Have you had scalp burns, baldness, severe hair loss, and fine, dry hair after chemically straightening your hair with Redken Vertical? Some people had hair almost 70% thinner than it was before the hair was straightened, and sometimes the hair was very dry, brittle, and patchy. Many people may have posted complaints about Redken Vertical that it destroyed the health of their hair.
I am so sorry to hear about your ordeal. But Redken is a reputable company and there is nothing wrong with the Redken Vertical Curl Reducer. So before you take down the product, go back to the stylist and show him what happened.
Permanent hair straightening is NOT about a leap of faith or a reputable salon or stylist being very nice. Allowing a group of well-meaning hairdressers to straighten your hair will eventually cause irreversible damage to the hair and follicle. The skill and experience of the stylist and an understanding of the science of permanent hair straightening is of the utmost importance.
Cosmetic procedures, such as Redken’s Vertical, do not damage the hair follicle within the scalp and therefore do not cause hair loss. Only a severe chemical burn on the skin of the scalp that destroys the follicle cells can do so. Burns like this can follow indiscriminate overuse of permanent hair straightening solutions and therefore these solutions must be handled with care at all times. But take an avid hobbyist who embarks on bleaching and straightening hair without any basic knowledge or experience, and pair this with a blow dryer used in your warmer setting – you’ve got a recipe for disaster.
Redken’s Vertical Reactive Chemical is Ammonium Thioglycolate or Thioglycolate. Thioglycolic acid is strong and irritating to the skin and is not used in solutions for waving and straightening hair as an acid, but as a salt or derivative. For example, ammonium thioglycolate, a salt, is used in alkaline permanent wave products, COLD straightening and TR products. In this case, the thioglycolic acid has been neutralized with ammonia. For the 60 years, thioglycollate has been and continues to be the preferred choice.
Thioglycollate is used to straighten and curl hair. The same chemical reaction that curls the hair during the permanent wave procedure, removes the curl from the hair in a chemical relaxer. At this point there is a reverse action, instead of reshaping the hair to the shape of the permanent bar, a straightening or pressing action is applied. This causes the entire structure of the protein to relax and stay in the new straighter formation. Thioglycollate straightener is mainly used on hair that has a very soft curl and a soft wave pattern. Generally not effective on African hair type, too curly, excessively curly, coarse.