You'll probably think I'm gross for saying this, but I might as well just come right out: I've been using the same bottle of shampoo for more than two years.
I know this because it's the kind that's supposed to protect colored hair from fading quite so quickly, and two years ago I colored my hair purple for the second time in my life. I remember using this very same bottle in the disgusting apartment in D.C. that I shared with two girls who couldn't clean a room if their lives depended on it. It came back with me to Chicago and lived with me through two apartments and I'm still squeezing pink goop out of the bottom of it as of today.
It's not one of those gallon jugs with a squeeze pump, either. This is a regular old double-size Herbal Essences bottle, the kind you pick up on sale for like five bucks when CVS is having a special. It's just that over the past two years, I simply have not washed my hair enough to necessitate buying a replacement.
I've gone through a couple conditioner bottles if only because my hair is a wild tangly underbrush that needs to be tamed with generous helpings of the slick stuff. (When I was 14 and had hair down to my waist, I could easily go through half a bottle of conditioner in a single shower.) But the 'poo? Not so much.
My shower-averse tendencies all started in that gross apartment, where the bathroom rug was literally rotting and there was nowhere clean to put your clothes while you showered. Despite the fact that I'd just cleaned myself, I'd actually feel dirtier post-shower just by having had to stand in the bathroom for 20 minutes. So I showered less and less, and by the end of the summer I was lucky if I could get myself to step into the tub twice a week.
My hygiene habits improved a bit when I moved back into my own apartment in Chicago, but during that summer I noticed something about my hair: the less I washed it, the better it looked. Sure, the frosty, air-conditioned environment in which it dried probably had something to do with its new sleekness, but it looked shinier, healthier too. It's almost like all those shampoos and conditioners were doing the opposite of what they advertised--instead of imbuing my hair with that shiny, healthy bounce, they were stripping it away.
I'm not the only one who's realized this. More and more people are giving up shampoo entirely, opting to rub a little baking soda into their hair once in a while or just rinse it in the shower. No harsh detergents, nothing to strip away the natural oils that are designed to coat your strands. I'm still taking a trickle out of that same bottle to scrub out the grease from my roots, but for the most part, I've gone shampoo-free. And honestly, my hair has never looked better. It's still got that scruffy, wavy edge to it, but it's shiny, full, sleek and healthy. Good to know that the only product I really need is the stuff that's already coming out of my scalp.