Have you noticed your hair not being as thick and full as it used to be since you’ve gotten older? Did you know that your scalp ages 6x faster than the skin on your face? We fight against our faces aging on a daily basis. Pointing out our fine lines, wrinkles, discoloration and dryness all seem so normal for us and there are hundreds of thousands of products on the market to help with them. Few of us know how to gauge our scalps health and how well it’s aging. So let’s talk about what happens to our scalp an we ages and what we can’t do about it.
Just as the rest of the skin on our body the production of elastin and collagen slows as we age. Our hair also naturally becomes thinner and weaker. Hair follicles become less productive overtime. This is all a completely normal part of the aging process and affects everyone to some extent. Scalp aging takes place under the surface, but shows up as changes in your hair. Scalp aging is responsible for changes in the color, smoothness, thickness and texture of your hair.
One of the first signs of an aging scalp is obviously white hair. The production of melanin declines as we get older causing hair follicles to become transparent and appear grey or white. You may see your first greys around your 30s, but grey hair can begin prematurely and is triggered by many things.
It’s totally normal to loose about 100 strands of hair per day. As our growth cycles slow down with age, it takes a lot longer for new hairs to grow in the place of the ones that were already shedded. This makes hair loss seem more apparent. Additionally strands may also shrink in diameter due to shrinking hair follicles, causing individual strands to be thinner than they once were. Between these two processes happening simultaneously it can really seem that you don’t have half of the hair you once did.
Hair can also become dry and brittle due to a lack of sebum in our aging scalp. Sebum coats our hair strands from our scalp as it grows and it gives hair that glossy look we all crave. Without this sebum and moisture to condition hair, it can be more susceptible to breakage. This can be made even worse with exposure to chemicals, heat and environmental factors such as UV rays.
What can we do about it?
Changes in diet and lifestyle can help with these unavoidable changes. Make sure to feed your body with nutrient rich foods. You can get a full list on what foods are good for hair and scalp health here. Managing stress can also help with a rapidly aging scalp. Keeping your scalp and hair protected from UV rays while outdoors will lessen sun damage and prevent potential sunburn.
You wouldn’t think twice about buying some type of anti aging treatment for your face, your scalp should be no different. There are plenty of scalp treatments available also, such as tonics, oils, and professional treatments at salons catered to your scalps individual needs.
