bb09, then the only conclusion I can come up with is your hair is porous not from having a raised cuticle but from having a missing cuticle from either chemical processing or just wear and tear from regular handling.
This is a close up of a hair cuticle:
Low porosity hair has the scales tightly shut while high porosity healthy hair has the scales slightly open.
This is what a newborn baby's cuticle looks like:
The cuticle^^ is whole and strand looks smooth and there's no wear/tear damage.
Below is a hair that has minimal cuticle damage from normal wear and tear like friction between it and other strands or normal manipulation:
Below is the cuticle of chemically damaged hair. Notice the cuticle is wide open and damaged so that it doesn't really close:
That strand^^ will not hold onto moisture or stay moisturized for long. That image kinda makes me think of a melted plastic container that is no longer flexible. So that it doesn't matter what the pH of a product is, it will not close the cuticle. Also that hair is likely to tangle easily because the rough strands will catch on each other. The only way it probably can escape tangles is if coated with something heavy like a serum or a conditioner heavy in 'cones applied on wet hair so that the product creates a smooth cover on the strands.
The pics below show progressive damage of hair strands. As you can see the cuticle is missing more and more and eventually you no longer have that scaly wall that could open to allow moisture in and close to retain moisture so moisturizing and retaining moisture becomes impossible to do.
The side closest to us has been stripped of its cuticle:
The cortex is exposed and without a prayer:
Damage to the cortex and protein fibers is next:
The cortex has ruptured and this hair is at a point of no return:
(
Images courtesy of P&G Beauty Grooming Science)
Now I don't know when you started your HHJ or learning how to do right by your hair. If you started it from a BC and have been kind to your hair then this may not be your story. But if you have hair from back when you didn't really have tools for good hair care, it could be that your hair is at one of those stages of damage and it will only be your new growth--or the hair you grew since you started doing right--that will reap the fruits of your good works. So it may be that you will see your hair acting right after you have trimmed/cut off the damaged hair.
Remember we talked about dusting. If that's something you haven't done in forever, it'll take a good cut in order for any dusting you start to make a difference. And that's for the same reasons explained above. Damaged hair cannot be fixed the way you can fix a break in a toy with glue. So sometimes it takes a do over to get it right. Not saying you should cut your hair but putting it out there so you can recognize when you're flogging a dead horse.