locks from turning a rather ugly shade of brassy-yellow. Therefore, you won’t need to go back to your stylist for more bleaching for at least 6-8 weeks. Even then, you will be able to get away with less harsh treatment.

This will give your hair time to recuperate and strengthen enough to take on a new dose of bleaching. At this point, you will only need to do the grown out roots as tinting hair care products will help keep the rest of your hair from yellowing due to oxidation. The effect isn’t perfect, but it’s as good as the chemistry of hair products gets today.

Blondes will need purple shampoo to negate yellowing and brunettes with highlights and ombre will need a blue one to neutralize orange pigment.

Oil it up

A coconut oil moisturizing hair mask is an essential element for your bleached hair restoration process. Use it 1-2 times a week in place of deep conditioning treatments, which are basically the same but with more synthetic chemicals in them. If you can splurge on a specialized deep conditioning treatment for bleached hair, do this, but if you can’t, coconut oil is the best solution.

However, severely damaged bleached hair needs more oil thana weekly treatment. You also need to massage some almond oil into your locks. Start at mid-length or only 1-2 inches near the ends, depending on how bad your situation is. Do this before blow-drying your locks. Please note that this isn’t a substitute for using a heat-protection spray. It’s essential to use every tool you can to reduce heat damage.

Rinse your locks with rice water

You can’t avoid shampooing your locks entirely, but it’s important to do this less often when your hair is damaged by bleaching. To make the washing process better for your locks, finish it with a rice water rinse. According to research, it helps restore and improve hair structure.