Have you ever examined your hair strand...

[DarkDesire]

... and found split 'ends' in the middle of the shaft?

My hair feels relatively healthy to the touch, bar my split ends. But when I look at individual strands, I very often find splits halfway through the middle of the shaft - and then the hair goes on to re-attach itself. I don't know what to do! My hair grows regardless - but I'm worried about the long-term effects of this - will my hair start breaking in all different places? I reaaaaally don't want to cut my hair - I couldn't face it, after all this time. erplexed

Actually - maybe this has started to happen anyway - the individual hairs are all very much different lengths, and it's only when you look at the general bulk of it that it can be classed as near APL (i think?).

What should I do?

 

[MissMasala5]

YES! I have noticed these a lot since I started bunning, so for me, that may be the culprit? I did an S&D last night, and saw 5 of these. I snipped them right off, because they will eventually split all the way and break.

Do you bun alot? Try and find out what may be causing this, and go from there. I started wearing single braids and will bun less often.

 

[Energist]

It's been my experience that when the hair does that it goes on to split in a bad way later on down the line. It is best to cut split ends from where they begin, even if they reattach, because the split that you found will go up the hair shaft and become worse, even with the bottom mended.

I know that it may be painful to cut split middles, but it is better for the long term. Just work on keeping those ends protecting especially at shoulder and apl

 

[PassionFruit]

Ive never done so but my dermatologist did when I complained of hair loss... she took 3 strands and looked at them under a microscope and told me a few things about my hair including that my hair was pretty much healthy and my loss at the time was related to something else

 

[DarkDesire]

Well, I don't bun much at all, you would normally find me in braids. Maybe it's because I didn' t do a bc to start with. I just put my hair in braids, and did c & g for a while, and improved the state of my hair from that point. Maybe I will just cut them. But I have a feeling that I have a huuuge amount of these hairs on my head. If I were to cut them out, I would be kind of like a thinning out of my hair thickness. I'm so not ready for bc'ing at ANY point.
I'll start off by cutting one at a time. I was thinking of trimming for the first time in a v. long time tonight anyways...

 

[PeaceFlow]

I cut my hair the other day coz this was happening Im only 6 inches tho (was) but all of a sudded my ends were looking crispy and split so I dusted the ends of. It felt good, I enjoyed cutting the crap out

 

[JustKiya]

Oh, yeah - I've seen splits dead in the middle of my hair - which is why I don't worry about trimming to cut split 'ends' off - I would have to be bald to INSURE I had no splits.
I usually see them on shed hairs, and I figure once my hair is long enough to do search & destroy's on, I'll handle it that way.

 

[SW2011]

I am sitting at work with my hair scissors (I brought them from home) and I'm dusting my hair. I have the same problem, and I have the little white dots on my hair where the hair is snapping. I hate it!

 

[SleepyJean]

I am sitting at work with my hair scissors (I brought them from home) and I'm dusting my hair. I have the same problem, and I have the little white dots on my hair where the hair is snapping. I hate it!

Sistaslick had an article about those white dots. They come from split ends. I used to have those.

 

[crazydaze911]

Well, I don't bun much at all, you would normally find me in braids. Maybe it's because I didn' t do a bc to start with. I just put my hair in braids, and did c & g for a while, and improved the state of my hair from that point. Maybe I will just cut them. But I have a feeling that I have a huuuge amount of these hairs on my head. If I were to cut them out, I would be kind of like a thinning out of my hair thickness. I'm so not ready for bc'ing at ANY point.
I'll start off by cutting one at a time. I was thinking of trimming for the first time in a v. long time tonight anyways...

I have alot of these strands and it upsets me sometimes (b/c it makes me feel like my hair is less healthy), but i am APL and i am not cutting them all off - i'd be bald like nappywomyn says! or at least have a REALLY bad layerd uneven cut. I figure as long as my ends stay trim and my hair isnt losing thickness, i will not mess with the middle splits. i do bun alot and this may have been the culprit in the past b/c i was concerned with being 'neat and tight' but i use satin elastins and dont twist it too tight anymore.

 

[DarkDesire]

I'm glad I'm not the only one - I was starting to think my hair was crazy and abnormal or something!

Yeah I heard about those white split things on the end of hair on this forum too, something to do with the water in the hair boiling and splitting the hair shaft. I remember I had a friend whose hair looked the BOMB, all silky and shiny, but she was like, nah, I really need a trim bad...

I looked, and at the end of each strand, the hair was messed up, with all these weird white bulbs at the end. A lot of people (esp. 3a and above who don't know about this site I'm finding) are really running for those GHD's these days...

 

[SleepyJean]

I'm glad I'm not the only one - I was starting to think my hair was crazy and abnormal or something!

Yeah I heard about those white split things on the end of hair on this forum too, something to do with the water in the hair boiling and splitting the hair shaft. I remember I had a friend whose hair looked the BOMB, all silky and shiny, but she was like, nah, I really need a trim bad...

I looked, and at the end of each strand, the hair was messed up, with all these weird white bulbs at the end. A lot of people (esp. 3a and above who don't know about this site I'm finding) are really running for those GHD's these days...

Thanks for the ellaboration. I printed out the article, but haven't read it yet. That's what I was talking about!