7 Reasons Why Your Hair Is Not Growing

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Want to know why your hair is not growing? You’re going to learn exactly why, continue reading!

I am on a mission. I want to have beautiful hair, I want them to be long, thick, and healthy. This means I’m constantly researching everything about hair, I’m absorbing any information I can get.

Of course, getting your hair to grow is super important if you want long and luscious hair but sometimes it feels like it’s impossible. This is why I started to go deep into why hair may not grow: what are the possible causes and how can it be fixed?

Here are common reasons why your hair is not going

1. Genetics
2. Age
3. Underactive thyroid
4. After a haircut, it may look like your hair is not growing when it actually is
5. Excessive stress
6. Hormonal imbalance
7. Nutritional deficiencies such as vitamin deficiencies

For those of you who are interested not only in growing your hair long but also in growing them thick and healthy hang on a little longer. I also talk about why your hair is not growing healthy and what to do about it.

Hair growth cycle

First things first, understanding how your hair grows can help boost hair growth. So, we are going to quickly go over the phases of the hair growth cycle.

1. Anagen. During this phase your hair is growing the most, in fact, it’s also called the growth phase. When in the anagen phase your hair will be growing half an inch a month on average, around six inches a year.
2. Catagen. This is a transitional phase where your hair is cut off from its blood supply.
3. Telogen. During this phase, your hair is released from its follicle and falls out.

Why won’t my hair grow?

1. Genetics

Genetics actually plays a big role in our hair growth. For example, on average the anagen phase lasts 3-5 years but for people of Asian descent can last up to seven years. You can see why that would be helpful, if your hair has more time to grow you obviously will be able to grow it longer.

2. Age

Age affects hair growth because your hair’s growth cycle becomes shorter as you get older. 

Also, as you get older your hair typically gets weaker because of everything you put it through throughout your life, like styling and bleaching, but also your diet and overall physical health.

This could mean that if your normal cycle lasted six years, as you get older it could get two years long. You can understand how your hair could be thinner and/or unable to grow past a certain point.

3. Underactive thyroid

To put it simply, if your thyroid is not functioning properly it can affect hormone production. If it’s producing fewer thyroid hormones it can lead to hair loss.

If you’re experiencing other symptoms of underactive thyroid such as constant fatigue or trouble losing weight it would be appropriate to see a doctor.

4. After a haircut

When you get a haircut, especially if you cut a few inches, it may feel like your hair is not growing anymore. Most of the time that is not the case, your hair might just seem to be growing slower when actually it isn’t.

On average, hair grows about half an inch a month (six inches per year). If you recently had a haircut and feel like your hair is not growing anymore I suggest you measure it now and again after a month.

If you see a growth roughly similar to half an inch your hair is growing just fine, you don’t need to worry.

5. Excessive stress

Is no secret by now that stress is detrimental to our bodies. Hair suffers significantly when your stress levels remain high for a long period of time.

I know it can be easier said than done but it’s very important that you work on lowering your stress levels. Not only your hair will grow longer and healthier but your life overall will benefit from it.

6. Hormonal imbalance

Hormonal imbalance can lead to hair thinning and/or hair loss. Both men and women can develop it.

Essentially, hormonal imbalance happens when you produce too much or too little of one or more hormones. While estrogen and testosterone are usually involved, as we already discussed, also thyroid hormones can play a role here.

7. Nutritional deficiencies

If you’re lacking certain vitamins and minerals this can affect your hair health resulting in hair loss. Deficiencies in vitamin D and iron, for example, have been associated with hair loss.

Also, it’s important you know those nutrient deficiencies can cause problems to your overall health, they are something that you should pay close attention to.

If you’re interested I have an entire article about nutrient deficiencies that can cause hair loss and how to know if you have any.

Why won’t my hair grow healthy?

Excessive hair breakage

If end up having hair breakage, you don’t need to worry because you can absolutely reverse it by taking care of your hair properly.

The only products I highly encourage you to buy aware the ones from the Olaplex line, specifically:

I know these are expensive products, in fact, I postponed trying them for so many years myself for this exact reason. But I’m telling you, these are the only products you really need. I have never seen such a difference in my hair using anything else and – believe me – I tried a lot of products.

If you want to know exactly how to use them and why they are going to give you results I wrote an article on how to stop hair breakage once and for all where I go in-depth on the Olaplex products and give you all the hacks I picked up during the years.

Split ends

You see, not split ends make your hair look nasty but also they don’t affect just your ends. What I mean by this is that if you don’t address them, they can continue splitting through the hair shaft thinning the entire hair strand.

This is why it’s important to trim your hair regularly, split ends won’t open further to the hair shaft and your hair will look healthier overall.

Now, ideally, you should trim them every three months but I know how expensive haircuts can be in fact, I visit my hairdresser less frequently than that.

Personally, I have a rule to trim my hair at least twice a year. If I can I will go to the hairdresser more often but I found that twice a year can grant me the minimum maintenance that I need.

Aggressive styling

Heat, tight hairstyles, and excessive combing can all lead to hair thinning or hair loss. You need to be intentional about how you take care of your hair so that you don’t stress them.

This way, you can stop hair loss – if these are the causes of your hair loss – and also stimulate new hair growth.

This post was all about why your hair won’t grow and how to fix it.