help coloring my hair

[mrscoyote]

I am looking for advice. What do you all use? My hair is not doing well with regular dies anymore. It damages my hair, leaves me itchy and the color fades to fast. I am thinking about trying henna but don't want red/orange hair. I am naturally a light brown and my goal is to cover the gray any thoughts or experience? I have also heard some herbs will darken the color.

 

[TanksHill]

I started turning grey at 25. That was over 15 years ago. I used go color non stop. Until last year. I'm now in the Going Grey Gracefully crowd. No dye for almost a year.

I couldn't get good coverage at allon my greys. And any color only lasted a short time.

I wonder if anyone has any ideas?

Gina

 

[Denim Deb]

The only thing I know of will turn your hair black, and that's walnut.

 

[Marianne]

I was also a premature grey and dyed my hair for 40 years or something. I tried all the natural stuff, but not walnut. I never did get any lasting results, but I wasn't dumping strong coffee on my hair daily. I finally decided it wasn't worth the hassle.
So I have been grey for 2 years. Most of the time I'm okay with it.

Fanciful (Roux) is a vegetable based washout color that you get from beauty supply stores. Walmart used to have a few, don't know if they still carry any.
Since you are naturally light brown, what about doing blond streaks or highlights? If you use the crappy plastic caps in the home kits, you just pull through the hair you're going to color. Still damaging some hair, but at least the bleach is not on your scalp and not on all your hair. You should be able to go longer in between colorings and the grey should blend in well.

My blond friend told me that blonds never go grey, they just get lighter blond.

 

[baymule]

I started turning gray at 12 years old. I finally gave up and colored my hair on my 27th birthday. I was a dark brunette. For years I colored my hair brown. By age 35, I was white headed and 2 weeks after coloring my hair, I looked like a skunk. I lightened up and colored my hair light auburn. I used that for 20 years. Finally I quit.

Growing out my hair was dreadful. I wanted to shave my head just to get that 2 toned scraggly stuff off my head. I did get it cut real real short for a few hair cuts until it was all white. Now I am letting it grow out and it is past my shoulders. I haven't decided on a cut yet, but it darn sure won't be short! My hair is nuclear, glow in the dark, WHITE! I will never color it again. Done. No more white roots fresh road kill looks for me!

If you really want to keep coloring your hair, try the henna. Just do a patch test on a strand. Then if you hate it, it will just be a strand and you can blend it in your hair and put brown color over the top of it. It won't be a disaster. I loved having red hair. People treated me different and I could get away with anything. I have an over the top personality anyway, but as a red head, people expected me to push the limit. So naturally I did. Try it, you might like the benefits of being a red head.

 

[Denim Deb]

OK, I think I need to dye my hair red!

 

[baymule]

OK, I think I need to dye my hair red!

I could be a bi##h and it was ok. It was nice to have an alter ego to pull out on occasion.

 

[mrscoyote]

Well, for now I had blonde highlights added to help cover the gray. I will most likely try the henna in the future.

 

[frustratedearthmother]

I hear ya on the redhead issue! When I was red my DH referred to me as "sassy" and he was right, lol! I might have to go red again!

 

[TanksHill]

If I died my hair red I'm sure the grey would look pink. The grey has such a hard time taking color.