THANK GOD IT'S FAVOURITES: Kerastase Resistance Bain de Force Shampoo

As a heads up, this stuff is pricey. I never thought I would find myself recommending such an expensive shampoo, mostly because I never thought I would find myself buying such an expensive shampoo, but it really is good. To make it a bit better, I am recommending mostly just the shampoo, not the conditioner as well, and also I am recommending this as something to have to use sometimes, but not necessarily every single time you wash your hair. I hope that makes you all not run away immediately.

Essentially I ended up getting this because I got intimidated at the hairdressers, as happens quite frequently, but I have to admit now I am quite glad. This was a couple of months ago now, and I was getting my hair cut but discussing recolouring my hair all over, as I then did, and my hairdresser said my hair was quite weak and it would be good to try to strengthen it a bit before the bleach I needed to get my hair red, so she suggested this. It really has strengthened my hair, and I had very little breakage from the bleach. I think to remotely justify spending this much on shampoo, you need to see long term results as well as it just feeling nice each time you wash your hair. So anyway, my hair definitely feels stronger - hairdresser tip here, apparently one of the ways to tell, apart from just breakage, is if it is stretchy when it's wet, then it is quite weak. My hair was super weak and now is definitely less.

Moving onto how it actually feels each time I wash my hair, it feels lovely. My everyday issues with hair are that it is fine and flat so I can never use anything too heavy, and also when I first started using this I had a horrible dry scalp, as in not just dandruff but it was also very tender and sore, and I even felt like it was making more hair fall out than normal. Unusually for a restorative shampoo, it doesn't weigh my hair down at all, which is amazing in itself, but even more incredibly, from the very first wash my scalp was fixed. I had basically been bathing in Head & Shoulders and also tried Tresemme Scalp Renewal with no results, but this just instantly sorted it out. I feel this is what you're paying for, that it makes your hair healthy by looking after your scalp, and this is how it works in the long term. It says it strengthens the hair by "resurfac[ing] the outer layer of the fibre with a protective film", and I'm sure it does, but it also makes new growth stronger as well I think, I really just feel it makes everything feel super healthy.

Having raved about this, I should say that although I used it every time I washed my hair for a couple of months, to really try to look after my hair, I will now be using it less often. This is partly because I can't afford to buy another one any time soon so I want to keep it going for a while, but also because I do now have other needs for my hair. It has strengthened my hair incredibly, but it has not looked after my colour, and while I was much more concerned about just getting my hair healthy again, now that I have, and now it's time for me to colour my hair again, I will be getting a colour-protect shampoo to try to keep it bright this time.

So the big question - do I recommend that all of you go out and buy this immediately? Not necessarily. That may seem weird for a favourites post but it definitely depends on your hair needs (sorry for sounding like a pretentious hairdresser). If you have weak hair, and especially if you are thinking about some kind of weakening treatment like dyeing or chemical straightening, then I really would recommend this if you possibly can get it in preparation. Also, although it is expensive, it really does last. It is super concentrated so you can use just a 10 pence-sized blob (although I was also told to repeat), so I would say given how much I have already used it and how much is left, it probably gives a good 50 or so washes, at least? I sort of made that up, but anyway it's a lot. So again, if your hair is super weak, I would use it all the time for a bit, then when it's less weak you don't need to use it all the time, but just occasionally to give it a little treat, so I am hoping I will be able to eke this out to last about 6 months.

Just as a quick end note, I got the conditioner (or Ciment Anti-Usure if you want to be fancy) with this, and used it in combination, and I am sure that it has helped strengthen the ends, but I probably won't be buying it again because I just can't justify it as much. Although the ends are most damaged, they can also be easily fixed by regular trims and what have you, so I think it is most important to look after the scalp and new hair because that will be with you for a while. The way the shampoo looked after my scalp was a real 'wow' moment, and I definitely need that to spend this much on haircare, and I didn't have a 'wow' moment for the conditioner, so I will keep using it until it runs out but I am not hugely bothered about replacing it because I don't exactly have that kind of money to throw around.

Final final note (I promise!), I bought this in the salon and paid full price (£17 I think) for it, but when I replace it I will be doing some serious internet hunting, because on the RUSH shop it is £11.85 and on feelunique.com it is £12.75 right now, which both would actually make a huge difference.

Sorry for this being such a super long post, I really didn't mean it to, I feel that such an expensive product needs a lot of justification, but it really has changed my hair a lot!