Lillian Loves... her Tangle Teezer!

 So this is going to be a new semi-regular feature, called Lillian Loves. I never get around to posting my  monthly (or even yearly :/) favourites posts, so this is sort of my alternative. I'll just be posting certain items that I've been loving recently and why.

So the first item is the glorious Tangle Teezer. Sure it may feel incredibly light and cheap and look like something you'd use to groom a horse with, but it is the best darn hairbrush I have ever used!

I've sung the praises of this thing before but only recently have I realised just how much I've come to depend on it. My hair is a bit on the thick side, curly and naturally forms tangles and even huge dreadlock-like matts if left to it's own devices (by which I mean if it's not combed, I do wash my hair... on ocassion :P). And for the last few weeks I've been leaving it to it's own evil devices. Why? Well because Claire and I managed to lose both our  Tangle Teezers a few months ago. At first I tried to keep my hair in check with other brushes and combs but it hurt too much and I couldn't work through my tangles at all because I'd just end up ripping out the tangles and huge chunks of my hair along with them. Luckily I found some styling mousse that stops the tangling a bit and makes my hair into big chunky curls so I gave up trying to brush it and just used that. But today I discovered that Claire had bought a new holy-of-holies! 

Using it was just great. When it runs through my normal hair it's just fab, it easily, quickly and painlessly gets rid of small tangles and the rest of my insane frizz. After washing my hair this morning I was left with three huge matts that I thought even the pink plastic beauty couldn't handle. And it took a little time, and a little wincing, but I got those matts detangled without pulling half my hair out!


Also back before I lost the first 2 and was using one religiously, I swear it made a difference to my hair's texture. It became much less prone to matting and just felt and looked a bit smoother and softer. I don't know how it happened, it could be a coincidence as my more recent hair growth hasn't been damaged by bleach like the ends have. But I do think that using the Tangle Teezer made at least a little difference. And even if it didn't I'd still love it because it's the only hairbrush I've ever found that is practically painless for me to use (it's painless unless I have a big matt)

(my family calls hair matts 'sheep knots', which I thought was normal but after googling it, it appears that noone else uses that expression! Bloody family slang)

Claire has also grown to love the Teezer. She wanted to weigh in with her opinions. It really sounds like a cheesy advert but it's what she thought!:

'Since bleaching about 8 years ago and not stopping to let my poor hair recover since, a particular section of my hair near my hairline on both sides of my head keeps breaking off and never gets longer than about 2inches long. Since I started using the Tangle Teezer, those little bits have actually started to grow, and look a lot less frizzy than they used to. And since I'm pretty horrible to my hair, if the Tangle Teezer can do that singlehandedly, I never want to be without one!'

So yeah, I love this guy.

*despite the ridiculous gushing this is all my own thoughts, I bought this myself and have recieved no form of compensation for writing this post. I just really love this!*

Tangle Teezer Review

 (apologies for my absence, back to normal hopefully now :) )

I bought the Tangle Teezer on a whim one day when they was some sort of promotion in Boots where you got extra Advantage points if you bought a certain amount (i love me them points! Will i ever use them?).  I'd heard the claims it makes before but had laughed it off, especially after i got it out of the pack and saw it for myself. Not only does the ergonomic design look more like something used to groom horses than a human hair brush (though a horses hair is probably in better condition to mine...) but the bristles don't look special at all! It's hard to get a picture that will really show it (so i haven't even bothered to try and show you) but it just looks like a regular set of plastic bristles with a shorter set in between each row, really nothing special. So while i needed a new hairbrush and was sure it would work well I didn't believe it would be all that spectacular or different from a regular brush.

Oh how wrong i was! This probably will sound like I'm being paid by Tangle Teezer (I am not, bought it myself and have never been in contact with anyone vaguely related to the company as far as i know) but i can honestly say it is head and shoulders above any hairbrush or comb i have ever used.

If you can't tell from photos, my hair is a sort of straw-like, Scarecrow-esque, brittly, frizzy lump on my head (though going ginger has calmed it a little) and that's the way i like it... most of the time. I abuse it quite a bit, backcombing and hairspraying it to death and of course it had previously been bleached to almost white. Anyway because of this combing or brushing my hair was to be avoided at all costs if i didn't want to be reduced to tears and possibly break the comb. My hair was so full of tangles it could take me a good 1/4 of an hour to just comb out the tangles, which of course damaged my hair more. But this thing, this miraculous lump of plastic is a complete Godsend.

As i said before i wasn't really expecting much from it when i first used it. And to be honest the first try i wasn't that impressed, it got through all the knots and tangles well, but i had actually forgotten how hard it was to usually comb my hair. The next time i used a regular comb and after a while of pulling and wincing i decided to give the Tangle Teezer another go. To my amazement it just glided through my hair, somehow detangling effortlessly and leaving my hair all sleek and knot-free! Usually when i combed my hair i would end up actually pulling out a big knot of hair, but this thing actually seems to be able to detangle it completely, so i end up losing a lot less hair.

As a result of this my hair is sleeker and a lot easier to style. It also claims to help with split ends and to encourage growth, i haven't really seen any evidence of this yet but i haven't been using it for long enough to really see any benefits yet (if there are any). To be honest I think any powers it might have on a normal scalp will be negated by my zombie hair. But still i am so so happy that i can finally brush my hair easily and with little to no pain. It just makes life easier!
Tangle Teezer costs around a tenner and you can get it online, at Asos or at Boots and possibly other places. Personally while at first I was a little dubious that a hairbrush could be worth 10 quid (i know you can get much more expensive hairbrushes, but to me that's just crazy) but now i think it's a fine price to pay and I couldn't really cope without one. In fact I'm going to buy a back-up because i tend to lose things so often :P
If you don't have any problems with your hair tangling then I can't say if it's worth it, but if you have any tangles or knots then i think it's well worth it!