Managing Your Child’s Hair: How to Detangle, Shampoo and Style

Finding a hairstylist to do your child’s hair now days can be difficult, even if you do, pricing can make you feel like you should just do it yourself. If you don’t know where to start, I will cover managing the hair, cooperation, wash routine, and protective styles to help you manage your child’s hair at home.

Starting off with a very common issue in children’s hair, dryness. Something most parents don’t realize comes from hair styles that don’t promote moisture retention, infrequent washing and moisturizing which can result in tangly hair.

Causes of Tangling

• Dryness from either lack of moisture or swimmers hair from not protecting the hair from chlorinated pool water and/or not clarifying the hair after swimming.
• Ends are damaged and need trimming.
• Styles that don’t prevent tangling or promote moisture retention.
• Leaving styles in longer than 4-6 weeks.
• Lint balls and matting from not wearing a bonnet or using silk/satin.

It’s important to recognize when your child needs a trim as it can help with manageability, reduce tangling and ease pain when manipulating the hair. Factors that help determine your child needs a trim: 

1. The ends are dull and lighter in color.
2. They feel rough to the touch compared to roots and mid shaft area.
3. Hair tangles towards the ends of the hair easily.

Causes of Dryness

• Infrequent washing and deep conditioning.
• Not using the LCO or LOC method based upon your child’s hair porosity.
• Using products that don’t properly moisturize your child’s hair.
• Choosing hairstyles that don’t promote moisture retention.
• Not rehydrating the hair between washes with leave in conditioner or misting water followed by Kayhairapy oil.
• Lots of friction against the hair from things such as laying, sitting and playing (especially in toddlers with curly hair).

Wash Routine/Frequency

Every child should get their hair washed every 1-2 weeks. The washes should include deep conditioning to promote moisture retention. Follow up with leave in conditioner and oil or grease (helps the longevity of moisture retention because it seals the hair).

Once a month use clarifying shampoo which helps remove stubborn build up from products like grease and creams. If your child is a swimmer, it’s important to clarify the hair after every swim if the pool is chlorinated.

If your child gets lot of build up on their scalp that looks like dandruff or severe flaking, they may have a condition that needs treatment. Their pediatrician can diagnose and provide medicated shampoo that may need use 2x a week. If you want to take a more holistic approach, some scalp conditions have diet or environmental factors that can be resolved once diagnosed.

How to prep for washing

Prior to washing, after taking down the previous style, it’s important to break up tangles and lint balls to prevent further matting (if you wet the hair before detangling). Use fingers to gently separate hair, a wide tooth comb, or a flexible paddle brush. In some cases, a detangle spray or leave in conditioner with lots of slip can help break up the hair or remove naps.

Shampooing

• In some cases, washing the hair can be most convenient and manageable while in the bath tub. For toddlers that don’t like to get their face wet, there are products often called shampoo visor, shampoo shield, or bath visor that shields their face from getting soap and water while washing. When washing hair in the bath, after shampooing I like to let the deep conditioner sit while they’re bathing and get a little play time, then I will rinse the deep conditioner last. I also like to detangle the hair with a flexible paddle brush while deep conditioner is in the hair as the slippery product creates more ease getting through the hair, prepping for styling. Helpful tip: Use a large cup to dump water on their head when wetting the hair, and rinsing product out.

• For older kids, or those who do not want to wash in the bath tub, using the kitchen sink is the old school way that works great. If your child is small enough you can lay them across the counter, place a towel at the edge of the sink for comfort and have their hair fall into the sink where you would wash. For older kids that can stand on a stool in front of the sink, they would simply bend their head over the sink. I would also use a large cup for wetting and rinsing if you do not have a detachable nozzle.

• Sectioning & Detangling is a very important step after washing, because this is where the hair is prepped for styling, and can make the job 2x easier if done properly.

• Parting the hair in 2-6 sections (depending on hair type) can give you control over managing your child’s hair. It also can help with a tender head.

Time Management

If you can learn and master managing your child’s hair at home, wash day should take between an hour and a half and three hours every one to two weeks depending on your child’s hair, cooperation, and style of choice.

Most suitable hairstyle

You want to choose a style that is manageable, time efficient for you, and makes sense for longevity. I would not choose a style that takes three hours to do, if it will only last a week, but I would choose a style that takes three hours if it lasted three weeks. I would not choose a style that takes two hours, if I know my child is tender headed and it will take me four hours to complete, even if the style would last three weeks, I would rather choose a simple style that takes 45 minutes to do, that needs to be redone every week. This is where convenience and manageability for you and your child is determined, and it may take time to figure out.

Tender Head Children

Tender head is when the scalp is very sensitive, when manipulating the hair and scalp it can feel extremely painful and uncomfortable. Knowing the difference between rough handling and tension vs a tender scalp is important for multiple reasons:

1. Tender scalp can be a symptom of scalp inflammation which can be diagnosed or treated by a dermatologist or physician.
2. Aggressive manipulation can be reduced or eliminated completely making it easier on you and your child to wash and style.
3. Tension is not from being sensitive, excessive tension can be very uncomfortable and cause traction alopecia even in children that is permanent.

Cooperation

The biggest struggle for a lot of parents is getting their child to behave while getting their hair styled. Some children don’t want their hair done because it takes forever, boring! Some children are tender and fear the pain, which makes it scary. Some parents are doing it all wrong and causing their children pain which makes them simply want to avoid wash day.

Making Wash Day Easy

1. Figure out the most comfortable way to wash your child’s hair, whether that’s in the bath, laying or standing at the kitchen sink, or a portable shampoo bowl.
2. Use moisturizing products that provide slip such as deep hydration masks, leave in conditioner, greases, creams or Kayhairapy Oil. This provides lots of slip to the hair which prevent snagging and pulling, detangling is much easier.
3. Choose styles that are suitable for time, longevity, moisture retention and what your child’s scalp and hair can tolerate.
4. Allow this to feel like their relaxation time, they can get things that create distraction to keep them still such as snacks and a book, tablet, tv show, music or toys. The distraction is to keep them still for the time needed to get their hair done.

Additional Notes for
Frequent Swimmers If your child spends a lot of time in the pool, it’s important to protect their hair from the chlorine as it can alter the hair. Overtime, hair can change colors, become extremely dry, tangly and porous. Managing swimmers hair can be very difficult for the parent and child as the texture of hair is hard to manipulate. Follows these tips to protect from pool water:

1. Swim cap! Most kids prefer not to, if so proceed to following options.
2. Saturate the hair with tap water, the hair will absorb this first so chlorine water won’t have room to be absorbed by the hair.
3. Apply conditioner or grease before swimming as it coats the hair blocking out chlorinated pool water.
4. Shampoo the hair with clarifying shampoo  ASAP after swimming

If your child is already suffering from summers hair, I recommend using a chelating shampoo to remove chlorine from the hair. Some cases cannot be reversed and the hair must be grown out and eventually cut off.

If you would like to purchase the products  recommended in this guide, to help with managing your child’s hair, visit  Kid’s Hair Essentials