Can hair thickness increase?

**ALenee** · January 25th, 2009, 05:26 PM

I measured my pony tail thickness back in September and it was 2.5". I measured again today and it was 4" !

I made sure I measured the same way I did last time, and the measurment is correct. I have definatly changed the way I take care of my hair since I found this site in September. I c/o most of the time, and other times I use LUSH shampoo bars. I also oil and SMT. Any thoughts?

**~~kam984420~~** · January 25th, 2009, 05:38 PM

From everything i've read on here, it can definately increase, but it can also DECREASE just as fast.

**ALenee** · January 25th, 2009, 06:10 PM

Originally Posted by kam984420

From everything i've read on here, it can definately increase, but it can also DECREASE just as fast.

What do you mean? A bunch can just fall out???

**Kimberly** · January 25th, 2009, 06:37 PM

Originally Posted by ALenee

What do you mean? A bunch can just fall out???

Half of my hair fell out after I had surgery a few years ago. And about two years after I had given up on it, I have noticed some of it is growing back!

Your apparent thickness can be much more or less depending on all sorts of things. I can change my measured thickness a lot just by brushing my hair, which gives me lots of frizz instead of curls. What I use to wash my hair, how much humidity is in the air, and all sorts of things affect how thick it measures.

**ALenee** · January 25th, 2009, 07:22 PM

Originally Posted by Kimberly

Half of my hair fell out after I had surgery a few years ago. And about two years after I had given up on it, I have noticed some of it is growing back!

Your apparent thickness can be much more or less depending on all sorts of things. I can change my measured thickness a lot just by brushing my hair, which gives me lots of frizz instead of curls. What I use to wash my hair, how much humidity is in the air, and all sorts of things affect how thick it measures.

I have had 5 surgeries and never noticed a difference. I didn't know hair could fall out from surgery. Was it the anasthesia?

**ChloeDharma** · January 25th, 2009, 07:38 PM

Thickness can fluctuate for lots of reasons other than the obvious layers cut in or grown out.
Hair is often a reflection of general health, diet, excercise, illness, stress, scalp health, handling etc all can effect it.
Surgery can cause the body to suffer extreeme stress and often after an extreeme stress on the body a condition caused telogen effluvium can be caused. This is the body reacting to stress by making a large number of hairs prematurely exit the active anagen phase of the growth cycle. They then shed anytime up to 3 months later and can take up to a year to grow back.
Illnesses like diabetes, lupus, thyroid problems can all cause excessive shedding as well.

Given your hair has thickened dramatically it would seem something has changed. Some people find that chemicals like sulphates, or waxy/coney conditioner on the scalp increase shedding, if you have cut these things out or changed the types of chemicals used then it would indicate not that your genetic potential for thickness has increased, but that before something was preventing you from reaching your genetic potential.
I notice you use SMT's and oils, if you oil the scalp then something added to the oil, or the type of oil itself may be having a beneficial effect in reducing shedding or stimulating growth....aloe vera is also considered good for hairloss and for stimulating growth so it could even be that.
Anyway, whatever it is, congratulaions and just keep on doing what you are and enjoy the results

**Kimberly** · January 25th, 2009, 09:27 PM

Originally Posted by ALenee

I have had 5 surgeries and never noticed a difference. I didn't know hair could fall out from surgery. Was it the anasthesia?

My doctor warned me that the surgery could make my hair fall out, just from the strain on my body. She said it wouldn't happen right away (how long until it was supposed to happen I don't recall clearly, but it was something like six months or a year). At the time she was pretty sure I was going to die soon anyway, so she didn't bother talking about it in detail. I was already deathly ill and the surgery was major. Due to it, I had instant menopause, and I was never given an adequate amount of hormones to reduce my symptoms. About two years after surgery I noticed half of my hair was gone. In retrospect, I guess it did take something like a year to start falling out, but I was in such bad shape after my surgery that I wasn't paying much attention.

I was pretty sure my hair loss was due to the menopause and I expected it would keep falling out. At its worst I had a receding hairline and some patches that were thinned bad enough I was afraid they'd be bare soon, with bald spots like my mom has. After a couple of years I stopped taking the hormones. I was afraid that not taking the pills would make more fall out, but it didn't. And now, about three and a half years out from the surgery, I have just recently noticed there are all these crazy little curls sticking out -- new hair! It took a very long time for it to start growing back, but I was so, so sick and the recovery from the surgery still isn't complete. Guess I'm finally getting healthy again. I wonder now how much of my hair will come back! Pretty darn exciting.

ALenee, maybe those five surgeries did thin your hair a little bit, but you didn't notice, and now it's just growing back in?

**Cai** · January 25th, 2009, 05:44 PM

Wow, this is a really big change. I heard before from others that the circumference of their ponytail improved, but most of the time (if there was a bigger change) that included growing out bangs or layers.
Did you additionally change anything else? Nutrition, lifestyle/situation, scalp massages or did you have lots of breakage before ?
I can't really imagine that this is possible as it would mean (if you started from hair in quite a good condition), that you suddenly have lots of new hair that wasn't there before.
But I'm happy for you that it is (would be a nice surprise for me too, but I guess I won't be that lucky).

**ALenee** · January 25th, 2009, 06:09 PM

Originally Posted by Cai

Wow, this is a really big change. I heard before from others that the circumference of their ponytail improved, but most of the time (if there was a bigger change) that included growing out bangs or layers.
Did you additionally change anything else? Nutrition, lifestyle/situation, scalp massages or did you have lots of breakage before ?
I can't really imagine that this is possible as it would mean (if you started from hair in quite a good condition), that you suddenly have lots of new hair that wasn't there before.
But I'm happy for you that it is (would be a nice surprise for me too, but I guess I won't be that lucky).

My hair was in good condition before, I never used heat on it, ect.. I did use chemical filled hair products tho. I just wasn't very careful with it before.

**Darkhorse1** · January 25th, 2009, 07:25 PM

Hair can fall out due to stress of the surgery. I've read that before. Depends on the surgery as well.

From my understanding, you can't add any more hair on your head than you already have. You have a pre-set amount of hair folicles. What can happen in regards to gaining thickness is:
reduction of hair breakage, growing out layers/bangs (I'm growing out most of my bangs and have added .5 inches to my circumfrence). I don't know if you can grow more hair, though in each hair folice, you can grow more than 1 hair in it.

Congrats!!! That's exciting