킴씨머리 (Kimshi Meoli) | Caprylyl Glycol vs. DMDM Hydantoin: What's in Your Bottle of TRESemme Naturals?

안녕하세요?

If you have been in the natural world for longer than a day, you have likely heard of or experimented with the TRESemme brand of conditioners. A self-described "affordable yet professional" line, TRESemme carries a wide range of products - shampoos, conditioners, serums, hairsprays, dry shampoos, mousses, gels, heat protectants, deep conditioners, etc. It was one of the first product lines I used during my transition and ongoing natural odyssey; for 2.5 years I have used a various assortment of their shampoos, conditioners and deep conditioners with great success. Though the majority of the TRESemme lines offered were not free of sulphates or silicones, they still had Tightly Curly (TC) friendly ingredients most of the time, and their low fragrance (and comparatively low price) appealed to me.

Since going fully CG over the past few months, I transitioned from using the regular TRESemme conditioners and shampoos to the highly acclaimed conditioner sitting in many naturalistas' shower caddies: TRESemme Naturals Nourishing Moisture Conditioner. Though it came in a smaller 25 oz. bottle and was silicone free, it still had the same great slip and moisture available in the regular conditioners from TRESemme's regular lines. I have used it for deep conditioning, detangling and conditioning, and even as a leave in on occasion. For the price (about $3.50-$5.99 in most Targets, Wal-Marts and drugstores), it has relatively good ingredients. The fragrance does not bother me much and it is free of dyes and many other potential irritants. It sounds almost perfect, right? That's what many curlies and coilies thought, as well. But apparently the chemists at TRESemme felt that something was left to be desired in the 2011 reformulation of the product. Yup...they've changed it again, folks. The second one in less than 5 years (it was reformulated back in 2011; the isopropyl alcohol [drying, short chain] was removed, and more avocado oil and aloe vera were added to the formula).

Anytime I'm in a store with a hair care aisle, I stop by and see what they have. Last week, I was in Wal-Mart with one of my friends, and as I glanced over the TRESemme section, I noticed that the bottle design for TRESemme Naturals was different. With dread, I picked it up, flipped it over, and felt my heart sink to my toes as I saw the new list of ingredients:

The new ingredients list for the TRESemme Naturals Nourishing Moisture Conditioner: Water (Aqua), Cetearyl Alcohol, Stearamidopropyl Dimethylamine, Behentrimonium Chloride, Persea Gratissima (Avocado) Oil, Brassica Campestris/Aleurites Fordi Oil Copolymer, Aloe Barbadensis Leaf Extract, Fragrance (Parfum), Dipropylene Glycol, Potassium Chloride, Lactic Acid, Disodium EDTA, DMDM Hydantoin, PEG-150 Distearate, Caprylic/Capric Triglyceride, Lauroyl Lysine, Methylchloroisothiazolinone, Methylisothiazolinone.

Here's the previous ingredients list for comparison: 

Water, Caprylic/Capric Triglyceride, Stearyl Alcohol, Cetyl Alcohol, Stearamidopropyl Dimethylamine, Persea Gratissima (Avocado) Oil, Aloe Barbadensis Leaf Extract, Brassica Campestris/Aleurites Fordi Oil Copolymer, Fragrance, Caprylyl Glycol, Aspartic Acid, Lauroyl Lysine, Distearyldimonium Chloride, Benzyl Alcohol, Citric Acid.

In the new list, the ingredients highlighted in blue were in the previous formulation, but their proportions have been changed (the AVJ and water are about the only things that stayed the same lol). The ingredients in red are new additions. In the list of ingredients just above this paragraph, the bolded ingredients are the ones that remained in the newest formulation. I did a bit of research on these ingredients, and here's some info I found on TightlyCurly.com about the newest additions to the formula:

Cetearyl Alcohol
Used as an emollient, emulsifier, conditioner, and thickener. Not the same as SD alcohol or ethanol. This is actually a mixture of Cetyl Alcohol and Stearyl Alcohol [Hunting (Conditioning) pg 142].

Behentrimonium Chloride
Used for detangling and as an anti-static ingredient and emulsifier [Begoun pg 75, Winter pg 100].

Dipropylene Glycol
Similar in function to propylene glycol. Humectant. Pg 211, 428. (Propylene glycol: Humectant. This is a clear, colorless, thick liquid. Can penetrate the skin better than glycerin, but is less expensive. Second in moisture-carrying abilities only to water. Can also be used to dissolve ingredients (in the way that water can dissolve them). Winter pg 428. Rumors have circulated that it is bad, but there is no research validating this. For more information, check out Propylene Glycol Begoun pg 1326.)

Potassium Chloride
 Used in products as a cheap thickener. Considered to make the product a bit more stable than using Sodium Chloride as a thickener instead. Potassium Chloride is a salt. Comes in colorless crystals that are salty in taste. Used in food as well as in cosmetics [Winter (7th ed) pg 426; Hunting (Conditioning) pg 339].

Lactic Acid                 
Lactic acid is used in hair care products mainly to adjust the pH, but may also be used as a humectant. Lactic acid occurs in sour milk through fermenting lactose, but it's also prepared commercially. Since it is considered safe (in small doses), it is often used to adjust the pH in products. Since it also somewhat increases the moisture content in hair in small amounts, this is an added benefit to including it. In high enough concentrations, it can harm your hair, but in the small concentrations usually used in hair products (it usually appears at the bottom of the ingredients list, meaning there isn't much of it in there), it's fine [Hunting (Conditioning) pg 258].

Disodium EDTA
 Chelating ingredient that attracts the minerals away from the hair shaft and helps them rinse away. Good to use after swimming [Begoun]. Aso used as a preservative. Considered harmless in cosmetics at low levels. Sold as a water soluble white powder that is slightly acidic [Hunting (Conditioning) pg 185].

 DMDM Hydantoin
Preservative. (Preservative:  Used to keep microbes such as bacteria, mold and fungus from growing in your products. Though many are controversial, it's believed to be much better to use products with them than without. For more informaiton, see Paula Begoun’s Problems With Preservatives?.)

PEG-150 Distearate
Thickener.                                

Methylchloroisothiazolinone/Methylisothiazolinone
Most research that's been done on these two preservatives have been done on how Methylchloroisothiazolinone (and) Methylisothiazolinone work together. These preservatives are known to be corrosive to skin, irritating to eyes, and toxic to fish. However, in the low doses of it used in cosmetics, they haven't been found to be irritating so long as it isn't used in concentrations above 0.12 percent. The reason these two ingredients are so often found together is because when they are combined, the kill off nearly all microbes, and not much of them are needed to do so. They also work over a wide range of product pHs. When these two ingredients are sold as a ready-made mixture, Magnesium nitrate (as well as a little Magnesium chloride) is often added to them (though it's not usually listed in ingredient lists as being there) [Hunting (Conditioning) pgs 276-277].

 From all appearances, it seems like TRESemme's chemists were trying to thicken up the formula. Some of the changes make sense to me. The switch from stearyl and cetyl alcohols to simply cetearyl alcohol, for example. And moving the avocado oil from spot #5 (after water) to the number 4 slot. Even adding more stearamidopropyl dimethylamine (the main slip ingredient in much-loved Aussie Moist) seems like a positive change to me. Others, however, I'm not so sure about. All of the preservative switch-ups, as a prime example. The several preservatives grouped together at the end of the old formula were traded for less gentle ones, and even one that has the potential to be formaldehyde-releasing - DMDM Hydantoin. I'm also not thrilled about the potassium chloride. My hair is particularly sensitive to short-chain alcohols and drying salts, so I may not be able to use this as my staple rinse out conditioner any longer.

As disappointed as I am that it looks like TRESemme fixed something that wasn't broken, only time will tell how this newest formulation pans out in the textured hair world.

A shot of the TRESemme products section in the Target near my house. The newly reformulated conditioners have a black background against white letters, as seen in several of the bottles above. As you can see, the Naturals line isn't the only one that received a makeover. I checked the back of all of the shampoos and conditioners, and TRESemme added harsher cleansers to the shampoos like TEA-dodecylbenzenesulfonate, and potassium chloride, mineral oil and/or isopropyl alcohol to almost all of the conditioners. It just looks like a downgrade in product quality, which is saddening.

 

Do you or any of your family members use TRESemme or TRESemme Naturals? Have you tried the reformulated conditioner? Does it work the same on your hair? If you haven't tried the newest formula, do you think that you will purchase it and try it, or will you look for another product? Let me know in the comments below, bellas!

Hullo! Primero parte :-D

안녕하세요 (Annyeonghaseyo = hello), curlies!

I know that it's been an eternity since I last posted, but I had good reason for it this time - school. I'm taking 15 credits this semester again, and I really wanted to focus on classes. So, I didn't just take a blog break, but a break from most social media in general. I feel bad for leaving y'all in the dark, though *sniffles* :-( Hopefully a few updates about everything will make up for it. Sooo, here we go!

1. Universidad (College/University): MUCH better this semester! By God's grace, I'm able to really buckle down and get things done this term. I know that God is a huge part of that, just because I was having emotional issues last semester. Every day hasn't been easy, and I have been tempted to skip classes some days, but I realised how disrespectful that is - especially since my classes are being paid for by my school. So I'm really trying to be more diligent this semester. 

Also, Korean is going really well! It makes Spanish seem like a walk in the park, but I LOVE Korean! It's so different, and yet makes perfect sense to me. King Sejong (credited with inventing hangul, the Korean writing system) and his advisors were geniuses! The entire alphabet was created based on nature and the structure of a person's throat and vocal organs. It's amazing to me that just looking at a word tells you how to pronounce it! It's so much simpler and more logical to me than English. Another cool thing about Korean is that all words are built from Consonant + Vowel (always in that order!) syllable blocks, so translating names is a bit easier. 

For instance, my first name in English is: KIM-ber-lee. Korean doesn't have the strongly emphasised "-er" that I have in my second syllable. But in Korean, my name is written as this: 킴벌리 and pronounced as KEEM-bul-lee. 

The force is still on that first syllable, because the first consonant (ㅋ) is an aspirated (spoken with air) consonant and commonly used for loanwords and non-Korean words/names. The "b" consonant (ㅂ) has a slight "p" sound to it, but it's softened by the previous syllable.  Also, the first two syllables have this nifty thing going on called Patchim (or what my sunsengnim [선생님] calls C-star). Patchim is when you add another consonant (or 2) to the original Consonant + Vowel block. It can change the pronunciation of that consonant - like in the middle syllable of my Korean name. The "ㄹ" has a slight rolling "r" sound (think like the double "r" in correr [Spanish]). As patchim, though, the "ㄹ" changes to an "l" sound. The "ㄹ" would have that rolling "r" in the last syllable ("ree"), but since there's another "ㄹ" right before it, the first one makes the second one take on it's "l" sound.

Also, in the word 선생님, there's patchim in every syllable. The "ㄴ" and "ㅁ" don't have sound changes, but the "ㅇ" does. Originally, "ㅇ" is a silent consonant (needed for words that start with vowel sounds but that need a sort of consonant placeholder), but with patchim, the silence is broken and "ㅇ" is pronounced as "ng" (like the "ng" in "ing"). Pretty cool, huh? Okay, going out of nerd mode...

2. Spiritual Health: I'm keeping on keeping on. I'm still in the same life group (small group/Sunday school) at my church, and we're supposed to be starting a new series in a couple of weeks. I guess I'm excited for it, but for a while now, I've been very dissatisfied with my church. Before y'all run away and condemn me for blaspheming Christ, please believe that my dissatisfaction is biblical, and not just nitpicky things like the music. I don't want to go on what seems like a whiny rant about it, but suffice it to say that I don't feel like I'm growing spiritually at the church I'm currently attending with my family. It's bothered me for quite a long time now (I think I started noticing around 11th or 12th grade), and I've continued going only because I'm on a ministry team with my sister and I can't just abandon them. Once I fulfill my obligations with them, however, I'll be praying about visiting other congregations. My personal devotions have been erratic (what's new? :-/), but the Holy Spirit is quick to remind me when I forget. Not a pleasant feeling, but needed, nonetheless.

3. Physical Health: I must say that this took a turn for the better! I'm taking nutrition this semester, and at first I was a tad skeptical. My professor assigned us to do a personal risk assessment; we had to interview our parents about their health, their siblings' health, their parents' health, and their parents' siblings' health. We also had to compose a family tree showing the birth and death of everybody (including ourselves and our siblings), and note any nutrition-related diseases that could've been prevented. I always "knew" that both sides of my family had health issues, but this assignment made it real to me. 

After interviewing my parents, I stared numbly at my paper as I saw that relative after relative suffered from Diabetes, hypertension (high blood pressure), hyperlipidemia (high cholesterol), obesity/overweight and cancer. My dad, paternal uncle, paternal great uncle, maternal grandmother (deceased), maternal grandfather, maternal uncle, and maternal great aunts and uncles all have Diabetes. They also all have hypertension! Nearly everybody on my mom's side is obese or overweight, as am I. I inherited gallbladder disease from my maternal grandmother. It was just disease after disease, and I felt so overwhelmed! I wanted to cry. I was at a heightened risk for everything because it was so prevalent in my family! I already have gallbladder disease and obesity, but the one thing that freaks me out is Diabetes. After learning even more about (I picked up a lot from my dad) it during our carbohydrates chapter, I felt numb on the inside. My dad was slowly killing himself from the inside out with his horrible diet, and he didn't seem to care! He could literally keel over any day with the way he eats. It's only by God's grace that he's still alive (just like the rest of us, though, so...). He's already had a scare with clogged arteries a few years back; God provided a miracle then. But the way in which my Daddy doesn't seem to take care of his body really scared me. Death never seemed so close or mortality so real. 

I decided then that I couldn't let that happen to myself. I finally read that last chunk of Eat to Live, and for the past few weeks, I've been eating raw vegan. Before you think I've gone off my rocker, it's actually been a great way for me to eat! My normal, incredibly nauseating post-nasal drip has all but vanished. My sniffles are gone. My stomach is no longer bloated. My gallbladder no longer aches trying to provide bile for foods I had no business eating. I feel more energetic than I have in a couple of years, and my skin looks healthier, too. Typically, I have smoothies for breakfast, a salad with raw crunchy veggies for lunch, and a salad and cooked veggies for dinner (huge, huge, huge salads - about 1/2 pound of lettuce per meal). It's amazing! It's not easy, and I have succumbed to temptation several times, but I'm continuing on. I have to do this not just to look good, but to make sure that I'm taking care of the temple in which the Holy Spirit dwells. To put it frankly, I was being (and still am sometimes) a glutton and acting foolish about my health. It was unwise to treat my body in such a manner. But better late than never, right? I'd rather change my habits before a crisis hits my body.

I'll definitely be updating you guys with my progress! I'm a work in progress, but I can't ever go back to eating the way I was. It's too risky.

Y'all's eyes have taken enough of a hit this AM, haven't they? I thought so lol. Tomorrow I shall continue, dahlings! I'll be updating y'all about the hurr - what's been going on and where I'm thinking of going next. Spoiler alert: my CG days might be over for good *cue Twilight Zone music* Lmbo!

Anywho, how have y'all been? I've missed you (even those that don't comment; every view is greatly appreciated)! I tried to keep up with blogs, and I have to say that Dee, you and AuCurls have done amazing jobs with TC, as usual. Such pretty coils! Raven, your articles and advice are as fascinating and insightful as usual :-) GoldenBlaze, your product reviews have me drooling over here! And Valerie from Curls2Envy - great devos as always, and drop dead gawjus hurr of late! What's in those products of yours? Lol.

안녕! (Annyeong! = Adios/Ciao/Aloha/Bye)

WnG Day 3 + My New Favorite Oil

Buon giorno, bellas!

My Wash 'n' Go is still going strong...it's day 3 now (or, the 2nd day after styling). Last night I was feeling extra lazy, so I skipped the bobby pins and put my hair into 7 or 8 fat twists (a la Tightly Curly method style from my TWA days). They pretty much stuck straight up all over my head. I didn't take any photos of it because, well - I don't want to be blackmailed later in life. Lol. I didn't want my hair too stretched, so I made sure to twist pretty loosely and not go all the way down to the ends.

This morning, I drizzled some safflower oil on my hands, smoothed it on my twists, and then untwisted, starting from the bottom. The results?

Left front. You can also see how the roots of that wonky wavy-ish section went straight a bit further back. They are straight ratchet -__-

The back

Full front view :-)

Right side - I have no idea why it looks like this. It kind of looks like most of my hair ended up on this side of my head and it doesn't know where to go. I'll know better next time.

Left side - my favorite :-D I also love that little tendril poking up in the back; it looks like a fiddlehead.

The right front. That frizz further back is driving me bonkers. That area of my head frizzes no matter what I do; it's always been like that. Meh.

I'm still loving it! Once it starts to look cray, I'll just spritz, remoisturize, and flat twist both sides and pin them together.

Maybe I'm just a crazy, but for some reason, my hair seems less tangled, more manageable and quicker to do when my hair is loose. In twists, all the shed hair wrapped around my other strands; it was a nightmare to detangle. Even taking down my twists after 2-3 days to finger detangle didn't help much. And I don't touch my hair nearly as much. Humphy. Mayhaps I'll go for another month and see how my hair does. *le sigh* Is it just me, or does it seem like once I have my hair figured out, it switches up on me? I can't be alone in this lol.


In other news, safflower oil has become one of my favorites! I did a bit of research, and found that it's a great oil for the hair. It's a lighter vegetable oil that comes from safflower seeds. There are two varieties: one with high amounts of polyunsaturated fats, which has a low smoke point and goes easily rancid. That type is used mostly in salad dressings. The kind useful for cooking (and hair) has high levels of monounsaturated fats and a high smoke point (which makes me think that it could be a good heat protectant, similar to grapeseed oil).

Though safflower oil lacks vitamin E, there are some companies which produce the oil enriched with this crucial vitamin (mine is vitamin E enriched). Flavorless, this yellow-tinted oil protects and moisturises the hair strands, nourishes the follicles (when applied to the scalp), and stimulates blood circulation to stimulate hair growth. It's great in deep conditioners, moisturizers, as a sealant, prepoo, etc. Additionally, it's great for eating, too - in salads, for stir frying, and much more.

I love how silky safflower oil is; I put it on my ends and the length and roots of my hair, and it instantly made it easier to finger through my hair. It helps to soften the gel cast and adds a nice shine to my hair. It's definitely on my staples list :-D

Have you ever tried safflower oil? What are some of your favorite oils? How do you use them?

Sources: CurlyNikki.com, "7 Fabulous Natural Oils for Natural Hair" 11 May 2011.
LiveStrong.com, "Safflower Oil" n.d.
Buzzle.com, "Safflower Oil for Hair Growth" n.d.