Grey hair - with pics

[TableDesk]

OK so I'm looking some advice.

Attached is a pic of my hair 3 weeks post root colouring at the hairdressers which cost £60. Obviously I would love to be able to manage the upkeep of this by having a full time stylist and disposable income at my finger tips, but I don't

I am a young (ish) looking 38 Yr old. I sometimes get ID for over 25 places etc. Most people are surprised that I'm 38 and most would put me at 28 ish without this being a braggy one!

WIBU to bit the bullet to go grey. I'm not talking about just leaving it to go naturally and looking two tone for god knows how long. I'm talking about bleaching it up and dying it a funky grey with the intent to then let it do what it wants?

Am I being silly to even consider this? I'm not sure I could pull off a funky grey...

Has anyone ever done this and pulled it off successfully? I follow some 'Greys' on Instagram but they are properly glam, whereas I am less so

YABU - keep with the brown & 3wk upkeep
YANBU - bleach it up then go silver grey

Thanks

I don't know but I'm having the same conversation with myself. My hair is all shades of brown/blond/caramel/honey with about 2 inches of darker roots, and my natural grey is coming through quite a bit as I've been struggling to get in with my usual hairdresser. I just wish it would all go grey at the same time and I'd leave it but mine just looks scruffy with odd bits here and there...I'm 47

Forgot the pic

Have you seen Sali Hughes? She looks fab with grey.

I'm in a similar position age wise. Planning on keeping up dying though until 40 and then reassess!

Definitely do it! I think more and more people are embracing the grey now.
My mum uses purple shampoo and toner on her natural grey hair because it keeps it very silvery. It's a gorgeous colour actually.

I think most important thing would be to keep it stylishly cut and styled.
Grey hair just left to go wild can look messy rather than intentional, if that makes sense

@FuckyouCovid21, Yes to the all shades of caramel, honey, light brown to try and disguise, but it's just not working unless it a fresh cover up. My roots nearly glow white and with a dark base, it's like a highlighter! My son says it's like a white millipede walking down my head

I will definitely look up Sali Hughes, is she the skin care guru?

I think it's because I'm in my 30 still that I feel it's a bit "giving up", but as you say a fresh style and good cut will always help.

I wish I could just wake up totally grey and embrace it, just skip the in between part!

I did at a similar age. Well I let it grow out, I didn't dye it grey. Zero regrets, I love it.

I've done it by adding in platinum baby lights and then using various toners, usually lilac, silver or pink. I've got a thick white streak at the front now and I like it. My hairdresser thinks its great too - she enjoys toning it into pastel shades.

Give it a whirl! If you hate it you can always dye it back to brown.

(BTW I'm mid 40's so not ancient but older than you are)

@TableDesk there isn’t a right or wrong answer about when to go natural, but I think your grey would look very pretty. Would you consider cutting your hair shorter to speed up the growing out process?

There are several good Facebook groups to join that are helpful and supportive with advice about going grey. Good luck with whatever you decide to do!

@CeeceeBloomingdale

I did at a similar age. Well I let it grow out, I didn't dye it grey. Zero regrets, I love it.

Me too. Mine’s been grey since I was 43.

My sis is younger than you and has the most fantastic grey mane for a good 5 years now, after 10 years of dyeing it every 3 weeks.

She let it grow, over used beanies in autumn / winter and cut it in a medium bob, wasn't her fav time but its worth it, it's absolutely fantastic now.
Doesn't make her look older at all.

She considered doing the same as you, but was talked out of it by the hairdresser, grey is a very hard colour to maintain, and a bleach + dye would never have the depth of a natural grey mixed with natural brown, so you'd have to deal with roots anyway.

I had similar coloured hair to you, and started going grey quite young, so a similar dilemma of regular touching up. I got fed up of trying to keep my hair brown, so my hairdresser did a colour strip to get rid of the old brown dye, then we did some bleach, then I went a dark steel grey, and the bleached bits were coloured silver (I'm not sure in what order, but it was a long day!). It was ok, but I was ready for something a bit more daring, so the next time we bleached slightly more, and I had a lilac colour wash, so it looked silvery lilac. That was Dec 2019.

I've now not had any dye since then, and I'm pretty silver throughout, but I actually use a colour deposit shampoo in a purple colour weekly, as I'm not quite ready for full silver, I quite like having colourful hair. It's my half-way house to full silver. I'm thinking of stopping the purple colour and seeing how it looks just grey, but not quite mentally there yet.

The great thing about hair, is if you don't like how it looks, you can just change it.

I'm talking about bleaching it up and dying it a funky grey with the intent to then let it do what it wants?

Sounds like a great idea! I tend to find that the 'change-over' so to speak can be a bit hit and miss i.e. when you let it naturally become grey so some bits are, some bits aren't and the roots are doing their own thing altogether. So if you're gonna go grey via a dye job and go from there sounds like a plan.

In my 20s I had a short grey bleach job for a while - loved it!! Now just back to my normal hair but honestly do what makes you happy!

The grey millipede - ouch that’s brutal!!!

I’m pretty much the same as you but a couple of years older, I manage to do my own roots in between hairdressers with balayage. Personally I find grey a little ageing so I don’t want to go there yet, myself.

I think it would suit you esp if you look young anyway. My only comment would be that the transition to grey is usually a) quite expensive as it takes a long appointment b)still some maintenance needed until you are fully natural as you will need to tone the brassiness out (this can be done with a good silver shampoo possibly 2x per week) Also probably good conditioning treatments as the transition can be quite drying. If you can face having a really decent amount cut off, it does save months of growing out the old colour. Eg Wolf cut or Shag is great for this!

Go for it - one of my colleagues let her natural grey hair grow through during lockdown and she looks amazing - she now has a really cool looking silver bob.

@FuckyouCovid21

Forgot the pic

I that is a lovely mix of shades.

I would think a few blond highlights and you are sorted.

I'd go grey if I were you. I think you're young and pretty enough for it to look good. You could always put colour rinses in, too.

I'm similarly grey, but at a saggy 52 I'll look suddenly ancient if I stop dyeing it, and people may think I'm my 11YO DDs grandmother, rather than mother, so I'll dye it for now. I do it myself, with semi-permanent which works well and is less damaging. Oh, and is cheap!

I would not go for the grey look. It's incredibly hard to keep and will most likely fade out within a few washes. I would go for babylights which are extra thin highlights all over. Should blend everything in nicely as it grows.

I went grey for the same reason a few years ago. Bleach with grey colour and toners.

It was a disaster. I had to have the toner redone every three weeks or else my hair ended up brassy. The constant bleaching was terrible for the condition of my hair.

My hair looked a lot liked yours- much more pepper than salt and didn’t go a nice naturally silvery grey on its own. Without bleach, it was just wiry and dull. With bleach it was dry and brassy.

I went back to my natural (dyed!) dark colour.

I think it depends on how much looking younger means to you. You seem quite pleased about it, which is fair enough.

As grey hair (no matter how beautifully styled) never makes anyone look younger than their years, you might want to consider that first.

I know some grey haired people who look amazing and attractive. It depends whether you're comfortable with it really. Do you suit lighter colours? I went greyer last year (I'm 40) but have naturally streaky blonde / brown / auburn hair and have added extra highlights. It really hides it.

I'm 30, and I'm not sure if I have actual greys as I dye my hair every few weeks anyway as I change my colour alot.
But this is my bleached and toned grey.
Either way is a big upkeep.
You'll still have quite a bit of brown coming through, so you'll need regular root touch ups, but I do think a dark root might be less noticeable and look more natural than a light root.
I love the grey, obviously, but a lovely brown can be just as nice.

I let my natural grey grow through and love it. I did speak to my hairdresser about putting a grey dye on top, just to jazz things up a bit, but he warned me that I would then have a different shade of grey growing through, so I'd be back where I started on terms of growing out a dye job. Sali Hughes will face the same problem if she keeps her grey dye job.

I'm talking about bleaching it up and dying it a funky grey with the intent to then let it do what it wants?

I would not do this. It will just destroy your hair.

Ok so I’m a similar age but made the decision to go grey over 18 months ago. I considered doing what you are thinking about but everything g I read suggested A) it would be just as much of a headache with upkeep as dying my hair was proving to be and B ) the dyed grey was unlikely to look anything like the natural stuff coming through. So I but the bullet and just grew it out. I added highlights throughout and used those to help break up the demarcation line. I used pink and purple temp dyes to funk my hair up a bit to get me over the difficult bits (I know, that sentence alone makes me seem about 30 years older 😂).

Good luck whatever you decide to do. I have genuinely had nothing but positive comments - maybe folk are slagging me behind my back but 🤷🏼‍♀️ I get stopped in public by strangers asking me how I get my hair this colour. My stock answer of a teenage pregnancy and over a decade as a midwife is rarely the answer they are expecting