For maybe two months, it felt like my hair had stopped growing and actually became a bit more brittle. Changing to lukewarm or cold showers helped a bit on the “brittle” part, but I noticed the length didn’t seem to change much at all.

My hair is pretty thick and can get quite irritating, especially when it gets hot outside. I barely use hair-ties anymore because pulling them out leads to some breakage, so I use spider clips and bandanas to gather my hair up.

I’ve done the shaved-head thing before (even made it bowling-ball smooth because I hated the stubble), and it just made my double-cowlicky hair grow out funny as ever the 2nd time around. I don’t want to do that again because my hair is finally becoming tame after two years of growth (though it was kinda fun… but I like my hair color experiments more).

So when my hair length didn’t seem to change and the breakage made it feel like it was thinning out, I was a bit alarmed. I wondered what could be causing it, and I remembered at the time I was NOT getting the vitamins and nutrients I needed. Hair is made of protein, and I was definitely NOT getting enough protein. Mix in some major malnutrition because I’d gotten away from taking my vitamins and living on coffee and junk food, and there you go.

What made it weird is my hair was growing as usual before my major changes, but then I figured out it was probably the protein I was eating as a result of eating out all the time. Meat-heavy meals meant a steady dose of that protein. I’ve been experimenting with other sources of protein, but as I’ve started recording my food intake again (much easier when you control your own food supply and don’t have to guess restaurant figures), I realized I was still way down on protein intake.

With my new exercise plans, I really don’t need as much protein for fuel as my initial plans dictated, but I still need a great deal more than I’d been taking in. Remembering to take my supplements has helped me as well. Smoothies give me those crucial vitamins because of the bananas and the protein powder fills the gap. It’s just OTHER meals where I know I fall short, because I don’t get enough vegetables right now and haven’t done much with them yet.

There are some nutritional gaps when it comes to changing to vegetarianism, namely the B, D, & E family of vitamins. My outside time will help with the D family for sure (hee hee), but on other days it’ll have to come from the veggies I’ve been neglecting by accident.

That was a weekend goal. Got some rain yesterday morning when I’d planned to do some yard work (those weeds need to go bye bye SO badly), and it made me thumb through my recipe books a bit. I’ll keep doing that the rest of this weekend as more rain is expected.

I’m just glad the length is coming back, and my bandanas are preventing breakage. My hair actually feels better than it ever has, but I can’t wait for it to get longer so I can do more with it. The quirkiness of my locks tends to become tamer with weight and length, after all… meaning less trips to the salon to “manage” what has been unmanageable a good chunk of my life.