Do you need a protein treatment?: Moisture or Protein how to tell

It's been a while a while. I'm a little more active on instagram but not by much. I've been wrestling with whether I need more moisture or protein. It's been so dry lately that i'm not sure if my hair has a core moisture problem or if I need to step up my LOC frequency.  So I thought I'd revisit some pointers on how to decide if you need moisture or protein.

First thing you need to do is assess whether you need protein or moisture in your hair.

So if your hair is breaking, do you get little pieces falling off? When you comb it do you feel as if it's going to snap off if you pull too hard? Then you have too much protein and you need to moisturize. Start with the water spritzes and sealing with castor oil (not a lot of oil otherwise your hair will get limp and heavy)

Then you need a heavy moisturizing conditioner to deep condition with every week.

I always go back to the wet hair assessment to make sure i'm not doing the wrong thing. 

Wet Assessment Hair Breakage Break Down

If your hair:

• (When Wet or Dry) Stretches slightly and returns to its original length without breaking, you are balanced! Stick with maintaining!
• (When Wet or Dry) Stretches a little more than normal then breaks, you need more protein in your regimen.
• (When Wet or Dry)Stretches, stretches, stretches with no significant breakage yet, add a bit more protein to your regimen.
• (Wet)- Feels weak, gummy, mushy, or limp, you need to add more protein to your regimen.
• (Wet or Dry) Experiences very little to no stretching, and simply snaps or breaks, you need to increase the moisture in your regimen.
• (Dry) Feels rough, tough, hard, dry, tangly, brittle, or any combination of those, you need more moisture in your regimen.
• Unsure? Err on the side of caution and give your hair more moisture. So now that you have figured out what type of hair breakage you have, what should you do?

Too much protein:

Hair that breaks with a little amount of tension/stress is a sign of too much protein with a deficiency of moisture. Too much protein and structure makes the hair rigid and stiff lacking elasticity.

Too much moisture:

When our hair is super elastic, it will stretch more because it lacks structure (protein).
Overmoisturized hair is "mushy" and overly soft especially when wet. It will feel weak, limp, soggy etc. Overly moisutized hair will stretch first and then break due to the overabundance of moisture.

So what is your hair telling you? No matter which corrective path you have to take (or not...you lucky thing) always remember to take your vitamins #manetabolism and detangle with your fingers!