Wondering why you have brittle nails? For those who find their nails breaking or fragmenting easily, this is a common question. Determining the cause of brittle nails is, of course, the first step toward getting rid of them! Let’s answer the question: “Why Are My Nails so Brittle?” To know more about this and any other nail care issue, you can check any of our articles, just click here.
According to the Cleveland Clinic, reasons for brittle nails can include hand washing that is too frequent, a side-effect of how often the nails are treated cosmetically or how long they are kept, a side-effect of aging, or even one of the side-effects of chemotherapy in cancer patients. To resolve brittle nails, purchase the best nail clippers for maintenance.
In this article, we will examine the top reasons that offer an answer or explanation to the question: “Why are my nails so brittle?” We’ll also go over a few tips on how to treat this issue, with the most important being our recommendation for a good pair of nail clippers that can resolve the problem.
With so much information to cover, let’s get started. We’ve gathered this information and tons of foot care information in this your BestPersonalCareProducts.com website.
Reasons Why My Nails Are So Brittle
If you find yourself with nails that wear and tear easily, or even split, you can be at your wit’s end trying to figure out why. After all, our hands and more specifically our fingers are used so frequently in daily life that having fingernails which break too easily can be a real hassle.
Luckily, there are solutions! However, brittle nails can’t be solved without understanding what causes the problem. Below, we’ve prepared a list of reasons for brittle nails:
- Chemo – If you are a cancer patient needing treatment and going through chemotherapy, one of the side-effects of this radiation treatment is brittle nails. Oncologists can provide helpful tips on how to aid your nails in weathering the difficult period of cancer treatment.
- Natural Aging – Generally, the main reason behind brittle nails is a nail’s reaction to light and dry air. Naturally, as we age, our nails take longer to grow. Longer growth periods means more time exposed to an environment, which sadly means brittle nails.
- Cosmetics – If you’re one of the many people who love to go for frequent trips to a salon, spa, or other facilities for nail cosmetics, this may be one of the reasons for your brittle nails. Unfortunately, some of the nail cosmetics commonly used such as polish actually tend to speed up the aging process of a nail.
- Washing Toes – Hand washing and foot washing are practices critically important to one’s health; it is certainly not a practice that anyone should give up on! However, the truth is, the water and sanitization products used on a fingernail can actually contribute to drying the nail out more quickly, which ultimately leads to brittle nails.
- Length – Finally, one of the most commonly overlooked but powerful causes behind the plague of brittle nails is improper length. When fingernails get longer than the actual nail bed of the fingertip, they dry out and crack quickly, and sometimes painfully. This is why a good fingernail clipper is so important!
- Bad Nutrition – Unfortunately, what you eat can be what you are; at least when it comes to what your nails have to say about how healthy you are! Without proper nutrition and foods that aren’t high in what your nails need to stay strong, they can become dry and weak all too quickly.
- Raynaud’s Syndrome – If you have Raynaud’s Syndrome, chances are, you’re already aware of brittle nails as a side-affect. This condition keeps all extremities, from hands to feet, from getting the blood that carries important nutrients. This means that nails die or become brittle more quickly than they otherwise would.
- Vitamin Deficiency – In addition to poor nutrition, sometimes the most harmful thing a body needs but isn’t getting for the sake of nail health are vitamins. B-complex vitamins like biotin can be essential to the health of a nail; without biotin and it’s relative vitamins, the nails can show signs of ridges, then cracking and breaking.
- Lack of Iron – Just like the right foods and vitamins are crucial for a finger or toenail to survive, iron is essential. This is because iron helps the body to produce high blood cell counts, which is helpful to many things, including the overall strength and vitality of your nails. If they’re brittle, check with a doctor to see if you have an iron deficiency.
Now that we understand why the fingernail or even toenail dries out and gets brittle so quickly, let’s go over some possible solutions to the problem.
Tips For Nail Treatment
There are many possible solutions to nail health issues like having brittle nails, and the importance of understanding what your nails say about your health cannot be overstated.
If you’re asking yourself, “Why are my nails so brittle?” then you’ll want to check out our list below:
Tips for an Optimal Nail Care:
- Moisturize – As we mentioned previously, when the toe or fingernail dries out, it quite literally expands and then shrinks, leading to easily cracked, brittle nails. Moisturizer can help with this! If you find yourself washing your hands frequently, apply lanolin-filled nail-conditioning moisturizer afterward. Do this before you go to bed, too.
- Watch Out For Your Nails – In addition to giving them the nutrients and moisture they need, take good care of your nails as you go about daily tasks. If you have to wash dishes, wear gloves to keep them from being over-exposed to moisture, or away from chemicals. Wear gloves when the weather gets cold for the same reason.
- Apply Strengthening Products – There are some products which can add a layer of strength to your nail and therefore keep it from splitting or breaking as easily, such as an actual nail hardening product.
- Carefully Remove Cosmetics – If you do like to go and get a pedicure or manicure frequently, that’s perfectly fine, as long as you can do it infrequently and carefully remove the cosmetics appropriately. Do this by using nail polish remover which doesn’t have acetone in it.
- Combat Nutrition and Vitamin Deficiency – With the help of a specialist or a doctor, you can actually fight against whatever nutritional or vitamin deficiency that your brittle nails are warning you about. Sometimes a doctor may prescribe an iron supplement, or recommend more of a certain food in your diet to help solve the problem.
- Control Nail Length – There are many ways to control your nail length. Some buff their nails (but improper use of this method can actually lead to splitting!) Others file their nails down. However, we’ve found that the best way to control length is through the best nail clippers!
The Solution to Brittle Nails
With research done, the best solution for the problem of brittle nails are Swissklip toenail clippers, when they stem from improper nail length.
When someone feels that their nails are growing too long, they may try to buff, file, or even bite their nails. The downside to these methods is that biting your nails can be very unhealthy no matter how often you wash them.
Additionally, filing and buffing both take very specific directions of movement if they’re going to do a brittle nail any good. One wrong move, and you could actually speed up the terrible splitting and cracking process by accident!
However, with a pair of good nail clippers, you can accomplish controlling your nail’s length, keeping them strong and thick. Just beware because if you get thick toenails it may become an issue to cut thick toenails.
What should you look for in a pair of Good Nail Clippers?
What should you look for in a pair of good nail clippers? We’ve got the answer for you below:
- Easy Use – Toenail clippers and fingernail clippers are necessarily tricky to use for some people; after all, your toes aren’t exactly the closest to your center of gravity, and you’ll need to be able to use your clippers easily if you want to get regular use out of them! Swissklip Heavy Duty are ergonomic, easy to grip, and fit most sizes of hands!
- Safety – A good pair of toenail clippers will prioritize safety above all else. After all, you are dealing with a sharp instrument near a sensitive part of your body that is already plagued by brittle nails. With Swissklip nail clippers, you can be sure that your blades won’t slip due to a bad grip, and can lock-up to avoid accidents.
- Effective Blades – When you get a pair of toenail clippers to handle your brittle nails, you need to be sure that they will leave a clean cut. If not, there is a chance of making the splitting and cracking nail problem even worse.
In Conclusion
To sum it all up, the answer to the question: “Why Are My Nails so Brittle?” can be one of many things. We discussed the possibility of frequent hand washing leading to dehydrated nails as well as vitamin or mineral deficiency, or even some diseases.
However, one of the most common causes of brittle nails is simply that they are improperly trimmed and get too long, drying out or weakening too quickly. The solution to this, above all else, is an effective pair of toenail clippers. These can keep nails that are prone to being brittle clean and under control for the health of the user.
