I woke up the other day to my five year old yelling, ‘’Mommy there is something weird in my hair!’’
When I looked, I found a massive wad of gum had entangled itself in her hair!
A Hairdresser’s hack for getting gum out of hair really works! Mix peanut butter with oil, apply to the gum and the hair, put a hat on, wait an hour, separate gum into three sections, cut the few hairs that hold the sections together (It won’t affect your child’s hairstyle), comb the gum out, wash the hair! My daughter said it didn’t hurt at all!
Ten easy steps to get gum out of children’s hair!
She admitted that she put her gum beside her pillow to chew it again in the morning!
My daughter Frida was worried it would hurt to comb the gum out, and she kept saying over and over I don’t want to have short hair!
She already had pretty short hair and cutting the gum out was not an option because it would leave her with only a few inches of hair!
When I carefully started combing out the gum, Frida exclaimed, ‘Mommy, it doesn’t hurt! I don’t even need to scream!’
- Mix 1 teaspoon of oil with one tablespoon of creamy peanut butter
- Apply the peanut butter mixture to the entire wad of gum and the hair around the affected area.
- Put a hat on your child and let it sit for an hour.
I stumbled onto how great a hat worked to warm up gum when my five-year-old got gum in her hair early one morning, and my other kids were asleep.
I didn’t want her to get peanut butter on the sofa, but I didn’t want to deal with the peanut butter yet because I thought she would whine or yell and wake up her siblings. The hat seemed the perfect solution.
- After an hour of ‘soaking’ the gum and warming it up, run a warm bath as hot as your child says is ok, and let your child sit in the warm water and play with bath toys.
The warm water and steam will heat the room and help keep the gum soft.
(Don’t make the hair wet. The hair is wet from oil, and the hot water can wash the oil off, which is not what you want to do.)
- Get out a fine toothed comb. (You will need this later)
- Start by trying to separate the gum wad into 3 sections with your fingers. Don’t completely separate it because pulling the last few hairs that are holding the wad together will really hurt.
While your child is playing, work the gum into three distinct sections leaving them linked together with the last few hairs. It could be ten hairs or three hairs. The point is not to pull your child’s hair, so it hurts.
- A simple hairdressers’ hack. This is a trick I learned from my sister in law who is a hairdresser.
You can cut the last few hairs that hold the wad together without changing your child’s hairstyle.
You won’t even notice you cut because you only cut a few hairs. Remember, you are cutting vertically and NOT horizontally.
Vertical cuts in the hair make lovely layers, and you don’t notice them. Horizontal cuts in hair that you want to hide are often blatantly obvious, especially if made by amateurs.
- Once you cut and separate the gum wad and hair into three parts, start combing out the gum one part at a time from the bottom up. I was worried about combing the gum out, but it was surprisingly easy! It loosened quickly without hurting my daughter.
When I started combing out the gum, Frida exclaimed, ‘Mommy, it doesn’t hurt! I don’t even need to scream!’
- Wash their hair with shampoo. Make sure that you use extra where you used peanut butter and oil. You may need to wash twice.
- Use cream rinse. A high-quality cream rinse can help prevent gum and other things from getting stuck in your child’s hair. Sticky things are more likely to get stuck to extremely dried-out hair. A leave-in spray conditioner is also a good choice for children’s hair. This should work just as well as a rinse-out option if your child doesn’t like rinsing and getting water in his/her eyes.
That was by far the easiest and simplest way to get gum out of hair that I ever tried! Frida got some hot pink hairspray as a reward.
I wish I had known this technique when my first child was born.
It would have saved me from struggling with uncooperative children and causing my older daughter (Maria) pain when I tried to disentangle gum from her hair.
Maria ended up with short hair for several years because she got gunk stuck in her hair.
She would scream and yell while I tried to get it out! She does have a sensitive head, but I think all my kids do. I wish I had known then what I do now!
Check out my other posts about games we love for different age groups. Click below.
10 Games 3-6 year olds, with ADHD and Dyslexia, can play!
15 Awesome Games for 5-7 year olds, with ADHD and Dyslexia!
20 Amazing Games for 7-10 year olds with ADHD/ADD and Dyslexia!
Games transform Kids
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Copyright Annie Eklöv
