If your roots look oily by the second day while your ends feel dry, rough or tangled, nothing is wrong with your hair. It is doing exactly what hair does. The trouble is that most products treat it as one thing.
Your roots are weeks old. Your ends can be years old.
Hair grows about half an inch a month. The part near your scalp is a few weeks old, sits right beside the glands that make your scalp's natural oil, and gets a fresh supply every day. Fine and straight hair lets that oil travel down quickly, so the roots look flat and shiny sooner.
The ends of shoulder-length hair can be two or three years old. They have lived through hundreds of washes, brushings, summers and hairdryers, and very little of your scalp's oil ever reaches them. So they dry out, tangle and break more easily.
One head of hair. Two very different jobs.
Why products for all hair types let you down
A rich conditioner that softens dry ends weighs down roots that are already oily. A shampoo strong enough to leave roots properly clean can leave long ends feeling like straw if you scrub it through them. So people with oily roots and dry ends end up choosing which problem to live with.
A simple two-zone routine
On wash day
- Shampoo your roots and scalp only. Massage until it foams, then let the foam run through your lengths as you rinse. That is enough for the ends.
- Condition your ends only. Squeeze the water out, then work conditioner into your mid-lengths and ends. Never the roots.
- Finish your ends. On damp ends, a light leave-in mist helps with tangles and never reaches your roots.
Between washes
When your roots look oily but the rest of your hair is fine, refresh the roots only. A non-aerosol dry shampoo mist puts the product where you spray it, not in a cloud over your whole head.
Once a week, if you need it
A mask on your ends instead of conditioner. And if your roots feel coated from dry shampoo and styling products, a gentle scalp exfoliant before you wash.
Where PALIM fits
Every PALIM product is made for one part of your hair, and the label says where it goes.
- For your roots: Between-Wash Hair Reset, a dry shampoo mist for between washes, and Clean Wash, a gloss shampoo for wash day.
- For your ends: Soft Conditioner, a gloss conditioner, and Softness Mist, a keratin leave-in mist.
Quick answers
Why are my roots oily and my ends dry?
Your scalp oils your roots every day, and that oil rarely travels far enough to reach your ends, which are also much older and more worn.
Should I use conditioner on my roots?
Usually not if your roots get oily. Keep conditioner on your mid-lengths and ends.
What is the best routine for combination hair?
Shampoo the roots, condition the ends, refresh the roots between washes, and give the ends a mask once a week if they need it.
Not sure where to start? Find your routine in five questions.