The growth and quality of our hair never remain the same and change during our lifetime. Everything from hormones and genetics to medication can affect our hair’s growth cycle.
Hair loss, in particular, can become a serious cause of worry and uneasiness for a lot of people. This is why understanding how new hair grows and what its stages are can help you find out whether your hair is healthy.
So What Are the Stages of New Hair Growth?
Hair growth is a complex process with four different stages. These stages include the growth and shedding of the hair. Reasons like stress, medication, illness, fungal infections, etc. can disturb this cycle by damaging the follicle, resulting in increased shedding and slow or no hair growth.
Below are the different stages of hair growth:
Anagen: The Growth Stage
Out of all the stages, this one carries on for the longest time for hair on the head. The period of this phase can extend up to 5 years. However, for hair other than the ones on the head, such as eyebrow hair, this phase lasts for a short time. It is at this point that our hair grows out of the scalp and continues to do so until the growth cycle is complete and the hair begins to shed.
Catagen: The Transition Stage
The anagen phase is followed by the catagen phase, which is much shorter than the first stage and only spans about a week or so. This is where the hair follicle is no longer functioning as before. As a result, hair growth is reduced and the hair becomes detached from the follicle. While the hair isn’t growing as it used to, it still remains grounded in the scalp.
Telogen: The Resting Stage
At this stage, there is neither any growth of the hair nor any shedding. This is why, this phase is called the resting stage. This phase only lasts three months. During this time, the follicles that detached from the old hair in the previous stage also begin to develop new hair.
Exogen: The Shedding Stage
The exogen phase essentially wraps up the growth cycle of our hair. However, this stage is considered to be an element of the telogen phase. This is also the part of the cycle where what we refer to as “hair shedding” begins to take place.
Some of the hair shedding at this stage is also caused by our routine hair maintenance, such as washing the hair or combing it to detangle it. This is completely normal, as we are supposed to lose about 50 to even 100 hair strands every day at this stage of the cycle.
Overall, eating well, getting good quality sleep, not putting tension on the hair, and being gentle with your hair by not using strong chemicals can definitely do wonders for new hair growth.
What Are the Signs of New Hair Growth?
The new hair growth or breakage has its distinct signs. We already know that conditions such as male and female pattern baldness can drastically thin out the hair on our heads and make them look sparse. In addition to this, extreme hair breakage can also leave the hair looking less dense.
Hair breakage is mostly caused when our hair becomes extremely damaged and weak, causing the hair shaft to break whenever we try to wash, brush, or style our hair.
Now that we know what hair breakage looks like, how do we recognize new hair growth? New hair growth signs include:
- The first sign is enhanced volume in the hair, and the filling up and darkening of parts of the scalp that had sparse hair before.
- Moreover, the hairline starts to become denser because of the growth of baby hairs along the hairline. The new hair is often much softer and silkier, hinting at better hair health.
- The new hair that emerges is also much stronger, leading to decreased shedding.
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