You HAIR what you Eat.

It’s not unusual that most people do not realize the significance of a healthy diet. Not only does it benefit a person both physically and mentally, but it also helps to improve the condition of our skin and hair. People shell out hundreds of dollars on appearance and cosmetics, not realizing a good way to start is looking at what you put in your grocery basket. The following is a list of foods and vitamins that are a necessary part of your diet, in order to improve the condition of your hair or skin.

Water

You can never drink enough water. The key element of any diet, and a necessary element of survival is the body having enough water. Water is good for the body for so many reasons. First off water helps digestion and the absorption of vitamins and nutrients. It also detoxifies the liver and kidneys, carrying waste from the body. Digestion, quite simply, does not happen without water. Fiber alone, can not aid proper digestion. Without water, good fiber actually goes bad.

A few facts for you:

83% of your blood is water. Muscles, 75%. Brain, 74% and your bones are 22% water.

8 glasses a day of water (or 1/2 your body weight in ounces) helps to improve the following but are not limited to:

- Improve energy

- Increase mental and physical performance

- Reduce headaches and dizziness

- Remove toxins and waste products from body

- Keep skin healthy

- Help you LOSE WEIGHT

Losing weight is typically a number one concern with most Americans, if not keeping the weight off is. Water helps you to do both. In fact those hunger cravings that a lot of people struggle with are sometimes your body asking for water. Even if you are not thirsty you should be drinking water. If you’re waiting until you’re thirsty, that’s too late. Thirst means your body needs water to be replenished.

Now, water is 1/4 the weight of a strand of hair. It helps to keep the hair soft and supple. Also women like to spend lots of money on products that make the hair silky and shiny. Drink up! It helps with that as well.

Protein

Protein should be in your diet as hair strands are made up of primarily just that. Protein provides strength to your hair, preventing breaking and splitting. You can find protein in foods such as, lean meat, fish, poultry, milk, cheese and cereals.

Minerals

Different minerals are important to your hair. For instance, Iron is key to providing oxygen to your hair. You can find that in red meat and dark green vegetables. Zinc can help to prevent hair loss. Zinc is found in meat and seafood. If you’d like to improve you hair’s natural color consume enough copper. That is found in fresh veggies, nuts, seeds, meat and liver.

Vitamins

Don’t forget to take your vitamins!!! Remember the Flintstone’s vitamins? Vitamins are an important part of anyone’s daily diet. However there are specific vitamins that are key to healthier hair. Vitamin A is one of them, but also helps with the condition of your skin. Vitamins B and C help hair growth and color. Including these vitamins will ensure that your hair is healthy and won’t split. You can get these from fruits, veggies, cereals, eggs, milk and bread.

So next time you are worried about appearance and are considering what to do about it, look at what you’re eating. You are what you eat, as the famous saying goes.

What to pay attention to about your hair….

There are certain “symptoms” that your hair may have whether it be temporary, or due to aging, or a reaction, but all of which indicators of how your health is. Paying attention to these “symptoms” can help you be healthier overall, not just have beautiful hair. Your hair is not just affected by the shampoo that you use, but what other products you may use, such as gels, sprays, blow drying or hot ironing, and even your diet can affect what your hair looks like. Here are a few examples of what your hair is trying to tell you.

Dull, dry, brittle, and breaking
Hair that looks frazzled, frizzy and fried most likely is just that. We can do tremendous damage by using chemical dyes and permanents as well as by simply aiming the blow dryer at our heads every morning. Like being in the sun, all of these self-inflicted abuses destroy the cuticle and leave hair wide open to damage. Pulling hair into tight braids or ponytails can increase that stress and lead to breakage—or even bald spots. But in addition to being a cue that you need to treat you hair more carefully, unhealthy strands can also be an indicator of an unhealthy diet. Without adequate protein, growing hair strands won’t become as strong and resilient as they should be. And essential fatty acids (found in fish oil supplements, wild salmon, and flax seeds) may also play a role in keeping strands strong, shiny and healthy. If your diet is lacking in them, try increasing your consumption and see if your hair eats it up! Of course, what you eat can only impact hair that is just starting to grow, so it will be several months before any improvements are evident.

Going bald
Really losing your hair can be a sign that you’ve inherited a tendency for baldness, or it could indicate a bigger health issue. Heredity baldness, medically known as androgenetic alopecia, affects up to one third of men. The hair loss—which typically begins at the temples or crown—is permanent. Alopecia areata is an autoimmune disease which can cause anything from smooth bald patches to the loss of all hair on both the head and body. The cause of the disease isn’t known, although some doctors feel there is a genetic link. With this type of alopecia, hair normally grows back.

Going gray
Some people start finding those wiry gray strands as early as their 20s, while others hold onto their natural color well into their 40s. The cause is unrelated to how healthy—or unhealthy—you are. As with so many things, it turns out you can blame (or thank) your parents for the rate at which your hair turns gray. “It’s mostly genetic,” Kauvar says, “so if your parents grayed early, it is likely you will too.” The hair that’s already on your head doesn’t lose pigment. But as you age, there is a decrease in melanin production in the hair bulb (or root). So when new strands start to grow, they may come in with less—or no—pigment, thanks to that decrease in melanin. The change happens most quickly in Caucasians, 50 percent of whom will be at least 50 percent gray by age 50.

Serious shedding
Seeing a swarm of strands in the shower drain every morning isn’t necessarily a cause for alarm—or a signal that anything is wrong with you. It’s totally normal to lose about 100 strands of hair every day. And even if you think you’re losing more than that, remember that your head carries at least 100,000 hair follicles, so it’s possible to collect a handful or two out of the bath or hairbrush without it visibly changing the appearance of your mane. And since those 100,000 or so follicles have different growth phases, even as several strands fall out, dozens of new ones are just on their way in to replace them. So unless you’re starting to notice visible thinning of your hair or bald spots on your scalp, chances are the loss is nothing more than natural, everyday shedding.

The flaky stuff
Dandruff is one of hair’s most misunderstood maladies. People often assume that those flakes must mean that the scalp is too dry and that, like skin that’s flaking, it must obviously need more moisture to make it look better. But while some people may indeed suffer from a dry scalp, true dandruff is not a matter of dryness. “Dandruff is the common name for seborrheic dermatitis, an inflammatory condition of the scalp that causes redness and flaking in the areas of the skin that are rich in oil glands,” Kauvar explains. Other skin conditions—such as psoriasis and eczema—can also cause a similar condition in which the scalp gets red, itchy and produces flakes of dandruff. In any case, the best cure is to seek out a medicated (not necessarily moisturizing) shampoo or scalp treatment.

Visibly thinning
If you have iron or protein deficiency—common with the caloric deprivation of anyone suffering from an eating disorder—it is not unusual to experience severe hair loss. That’s because the malnutrition forces the body to conserve protein (the building block of all the body’s cells, including the hair) by shutting down hair growth. And since more hair may also be shed—without being replaced—the result can be a noticeable thinning over several months. Thyroid disease (both an overactive thyroid and an underactive one) can also show up as increased hair loss. Once the disease is controlled, hair growth can usually be restored.

White overnight?
We’ve all heard horror stories of someone who, in the aftermath of some terribly traumatic event, woke up to find their formerly brown, red or blond hair turned shockingly white. Well, don’t worry about it happening to you, because, according to Dr. Arielle Kauvar, a New York dermatologist, it simply can’t happen. “The only way for hair to turn gray is a gradual decline in melanin production at the root,” says Kauvar. “There is no biological event that can remove pigment directly from the hair shaft.” However, a physical or emotional trauma can cause a change in the hair. The illness or stress sends actively growing hair into a resting phase, and a couple of months later, all those strands in the resting phase may fall out. So, if the dark hairs fall out and the already white ones remain, the result is hair that looks suddenly grayer.