Hair Perms: What Can Go Wrong?

Although it seems a little unusual to me, I still receive a lot of emails eelated to the topic of hair perms that have gone wrong.

The bad perm victims include women as well as men and covers all hair lengths from super short to very long. It also related to strands textures from fine to thick, straight to curly. Yes, people with naturally curly hair succumb to perm challenges, which is a whole other topic.

If I have learned nothing else about hair over the past several years, I have learned that applying chemicals to the hair will usually cause some sort of problems. Many hair experts have told me this repeatedly when I discuss chemical processing.

Perms That Go Very Wrong

Soft curls and waves are sizzling hot. For many, chemical perms applied to stick straight strands appear to offer the answer.

Perms are the simple chemical process of changing the natural shape of the hair follicle. Yes, chemicals applied to the hair actually breaks the natural textural code and then reforms the hair so that the texture is different.

A hair perm can be achieved through either a cold or hot chemical process.

A number of factors are involved in making a perm successful or unsuccessful.

• Correct chemical lotion strength.

• Right curler size for the hair type and length.

• Amount of time that the developer is allowed to remain on the strands.

• The expert skill of the hairdresser applying the perm process

• Whether hair has been previously chemically treated (color, straightener or perm).

• Texture of the hair (some texture can be permed better than other textures).