Am I shedding too much hair?

It’s normal to lose 50-100 hairs a day. Your hair must fall for new hair to grow. In this article we’ll talk about your hair growth phases, your hair fall, and what to look out for.

The Hair Growth Cycle

Your scalp holds around 100,000 hair follicles. These follicles hold your hair, and each hair goes through a multi-year hair growth cycle

Anagen Phase

At this stage the cells in the root are dividing rapidly, adding to the hair shaft which is what you see as hair growth. Around 80-90% of the hair on your head is in the anagen phase lasting anywhere between 2-6 years. Genetically some people stay in this phase longer than others. At the end of the anagen phase, a signal is sent for the hair to go into the catagen phase.

Catagen Phase

This is a short phase lasting 2-3 weeks. At this stage the growth rate is going from slow to stopping growth altogether. The hair is detaching from its bloody supply and moving into the telogen phase

Telogen Phase

At this stage the hair prepares to shed and the follicle rests for 2-3 months. After three months the hair follicle goes back into the anagen phase and new hair starts to grow

What is 50-100 hairs?

Now that we’ve understood the cycle, you can see it is normal, and encouraged to shed hair so that your hair is cycling continuously.

But what do 50-100 hairs look like? The image below will help you visualise it. We've added the hair as individual strands and also as a hair ball. The hair used here was of medium/long length and, for perspective, the paper it's on is A4.

Some truths about hair fall

Curly and coily hair will lose the most amount of hair during wash day. If you’re wearing your hair natural, you’re likely not brushing your hair every day. This means hair that has shed is being held by the rest of your hair. So if you wash your hair once a week, for example, you’re looking at 7 days of hair shed on wash day, equivalent to a minimum of 350 hairs.

Your hair will shed more on wash days and scalp oiling days. This is because you are stimulating your scalp and helping to release the hairs that are resting which encourages new hair growth.

Don’t fear brushing your hair. Be gentle of course. But brushing stimulates your scalp, and the hair thats at the end of its cycle, needs to go!

Is your hair long? This can make your hair shed look more since there’s more hair. Similarly, if your hair is thick, your hair shed could look like a lot.

50-100 hairs a day is not a hard and fast rule. Some weeks you might be following this pattern, some weeks a little more, some weeks a little less. The statistic of 50-100 hairs just gives you a general indication.

What to look out for

Here are a few things to look out for if you feel you are shedding too much hair

1. Are you suddenly shedding a lot more than usual? You might be experiencing Telogen Effluvium which is when your hair fall increases excessively. This is triggered by sickness, medication, stress level, change in diet. Usually, it can self-correct in 3-6 months
2. Are there thinning patches on your head? If you don’t have any, you don’t need to worry. If you are noticing thinning, we have some articles that might help about hair loss and blood flow
3. Is your hair breaking? You can check this by looking at your overall length compared to the hair that’s falling. If the hair that is shedding is a lot shorter than the hair on your head, you might be experiencing breakage from hair damage. Here’s how to address this

Are you concerned about your hair fall? Let us know, you can write to us in the comments or contact us on email/whatsapp