Denise Richards, 41, doesn’t have hair extensions. She said she takes care of her lovely locks by using an avocado coconut milk hair mask and washing her hair with vinegar to maintain a healthy shine. Photo By: Peter Kramer/NBC
If you flat iron, blow dry or curl your hair often, your hair is probably showing signs of heat damage. To repair or prevent dry, brittle hair, try the Avo-Coco mask. Denise Richards swears by it.
What you need: one avocado, 1/2 cup coconut milk and 3 teaspoons of olive oil.
Remove the avocado skin and seed. Mash the meat of the avocado in a pot and add the olive oil and coconut milk. Heat the mixture on your stove top. It should be slightly warm. Apply the mixture on hair, massaging from your roots to your ends. Twist your hair back in a clip. You might want to put a shower cap on if your hair is dripping. Let the mixture set for at least 30 minutes. Then, wash your hair normally.
For shine, simply rinse your hair with vinegar before you normally wash with shampoo.
If your hair is thinning or flat, instead of massaging conditioner all over your scalp, only apply it to the ends. This will still protect your ends from splitting, but your hair will have more bounce because it won’t be weighted down by too much moisture at the roots. For ideas on how to style thin hair, check out Cosmopolitan’s volume guide. Marie Claire recommends dabbing a cotton ball dampened with witch hazel around your hairline and on your part to cut down excess oil.
For everyone:
Glamour says don’t leave the house with a wet head because “damp hair freezes easily once temperatures drop into the 30s, and frozen strands lead to split ends.”
If you want your color to be more vibrant but don’t want to dye it with chemicals, check out Whole Living’s DIY color boosters. For brunettes, a deeper brown can be achieved by using a mix of cocoa powder, yogurt, honey and apple-cider vinegar. For blondes, tea, lemon and potato enhance sunny shades.
Eat these foods to keep hair healthy: Bananas, salmon, eggs, cantaloupe and cashews. For more foods that help hair and nails, check out this article by Women’s Day.