Hot Oil Review - Olive Oil

Hello People of the World,

Confession time.  I very recently dyed my hair – and more than once!  I have been blessed with very resilient hair, it may take a few weeks, but it returns to its natural soft and silky state after pretty much anything!

However, I think I’ve really pushed its limits this time.  Naturally, my hair is that ‘lovely’ shade that sits halfway between a dark ash blonde and a light brown.  The adjective lovely is my mother’s word for it – I prefer the term boring, but I digress. A year ago I decided to dye it black.  I know, I know, bad move.  Everyone said I would regret it – and I most definitely do.

But it gets worse.  A few months ago I got it into my head I wanted to be blonde, so cue the 3 different bleach jobs.  To top it all off, just a week or two ago, I dyed it a brown that is somewhat close to my natural shade.  Adding insult to injury, everyone said the brown looked the best – so it's true, your natural shade usually is the most flattering.

My point is, my hair isn’t thanking me at this point.  While the roots to about ¾ of the way down are soft and silky, the ends have still to recover.  The best way to fix this of course would be to go to the hairdressers and lop it all off, but I’m trying to keep as much length as possible, so I’ll see how much I can restore first.

Which is why I’m turning to a hot oil treatment.  There is a risk in this – the oil may potentially fade my hair colour, but at this stage it’s a side effect that I am willing to risk.

I’m planning on using olive oil, as it is commonly used, and the oil on hand at the moment.

***

Alright.  Here’s what I did.

After heating the olive oil in a glass jar that was submersed in a glass jug of boiling water, I took it into the bathroom where I then proceeded to massage the oil into my scalp and roots.  That didn’t take too long.  Following that, I actually dipped the ends of my hair into the oil, completely saturating them in the oil, as they were the most troublesome section of my hair.  Then, I simply rubbed some oil into the lengths, though I used nowhere near the amount of oil I had used on the ends/roots.

All of the above probably took me a total of about 10 minutes, as I took my time, ensuring I applied enough oil.  Once I had done all of that, I wrestled my hair into a shower cap and then wrapped a warm, damp towel around the cap like a turban.  Now all that was left to do was wait.

Since I had decided to make it a day of pampering, I climbed into the bath I had waiting and started watching some NCIS LA while I waited for the oil to sink it.  It was pretty damn relaxing for all of 20 minutes before the gardener showed up and started blower-vaccing right outside the bathroom window…

Usually the time prescribed to wait in anywhere between 30 minutes and 2 hours – I kept the oil on my hair for about an hour and a half before I rinsed it out.

I used the Natio Gentle Daily Shampoo and their Botanical Conditioner (I plan on writing reviews of these once I have had them long enough to assess them).

The olive oil, surprisingly, wasn’t too difficult to get out.  I was anticipating more trouble, considering my hair just about reaches the bottom of the small of my back.  I did however, have to shampoo my roots twice to get rid of all olive oil residue.

I also blasted my hair with a shock of icy water (I think the neighbours might have heard my shriek!) to close the cuticles and add to the smoothness factor.

Hot oil treatment finished.  Then all that was left to do was wait for it to dry and assess the results.

One thing I will note is that it took a lot longer for my hair to dry than usual.  I got out of the shower at 2:30 in the afternoon, and there were still damp tendrils when I entered my fencing club at 7:00 that night.

However it was definitely worth it.  My hair has been restored to its former silky glory, the ends were soft and touchable, and even the lengths were smoother.  On top of this, the roots weren’t weighed down at all – grease factor zero – and my hair colour didn’t fade either.

Two days later and my hair is still just as soft.

Olive oil for a hot oil treatment definitely gets a big tick from me!  This is definitely going to be a fortnightly addition to my routine.

Have any of you tried a hot oil treatment?  If so, what did you use? Homemade or store-bought?  What suggestions would you give me in order to improve my results?

Please feel free to leave a comment,

Teenage Goddess in Training,

Jadey xo

P.S – Next review will be Nude by Nature’s BB Cream!