Sticky / Oily / Greasy scalp?!?

[JerseyGirlNB]

I have an weird sticky substance in my hair that NOTHING will get rid of and it's extremely frustrating.  About a month ago i noticed after i got out of the shower and blow dried my hair that the hair at the crown of my head was very oily and sticky (but ONLY at the crown of my head). At first i thought i forgot to wash the conditioner out so the next night I scrubbed thoroughly, but once again the stickiness was still there.  Then i bought a few different brands of clarifying shampoo (thinking it was build-up) and still the same thing.  The oil is def coming from my scalp because at the same time that this happened I started breaking out with acne really bad.  I'm 27 years old and have not broken out this bad since puberty.  Very strange.  So i went to the extremes of trying baking soda, lemon juice, listerine, medicated shampoos, even dawn (for it's grease cutting abilities) and NOTHING gets this substance out of my hair.  It's driving me crazy to the point that i asked my dermatologist to put me on accutane to stop oil secretions.  Has anyone experienced this problem before, and if so, do you know of anything that will get my scalp back to normal.  PS - it has nothing to do with my diet, because i eat extremely healthy and always have.

[MSharma2008]

This is Seborrheic dermatitis.  The vinegar on scalp for 15-20min and shampooing does help.  You have to make sure you hair is clean.  It happens if fair is not shampooed regularly.  Our doctor recommended Hydrocortisone cream after shampooing with head and shoulder or sensing blue 3 times/week..

[Pawleysmith]

Thank you wonderful women. I thought I was having a hair melt down. I decided to lighten my hair professionally with a bleach bath and new colour and highlights. I then could not work out why my hair was full of sticky stuff immediately after washing at the back. I blamed my stupid idea of lightening my hair.

After reading all your comments I remembered I also paid for an intensive conditioning treatment after the colour. Putting two and two together I realised this was just not coming out of my hair.

I used Fairy Liquid and tea tree shower gel / shampoo then finished with a silicone/paraben free shampoo. A little conditioner on the roots. I was so desperate I would chance a little color fade.

It's gone!!!!!!!!! No wax at all. Plus no color fade. Thanks.

[StickyHead]

I have been suffering with this on and off for about 5 years now.  It came on very suddenly.

The first time it happened I used Neutrogena clarifying shampoo and it worked immediately.

Then a year later it happened again, and the neutrogena cured it again, but for some stupid reason I decided I'd be on the safe side and use the Neutrogena clarifying EVERY day.

Well then my hair or scalp seemed to have built up a tollerance to it, and it would no longer work to remove the build up. So when it came back again about 6 months later I used "Paul Mitchell's clarifying 2" shampoo and that cured it, and I vowed ONLY to use the Clarifying 2 Shampoo when the build up began.

It came back about a week ago, and I had given my bottle to a friend who had been going through the same thing and she lost it in a move, so I went and bought a new bottle of the Paul Mitchell Clarifying 2 shampoo again. This time it didn't work by itself.

I mixed 2 tbsp of baking soda with about 1/4 cup of Paul Mitchel Clarifying 2 shampoo, shampood my hair, rinsed with a mixtue of half apple cider vinegar and half water. Then I applied MORE shampoo/baking soda mixture and again, rinsed with half and half cider vinegar and water.

This seems to have done the trick FOR NOW.

The condition seems to happen to me when I have switched off my normal Salon brand shampoo and conditioner and grabbed cheap drug-store brand shampoo and conditioner when I couldn't afford the good stuff.

My salon brand is Matrix Biolage Normalizing Shampoo, now called the Clean Reset Normalizing shampoo, and I condition with Matrix Biolage Detangling Solition, now called Matrix Biolage Hydrasource Detangling Solution.

When I use this combination of products from 2 separate Matrix brands (the normalizing for getting rid of build up and it can be used every day- and the detangling solution for silky, hydrated, moisturized hair and scalp that tricks the scalp into producing less oil by moisturizing the scalp [for people with greasy hair who need to wash every day, this combo is AMAZING])

So anyway, I know what you're all going through.  Fortunately I have had success in clearing it with clarifying shampoos and natural remedies.  I say, try everything you can, mix multiple solutions together and STOP using cheap conditioners.

Also, I have Poly Cystic Ovarian syndrom which means my hormones are SERIOUSLY messed up.  If any of you suffer from acne, facial hair that is courser and darker than the average woman, irregular periods- I suggest you talk to your doctor about PCOS and have an ultrasound to see if you have it.  I strongly suspect this hair condition is a hormonal issue. Have blood work done to check your androgen, estrogen and testosterone levels. This might be the cause of your sticky hair.

[shanghaiartist]

use ketoconazole based shampoo everyone. i had same problem 2 years ago. it was that worse that once i shoved off my head and then my doc. prescribed me that. believe me, it works best! just using it as a regular shampoo twice a week and i'm normal again (:

[elisacara]

Oh my, what would I do without the internet!  Thank you all so much for your tips!  I had exactly the same thing happen to me last week, all the sudden my hair became so greasy, waxy and sticky on the top of my head.  I hadn't changed anything about my diet or beauty routine.  I washed and rewashed and it only got worse.  I started to wonder if it would ever go away or if I had some sort of medical condition.  I finally looked it up on the internet to find that many people have experience the exact same thing!  I had all of the products that you all were suggesting so I tried them, I want to pass on what WORKED for me!  
I didn't have tea tree shampoo, but had a bottle of 100% tea tree oil so I worked that into the oily area on the top of my head and let it sit for about 30mins, then worked in 1/4 cup of vinegar and let it sit for about 10mins.  By then my scalp was really tingling, so I decided not to do the Listerine.  Then I washed my hair with the green Palmolive dish soap until it was easy to get lots of suds.  ....it worked!  It dried nice and silky and fluffy, not a bit of that residue left!  
I still wish I knew what this was from and if it will come back.  ...but at least I know what to do now!

[MMK2014]

Ahhh thank you SO much guys!!!!

I moved to London from Brighton (lovely seaside city in the UK) 3 months ago very suddenly, moving to a brand new job, lots of stress, eating badly etc and obviously being around a lot of pollution on the underground....my hair started to feel as though it had wax all over the roots. I also had really bad white flakes all over my head and in my fringe - disgusting!! My hair before this had always been shiny and lush, so this was really not fun at all.

I persevered with my normal shampoo (organic and natural stuff) and just hoped the wax would shift..but it remained the same --- tough around the roots, feeling as though i hadn't washed it for weeks even when I was washing it in the shower! Bizarre. It made me so self conscious. As well as this, whenever I ran my fingernails over my scalp I would get white cream under my nails..it was if I was scraping conditioner off my scalp?! So weird.

Today I had enough so tried pouring Cider Vinegar all over my head (mixed with some water) and i rubbed it all over my scalp and put a plastic bag over my head and left it for about half an hour. Then I washed it out with a Boots own anti-dandruff cheap shampoo for greasy hair, lathered it up and again put it in a plastic bag and left it for another 30 mins.

Washed it all out and now my hair is back to normal!! Amazing, thank you everyone!!! It is so bizarre that this 'condition' or whatever it is isn't known yet!

Thanks xxx