How to Straighten Hair Without Chemicals

Back in the 60s, teens and young women discovered at-home hair straightening tips that worked quite well before today’s hair straightening products were available. This eHow article shows how to combine two hair straightening tips to create extremely smooth, very straight and sleek hair. The first part of the method is very good for your hair, and you can even stop at that point before the last step which calls for adding heat. Either way, it should last until your next shampoo.

Difficulty: Moderate

Instructions

1. Spray hair with milk. About a half hour before shampooing hair, pour one third to one half cup of regular milk into a spray bottle. Spray hair with the entire amount unless your hair becomes very saturated and can’t take anymore… stop at that point. Milk was one of our favorite hair straightening tips back when we wanted silky straight locks like Cher.

2. Leave it on for about half an hour. You can cover your hair with a plastic cap if you need to, but if possible, wear an old T-shirt you can wash afterwards, and just leave hair out in the open. Unlike many hair straightening tips and techniques, milk will straighten hair yet is also a good conditioner.

3. Shampoo and condition as usual. After your milk hair straightener has been on your hair for about half an hour, just wash and condition your hair as you usually do. Let it either air dry or blow dry. We didn’t use blow driers back then much, but when researching others hair straightening tips for today, they said blow drying doesn’t take away the hair straightening effect of the milk. You can stop here, or go on to step four.

4. Iron hair with a clothes iron. This step takes a partner. After applying the milk treatment, shampooing and conditioning your hair, make sure hair is completely dry. Never iron wet or damp hair – you can destroy it quickly that way. The iron's heat on your dry hair is also somewhat stressful, but not nearly as bad as on wet hair, and the milk pre-treatment can offset some damage. Set up an ironing board and put an iron on low heat -- no steam. Neal next to the ironing board so the top of your head is even with the ironing board. Have your partner brush out a section of your hair onto the board, brushing it very smoothly making sure there are no tangles. Then have her brush the hair again in a smooth sweep while following the brush stroke with the iron. Once over should give your hair an incredible straightness. You may want her to first test a tiny bit of hair to make sure the iron really is low enough not to singe. Continue until all sections of hair have been ironed. The final two hair straightening tips for this method are to never hold the iron motionless on the hair – keep the iron moving, and, when the iron is first being applied to hair, make sure it's gradually lowered onto the hair so it doesn’t iron a crease into the hair at the top where the ironing treatment begins.

Tips & Warnings

• Here are hair straightening tips if you want to use the milk method each time you shampoo, but you don’t drink regular milk or don’t want to bother going to the refrigerator each time you shampoo: Keep powdered dry milk in your bathroom and follow mixing directions on the box. Make sure the mixture has time to settle from the foaminess that occurs when you first mix it.
• Only adults should use the ironing method and no one should try it if irons or the ironing process is unfamiliar (as teens, we always had our moms do it for us). Use it rarely for special occasions to keep from damaging hair.

[godfather25]

on 7/9/2009 Excellent tips on straighten hair without chemicals.

[Merriment]

on 7/8/2009 This is really neat timing. My daughter recently asked me how to straighten hair without chemicals. She actually wants to also be able to reduce using her straightener, so we'll give the milk method a try!

[edieness]

on 7/8/2009 Great article on How to Straighten Hair Without Chemicals.

[sonni57]

on 7/7/2009 Good article on straightening hair it can take a while on long hair.