Not Your Mother's Leave-In Conditioner review

This leave-in conditioner helps soften and strengthen hair, but has a heavy fragrance. Plus, my dad's thoughts on leave-in conditioner sprays vs. thicker formulas.

My hair gets pretty darn frizzy in the summer. I usually throw my hair into a ponytail because I’d have to get up an hour earlier to have enough time to tame all that frizziness. I was curious if Not Your Mother’s Leave-In Conditioner could help keep my hair under control, so I picked up a bottle when it went on sale at CVS. I bought it on the same day I picked up Not Your Mother’s Texturizing Sea Salt Spray. This leave-in conditioner states that it is formulated with an ingredient known as Procapil, which helps “fortify, detangle, and protect against breakage.” That explains why this product is called “Way to Grow Leave-in Conditioner,” which is quite a tall claim for a leave-in conditioner. Usually these types of products only promise to help tame frizziness and prevent breakage—they don’t actually claim to help your hair grow.

Not Your Mother's Leave-In Conditioner review

Let’s take a closer look at the ingredients that go in this leave-in conditioner.

Not Your Mother’s Leave-In Conditioner ingredients

My Dad the Chemist’s review of Not Your Mother’s Leave-In Conditioner

Interesting. Procapil is a mix of apigenin, oleanolic acid, and biotinoyl tripeptide-1. It claims to help treat hair loss, and strengthen and condition hair. According to my dad, aside from Procapil, this leave-in conditioner contains other conditioning ingredients that should make it an effective product. Here are the conditioning ingredients you should look for in a hair product:

  • butylene glycol
  • cetyl triethylmonium dimethicone peg-8 succinate
  • quaternium-91
  • propylene glycol
  • myristyl myristate
  • hydrolyzed keratin
  • ppg-26-buteth-26
  • behentrimonium chloride
  • peg-40 hydrogenated castor oil

Not Your Mother’s Leave-In Conditioner review

Not Your Mother’s Leave-In Conditioner is my first experience with using a sprayable leave-in conditioner. I have a natural bias toward believing that leave-in conditioner creams are thicker, richer, and therefore more beneficial for dry, color-treated hair that needs some TLC. However, a spray is definitely easier to use—it distributes evenly across your hair and is less likely to weigh down your hair if it’s prone to getting oily.

I asked my dad if he thought leave-in conditioner would be more effective if it was a thicker cream, as opposed to a spray like this particular product. Here’s what he had to say:

My dad makes a good point—just because a product is thicker, doesn’t mean that it’s necessarily richer or more nutritious for your hair. You can add thickeners to any formula, but those thickeners usually boost the texture/viscosity, rather than the actual beneficial value. He thinks that this spray will work well but he recommends trying to distribute it through your hair as you spray it, if you want to make sure that it doesn’t just end up on the outer surface.

I sprayed about five times on damp hair, and then worked it through my hair with my hands. I thought it helped make my hair feel less frizzy on that humid summer day. I didn’t particularly like the heavy fragrance of this product, though. It gave me a slight headache because I’m sensitive to strong fragrances. It smells like you walked into a salon. That is the only problem I have with this product. If you don’t mind heavy fragrances, I recommend picking up a bottle of Not Your Mother’s Leave-In Conditioner, since it contains plenty of conditioning ingredients that help condition and nourish your hair without weighing it down or making it feel oily.

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