You Grow Girl 1st Mini Challenge, take your vitamins!!

You Grow Girl challengers!! Let me start by saying I've got lots of pictures, primarily via my Facebook inbox, but there are tons of "ghost challengers" that I welcome all the same. If you'd like to connect with your fellow challengers look up the hash tag #yougrowgirl15 on Instagram or "Post to this Page" link on  Braidouts & Barbells Facebook page.  Now onto the good stuff it's time for our first challenge and this weeks challenge is to take your vitamins!

By now you should be protective styling and using your castor oil. So let's take our growing to the next level by nourishing our hair from the inside out! Early this year I suffered a setback in my hair journey after the unexpected death of my father. Once I realized the amount of damage I experienced I begin to implement several options that I knew I could depend on to care for my damaged hair. In researching my options I found myself also reaching for something new- MSM. For those of you that don't know MSM stands for methyl sulfonyl methane which is also known as a nutritional form of sulfur. Sulfur is critical to many functions of our bodies and is primarily known as a joint supplement. We've seen it in hair care products before from Sulfur 8 to a few hair growth oils that contain sulfur. Also, there is a well known vitamin that declares MSM as one of it's primary growth stimulators.  Once I got into the benefits of sulfur I was convinced, in addition to hair growth it's also said that sulfur could benefit in the treatment of acne, dandruff and eczema.

For those of you who don't know our hair has three cycles: growing, resting and shedding. In terms of hair growth MSM is rumored to be beneficial in hair growth because it's said to increase the anagen or growth phase of our hair. For example if your growth phase is three to five years, with the use of MSM it could be extended to four or six years. Both numbers are hypothetical but one thing is for sure, we all experience the same three phases in the life cycle of our hair. Luckily because we have thousands of hairs on our precious heads those cycles are all in a different rotation. Can you imagine if all our hair was in the shedding phase at the same time? Yikes!! That's scary stuff, moving on!

There's also a certain hair growth guru I follow that has stated she gained three inches in three months opposed to her normal growth rate of 1/4 inch per month with the use of MSM. I decided to use MSM in conjunction with a Hair and Nail vitamin I found at Walgreens. The Hair and Nail Vitamin by AppliedNutrition contained "superior levels" of biotin and silica. I chose this combination due to biotins benefits in strengthening hair and nails. Silica on the other hand is a component of collagen which helps repair skin, hair and nails. Combined my "vitamin cocktail" is a lot less pricey than the popular hair vitamins that promise longer hair and personally I like the nutrient levels of my little cocktail. There can be too much of a good thing, read on to discuss more about that. For those of you interested in purchasing MSM it's on BOGO at CVS this week, you can thank me later.

My vitamin cocktail!

Now back to having too much of a good thing. Let me forewarn you that there are many, many ladies out there that have complained of breakouts, severe breakouts when taking biotin and some have complained with the use of MSM as well. I have never experienced that, but boy have I seen the side effects of too much. I drink a ton of water and highly recommend you do the same if you decide to try vitamins as part of your hair journey. There are some ladies that reach straight for the 10,000 mcg of biotin with the hopes that their hair growth will increase tenfold, I'm not saying it won't but you really want to increase your dosage slowly don't be that girl with a case of severely bad acne for an extra inch of growth. Secondly, once your hair begins growing from taking more vitamins, the growth rate of your hair increases everywhere, so stock up on razors while your picking up those vitamins! Here's what I did noticed about taking MSM, and I'm speaking on that specifically because I've taken various other vitamins, although not consistently, in my growth journey. I noticed my new growth was incredibly soft. It may sound weird to some but being a person that is constantly caring for my own hair I'm very aware of changes and my new growth tends to be a bit on the rough side. I honestly thought I was imaging it until along comes an article in Black Hair Information that confirms my suspicion. Also, another bonus to having MSM around the house is my husband started taking them to help with an aching knee (remember the primary use is a joint supplement) and it greatly reduced his symptoms. One last word on the use of vitamins is consistency, I find that I do a good job of taking vitamins daily when I keep them in the bathroom and take them every morning just like brushing my teeth.

Finally during my time taking MSM and vitamins my hair definitely grew, but let's be real our hair is going to grow regardless, retaining that growth is what's important. I don't have great pictures because I did some major trimming but you can bet now that we've created an environment for growth (protective styling, castor oil) I'm definitely tracking my progress. So ladies, do you accept this mini challenge? We're doing everything in our power to promote growth externally, lets increase our chances by nourishing our hair from the inside out!

Are you up for the challenge?