Blowout, Thermal or Relaxer?

The dirty backstory...

Since the time of Cleopatra women have been altering their hair, in particular the texture of their hair. It seems part of the human condition to want what you don't have. Those of us with bone straight hair want body and wave and conversely, those of us with a mass amount of curl want silky smooth and straight hair. Nowadays with so many options at our disposal it is easy to get lost in the push-pull marketing gimmicks that we are bombarded with on a daily basis. the three main options commonly practiced today are: Brazilian Blowout, Thermal Straightening, and Chemical Relaxing.

Much stigma surrounds chemical services in the hair industry. To make an informed decision about what service is right for you, it is helpful to understand how each service has changed in its application and chemical components over the years; as some services have vastly improved while others are still dwelling in a dangerous and archaic past.

The practice of chemically altering the hair to achieve a desired texture is nothing new, in fact permanent waving (perms) and chemical relaxing (relaxers) have been around since the late 50’s and widely available to the consumer beginning in the 60’s and booming into everyday fashion in the 70’s. In those days the chemical processes of altering the makeup of hair were crude and very harsh on the hair. We have all heard the horror stories of some poor woman's hair breaking off or falling out due to some botched perm or relaxer job.

Relaxers where some of the worst offenders, as their chemical process relied on sodium hydroxide (lye) as the active agent in the straightening process. Lye, being a very harsh and unforgiving chemical, often caused bleeding, burning and the lose of hair or skin in the hands of an uneducated salon professionnel. Sounds far from “relaxing”, right?!

The sodium hydroxide process gave chemical relaxers a bad name, and the stigma is still present today even though most salons and product manufacturers no longer use lye bases relaxers. This led to a demand for a less harsh and safer process to achieve straight hair for those women looking to tame their curl. It was right around this time in the early to mid 90’s that Brazilian Blowouts were first successfully used. Gradually from the 90’s into the new millennium Blowouts slowly gain popularity and favor over relaxers in America.

Right around the same time a revolutionary new technique and product came to the market called the Japanese Straightening System (or) Thermal straightening, which took the thio chemical from modern perm solution and innovatively re-purposed it for straightening the hair instead of curling it. This system, like the blowout, relied on the thermal heat of a flat iron to temporarily alter the structure of the hair prior to the chemical process. This required a chemical that was less harsh and more flexible in the time spent on the head and the temperature of the hair, this chemical is called Thioglycolate. Now, there is no need to whip out your chemistry set or pull out your chart of the periodic table, I will keep it simple. Thio is a two step process that breaks down the bonds in the hair, then rebuilds them in whatever structured form the hair is in during the second process (I.E. curls if ihair is on a perm rod and straight if ironed flat). Exactly like today’s modern perm, which is unfathomably healthier and safer than what we had back in the day. For the most part both Thermal straightening services and Chemical Relaxers use thioglycolate today.

The Japanese Straightening System (JSS) is its own brand, and has its own line of products, and is only available to salons that pay to have the brand name. The technical term for that type of service is Thermal Straightening, and it wasn’t long before every other product company developed their own thio Thermal System, and now it is widely available in most salons in America. You might be asking, what is the difference between a Thermal System and a Chemical Relaxer if they both use the thio chemical? The difference is in the process. By taking the time to flat iron between each step of the process the result is that the hair is chemically altered to the straightest possible form it can be in; whereas relaxers, that do not utilized a thermal process, are much less effective in the range of curl reduction. Each service has different results and used for different purposes.

Now, lets get back to Brazilian Blowouts. There is a lot of confusion and misunderstanding concerning Brazilian Blowouts. The notion that, Blowouts do not use chemicals and are not harsh on the hair, was use to usher the product into the favor of the consumer as an alternative to chemical and thermal relaxing. The truth is Blowouts use chemicals that are in many ways worse than any lye or thio process. The way a Blowout works is by preserving the texture of the hair once it has been flat ironed. So it doesn’t actually chemically alter the hair, however, the chemicals used to ensure the hair is preserved in its straightened state for any length of time are extremely powerful and potentially deadly. Blowouts rely on formaldehyde and other chemical preservatives that are commonly used in preserving dead animals.

You might be thinking, well that sounds bad, but how is it any worse than the lye or thio chemicals that can melt your hair and burn your scalp. The answer is simple; formaldehyde is a poison that not only affects the skin and hair but gets into the blood and affects the whole body. In the early 2000’s several documented deaths relating to overexposure to formaldehyde from blowouts shocked the fashion community and caused a major evaluation of the product. It is worth noting that the Brazilian Blowout process is banned in many countries. After the panic and the dangerous truth about the preservation process was brought to light, many salons stopped offering the service. Recently it has attempted a comeback under the new name Brazilian Keratin Treatment (BKT), utilizing the Keratin (a key protein in the chemical makeup of hair) as a positive marketing point. The fact still remains that the fundamental process relies on preserving the hair with an agent such as formaldehyde. Supposedly, the new formula has less of the preservative chemical in it, and is “Safe.” One can still argue that substituting one deadly poison for another doesn’t really change anything, furthermore, applying poison to someones head doesn't sound like a good idea no matter how little amount it is. After all, a rose is still a rose if called by any other name.