To highlight my hair again after three years of growing it out?

[LancashireSquirrel]

Just that really.. spent three years growing out old highlights but my self esteem has never been lower.

It's finally all grown out and in good condition but what's the point if I feel like shit?

I honestly don’t know what to do about my hair either. Bleaching it is knackering it. I have lots of grey but don’t want to go grey. I gave no idea where the middle ground is with this stuff.

Why not try a semi permanent rather than highlights as it's less damaging? L'Oréal casting is good. Just pick a shade or two lighter than what you actually want as they can come up darker initially.

what's your hair colour? what about going darker, for example, or red?

have you tried just getting a really good haircut?

Thanks all.

Natural hair is just a really dull brown, not dark enough to be shiny, not light enough to be blonde. It's just very one dimensional and boring.

I've tried darker in the past but it doesn't suit me and any roots which come through end up looking grey against the brown.

What about babylage? It is meant to be less damaging and lower maintenance than highlights. I am thinking about trying it after years of highlighting my dull brown hair.

That's what I'm thinking

I'm the same as you OP, 18 months in to growing out a full head of highlights which I had done for 10 years. But my hair just can't take the bleach anymore! I dont want to go darker as it doesn't suit my skin tone but my natural colour is soo boring. I had a toner put on at the hairdressers which was a nice colour but they don't last very long!

I'd try a dark blonde semi permanent, it will gradually fade out so you won't have that obvious line at your roots. It's much less damaging than highlights.

Thank you. Doesn't semi permanent blonde lighten your hair with peroxide though?

I have just had balayage after five years of nit highlighting and I bloody love it. Go for it! I'm

Be careful with semi permanent… mine went brassy and took a good year to grow out, I ended up chopping all my hair off to get rid of it 🤣

I was tempted to recolour mine last week (grew out in lockdown and quite a bit of dull grey now), hairdresser suggested going quiet a few inches shorter into a more defined bob as it might look more modern with the grey. I was terrified as I've always had shoulder length hair, but I'm much happpier with it, serums to smooth work better and it looks in better condition, and I dont need to start the colouring/highlighting cycle and the higher costs all over again.

Seems silly, but I also like my eyebrows being the same colour as my hair for the first time in 30 years 🤣

I grew out my highlights during the lockdowns and decided to “ go grey gracefully”

After a couple of years I changed my mind! I thought the grey made me look tired and sallow and my hair was dull and coarse. So, after a bit of thought and looking at photos of middle aged women, I asked my hairdresser to do some purple highlights! After she picked herself off the floor with the shock, she suggested that I had lowlights rather than highlights as the roots would show more against the purple than against the mid brown colours I used to have.

It was the best thing I did! I now have then redone every 12 to 14 weeks with a trim in the middle, I vary the colour, had pink last time and planning to have a blue/mauve colour next time. I get so many comments from people I meet, men and women, about how nice my hair is, even when I think it looks a mess! I dropped some books off to the library yesterday and the librarian complimented me - I was in old gardening clothes and had barely brushed my hair that morning!

Low lights are more subtle and my original colour ( which is now pretty grey) lies on top so the colour kind of peeks through and there are no visible grown out roots.

This is a photo of me when it was first done a couple of years ago, the current colour has pink streaks in as well as some purple.

Actually, looking at that photo, I think I am kidding myself that there is any of my original dark brown colour left, I am now almost totally grey!