Swimming with Dread Extensions

Is it bad for to go into a swimming pool with natural dreadlocks or synthetic dread extensions?

There are many misconceptions about dreadlocks in general, such as; dreads are smelly, they make your scalp flaky. Or the most popular, you can’t wash your hair when you have dreads. This is not true, whether you have natural or synthetic dreads, there is no reason you aren’t able to keep healthy clean hair! Also a huge misconception about dread extensions is that you cannot get them wet at all.

You want to try and get your fake dreads wet as little as possible. However, it’s understood that people like to swim and everyone enjoys washing their hair, so I make my dreads very durable so they can be soaked. Never get them wet every single day, if you have oily hair and need to wash it every day to keep it dry, then dread extensions are probably not for you, as soaking them more and more will eventually cause them to unravel, especially when showering with hot water.

Don’t shy away from the pool just because you have extensions in. But again, don’t swim every day..You get the picture. Once your dreads have gotten wet you may notice that their wear-time may shorten, this just means you may have to remove them sooner than expected. If you planned to wear them for 8 weeks and swim with them, expect to keep them in no longer than 3-4 weeks, depending on how oily your hair gets on a regular basis.

Dreads tend to dry pretty quickly, they’re made of synthetic hair that doesn’t hold moisture very well. Your natural hair and the top of your dreads where the hair is braided on may take longer to dry, but this is no problem and doesn’t take much more time than drying your hair without dread extensions in. Make sure to ring out your dreads and let them dry flat, don’t put them up in a bun because they might dry funny and when you take them down there will be kinks. Once your ends are fully dry, you may put them up, the dreads on your scalp will stay pulled straight. Also I find that pool water tends to keep my fake dreads smell free and I’ve never experienced any discoloration from chlorine, so as far as swimming’s concerned, you’re in the clear. :)