John O. Parker - The 15 Minute Fix: SCALP: Exercises To Promote Scalp and Hair Health

The 15 Minute Fix: SCALP is part of THE 15 MINUTE FIX series (or THE FIFTEEN MINUTE FIX series).

Copyright 2014 John O. Parker

All rights reserved

Published by Tidal Publishing, a division of Tidal Capital Holdings, LLC. The 15 Minute Fix, The Fifteen Minute Fix , Tidal Publishing, and their respective logos are trademarks of Tidal Capital Holdings, LLC.

All rights reserved. No part of this book (in print or electronic form) may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means whatsoever without express written permission from the author, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews. Please refer all pertinent questions to the publisher (info@tidalcapital.com).

The information contained herein is not intended to be a substitute for professional medical advice, diagnosis or treatment in any manner. Always consult a qualified medical professional before beginning any nutritional program or exercise program. Always seek the advice of your physician or other qualified health provider with any questions you may have regarding any medical condition. Never disregard professional medical advice or delay in seeking it because of something you have read in THE 15 MINUTE FIX series or on www.the15minutefix.com .

All content and information provided by THE 15 MINUTE FIX series or on www.the15minutefix.com is for informational and educational purposes only and any use thereof is solely at your own risk. Neither the author nor the publisher accept or bear any responsibility for liabilities resulting from the use of any content or information provided by THE 15 MINUTE FIX series or on www.the15minutefix.com .

While every attempt has been made to verify the information provided here, the author does not assume any responsibility for errors, inaccuracies or omissions. Any slights of people or organizations are unintentional.

Hair brings one's self-image into focus; it is vanity's proving ground. Hair is terribly personal, a tangle of mysterious prejudices.

- Shana Alexander

Babies haven't any hair:

Old men's heads are just as bare;

From the cradle to the grave

Lies a haircut and a shave.

- Samuel Goodman Hoffenstein

Table of Contents

Welcome!

Are you frustrated with thinning hair or a receding hairline?

Are you reluctant to manage hair loss through surgery or medication?

Is your hair brittle, limp, dull, or otherwise less healthy than you would like?

Is your scalp itchy, flakey, or otherwise less healthy than you would like?

If you answered yes to any of these, The 15 Minute Fix: SCALP is here to help. This book will teach you how to use scalp exercises to slow and possibly reverse hair loss, strengthen the hair that you do have, and improve the health of your scalp. You will also learn to use scalp exercises to alleviate stress, sharpen cognitive function, increase energy levels, and generally improve your quality of life. If you commit to this program, your hair will look better, your scalp will feel reinvigorated, and your overall health will improve.

This book is primarily comprised of a series of exercises designed to develop and improve the flexibility of your scalp muscles, improve circulation in and around the cranial region, and stimulate your scalps natural healing and regeneration mechanism. In addition to the exercises you will find:

• An in depth description of the larger benefits of engaging in scalp exercises,
• Tips on how to make your scalp exercise program successful,
• Guidelines on how to develop a workout suited to your particular goals and time/lifestyle constraints,
• Sample workouts to get you started and generate ideas for creating your own workouts,
• Templates for designing and tracking your workouts,
• Instructions on how to track long term changes to your hairline,
• Advice on how to take care of your hair and scalp,
• Information on nutrients that are good for your hair and scalp,
• Suggestions on personal care product ingredients that you should seek out or avoid, and
• A list of resources for learning more about maintaining healthy hair and a healthy scalp.

All of this in one handy little book!

Why did I undertake The 15 Minute Fix series?

I pride myself on keeping fit and healthy. Im not an elite athlete, but I do exercise frequently. I also love preparing for and competing in races a 5K with the kids, an obstacle course in the mud, an ironman that demands months of preparation, a 24 hour relay race with friends theyre all great. However, even without the races, I would still train. I know that if I dont, I will put on weight, sleep poorly, have less energy, and probably be plain old grumpy. I also find that as I get older, things start to fall apart very quickly if Im not keeping fit. If I have to take time off for an injury, it takes forever to get my whole body back into shape, not just the injured part. So I do my best to keep fit and healthy. As a result, I feel pretty youthful.

However, as I settled into my 40s, I realized that my usual running, swimming, biking, and gym work kept only a portion of my body healthy. Granted, it is a significant portion (muscles, heart, lungs, etc.), but there are other parts of my body that are also important, and I was doing nothing to keep them in shape. I had never purposefully exercised anything from my neck up (brain, eyes, ears, nose, mouth, face, and scalp). I hadnt focused on taking specific steps to maintain good balance, posture, or motor skills as I matured. Nor had I developed specific regimes to exercise parts of my body prone to injury (except when I actually had an injury).

Since I have a basic desire to stay active and healthy for as long as possible, I decided to see if there was anything I should be doing to get myself in better overall shape.

First I did some research. I talked to and read papers by established medical experts, alternative health practitioners, and people who will try anything. Many of the exercises and techniques that came out of this research are proven to be beneficial. Others are more controversial but have good potential and general health benefits that make them worth including.

I knew from the outset that some of the approaches I researched were a little on the crazy side. However, as I researched the potential of the intended benefit of a particular exercise or technique, I often found that there were side benefits that made it worth doing even if there was insufficient scientific evidence to prove that it would help achieve its primary purpose. For example, there is little concrete medical data to support the view that scalp exercises will lead to new hair growth. However, there is good anecdotal evidence indicating that scalp exercises will help some people grow new hair and help others keep the hair theyve got. What really got me excited, though, were the potential benefits of improving circulation, nerve sensation, and muscle control in all parts of the head. These benefits include stress relief, improved cognitive function, and increased energy levels. All of these are more important to me than my hair (although there is nothing wrong with a full head of hair).

Other areas of interest appeared to require straightforward physical exercise programs on the surface, but devolved into a world of crazy ideas and theories as I dug in further. A great example of this is the Achilles tendon. The Achilles tends to get tighter and tighter as we age, and active people frequently battle Achilles tendonitis. On the surface, there are a number of straightforward exercises to help keep the Achilles stretched and loose. Dig down a bit and talk to people who have tried to manage or recover from Achilles tendonitis, and you find an incredibly stubborn problem that plagues people for months and years. The remedies people try in their quests to fix their Achilles easily rival anything going on in the hair loss world. These include salves, supplements, tape, magnets, splints, boots, massage, scraping, acupuncture, wraps, lifts, orthotics, ultrasound, injections, drugs, and surgery. Its not to say that these remedies cant work, but few of them work for everyone, and some have risks or costs that are unacceptable to many. Trying to find your way through this maze of information is no easy task.