To let my 12 year old dye her hair?

[Mothership6]

My daughter has ginger hair, it is beautiful to me but she’s been asking to dye it for quite a long time now.

She started year 7 in September and whilst she has a great friendship group and she’s not being bullied or anything (thankfully) she does get the odd nasty comment.

Would it be unreasonable to dye her hair?

I’m worried that by letting her I’m saying her hair isn’t beautiful as it is- although I’m probably overthinking it 🤷🏻‍♀️

It's very likely once she dyes it she will never have her natural colour again. I had bright red hair when I was younger and started dying it around 15 years old and even when I let all dye grow out, my old colour has never come back !

I echo that once she starts colouring her hair, it will probably be a lifelong thing.

I remember my mum telling me I would ruin my hair keep highlighting it - and this was back on the days of rubber caps, crochet hooks, powdered bleach and bottled peroxide. At 54 I’ve got thick hair past my shoulders in excellent condition so proved mum wrong!!

I would say that nowadays the products are so much better than in my day and are very gentle on the hair. I definitely think it’s worth seeing a professional colourist though. At least to get their advice

Natural red hair is beautiful and unique.
Etsy do some lovely boho hair decorations, clips, headbands, bands etc, that look good in red hair.
I would encourage her to embrace it and work with it.I
We have 3 young girls at work, all with red hair and l think it looks stunning, much better than boring black, Brown and blonde.

I think 12 is to young personally.
I have red hair and it's a pain to dye, it eaither doesn't take, fades or looks nooooothing like the box.
I also think redheads who dye there hair completely different colours(black dark brown etc especially done with a box) look ridiculous, it's so obvious🙈🙈
I'm at peace with my red hair now, it's took a long time though, but my husband can hardly believe he managed to bag himself a redhead, Nicola was always his favourite!
I'd just keep doing what your doing, kids are just dicks.
Having a suitably scathing answer ready for the disgusting question she will be asked though, "does the carpet match the curtains" is a good idea though when she's a bit older.... I had no idea what to say when I was younger but when I was older it was alot easier, of course it does, what do you f*cking think. Or nope, no carpet downstairs is enough to embarss the crap out of them!

Reading this thread has made me so emotional as I so strongly remember being a 12 year old girl with red hair that was desperate to dye it to anything that wasn’t ginger. Admittedly, I wasn’t bullied except for a few passing jokes here and there but my confidence was so, so low as I hated being singled out and feeling different from the other kids. Ironically enough it was always older women who would fawn over my hair colour that I hated the most, the women who would stop me in supermarkets and draw attention to my hair colour, saying how I should never change it and blah blah blah. It’s always the people without red hair that have such judgemental opinions- but they don’t have to live with it. Imagine having your biggest insecurity pointed out again and again by virtual strangers and other kids and not being able to hide it or cover it.

My dad refused to let me colour it for the longest time, though eventually gave in to let me get highlights when I was 12 and it was absolutely game changing for my confidence. There was no lasting damage to my hair and just the subtle change of some dark blonde highlights made me very slowly begin to accept and appreciate my hair colour years down the line because I wasn’t always stuck with it.

I would let her but find a professional who will do it.

I was the end of year 7 when I dyed my hair for the first time. It was L'Oréal recital and it was a gorgeous red. I really felt like the bees knees and adored it! I also now have a 12 year old and we have been discussing it. My daughter is not ginger but is also not, not ginger. It's auburny. She gets upset by it. I have the same issue that a salon will not do it but I now realise that my hairdresser was hinting at doing it outside of the salon last time I got my hair done so will be asking her next time.

Those saying that she is likely not to go back to her natural colour, that's exactly what she wants! I'd start with a little highlight and add more as she feels more comfortable.

Definitely let her dye it.

I would probably just go with highlights or something to start with but I’d speak to a hairdresser and get their opinion.

I love ginger hair but if this is something she’s self conscious about then I’d absolutely do anything I can to make her feel good about herself.

Being a teen is hard enough without feeling self conscious about yourself.

My friend had very frizzy bright ginger hair and she was a shell of a person because she was so self conscious.
Her mum wouldn’t let her dye it as she felt that was sending the wrong message but my friend got really depressed etc.

Her mum then let her cut it, straighten it and dye it and it completely transformed her.
Not only did it look amazing but it gave her so much confidence and it literally turned her into a brand new person.

Let her have a good school experience.
As she gets older, she can then choose whether to keep dying it or not.

Discussed this with my ginger 23 year old.

She said: definitely don't let her dye it - it will draw attention on her hair and bring on more piss taking from fellow students. Years 11 and 12 are the worst for piss taking and bitching. And there's nothing wrong with being ginger so don't take action that suggests there is!

I haven't seen my daughters natural hair colour since she was 13, it's just hair, no harm in her dying it.

My daughter has always wanted to dye her hair. She’s ‘dark blond with reddish tints’. She always wants to go lighter so that means bleach and we did a few at home streaks etc and dyed underneath at the back so it could be easily hidden but shows up in pony tail or plaits. Condition eventually disintegrated and it had to be cut out.

Anyway, after a couple of expensive haircuts she now looks great and is volunteering as a hair model for a trainee hairdresser. It takes hours but she’s had professional cuts plus 2x ‘dye’ using bleach and toner. Her hair is now in great condition and she looks amazing. School doesn’t mind natural colours.

Salons with trainees are always looking for models - it takes ages, but the results are amazing.

Thanks everyone. We’ve decided not to dye it for now, she wanted it lighter but I’m worried the finished look would look terrible or make her more of a target for nasty comments and bullies.

We’ve agreed that she can have her ears pierced now, hoping this will give her a bit of a confidence boost and in the future we can maybe look at blonde highlights etc.

I’d not let her dye it, but if you can find someone willing to help I’d possibly let her have highlights.
I’d agree with a previous poster who mentioned the dramatic difference that help with styling, makeup, lash and brow tinting can have. That in itself can be massively confidence boosting. I’d have loved this when I was 12, but my mum had less of a clue than me!!

Agree with Spectrum2001.

Lash tinting or daily mascara in particular can make a huge difference. There are many shades of mascara available.

Far too young.

I've never understood why some people are so mean about red/ginger hair. But unfortunately there are always going to be mean stupid idiots like that in life. If it were me & my child, instead of changing the hair colour, i'd work on teaching her how to deal with the idiots mentally & emotionally. Because although we can't change the behaviour & actions of others, we can change how we let it affect us & make us feel. So looking at self esteem, confidence, and also making sure sge really understands that when somebody is mean to her about her hair, that its absolutely no reflection of her, it's more a reflection of the other person & their own issues, so instead of feeling offended, she could feel pity for them for being such an idiot etc.. hope that makes sense!

I started dying my hair at the same age as I was going prematurely grey. I had mine done at salons, I’m in my early 30s now so maybe the rules have changed 🤷🏼‍♀️.
I don’t see the harm. Considering I’ve been dying my hair for over 20 years on a regular basis it’s in great condition. If you don’t like it, it can be changed

Sorry, as a ginger myself I disagree that ginger has negative connotations. I have never called it anything else but ginger because that's what it is. Ginger. My two kids (now adults) both have ginger hair and never had problems with bullying apart from my daughter, who wore glasses at the time, being called a "speccy 4 eyed ginger" by an older child during her 1st week at senior school. She turned to the older child and replied "I can dye my hair and wear contact lenses if I want to but you can't do anything about your face". She never had any other comments after that response!

I think letting her dye it so young says there’s something wrong with it. There are so many positive groups about being ginger it’s like it’s own positive cult. I’d do some googling and build her up to think it’s her super power. Show her beautiful woman with red locks, Try your hardest to get her to love it and be positive about it.

getting her colours done is a really good idea. My husband is a colour analyst and the difference it makes when you’ve had them done and you know. The range of colours you should be working with are astounding. Wearing colours that are hers will help show her how beautiful she is naturally.

I’m ginger and hated my hair colour in school, especially when I went to high school. Wasn’t bullied just odd comment like you’ve said about your daughter. I started with highlights in year 7 and by the end of year 11 I was full head bleach blonde. Hair took years to repair from the damage as I used to straighten it everyday too. One of my biggest regrets is dying my hair and not embracing what I had. I’ve stopped dying my hair since having 2 babies and lockdown happened and since I’ve had non stop comments about the colour of my hair. Ooo saying they’d spend hundreds to have their hair the same colour as mine 😮 wish I never coloured it in the first place!!
she’ll learn to love it like I did

Red hair is so lovely, don’t dye it! I remember in school some of them dyed it brown or blonde and they just seemed to have really low self esteem by responding to all the negative comments.

I have red in the family and it’s always been fully embraced. When I had my son I had comments from others like “if it’s ginger it’ll be drowned in the bath” etc. (obviously meant to be a “joke”). Good to see she isn’t going to dye it and she has loving, supportive family surrounding her.

I would let her dye it. It’s something that most girls want to do once they are in ‘big’ school -whatever their natural hair colour is.

It's a beautiful colour, does she know who famous red heads like nicola Roberts, Emma Stone, Christina Hendricks are?
Nicola Roberts has a cosmetic range called Dainty Doll. And talks about her 'issues' with being a red head growing up till she embraced it. How much better does she look when she does!

As a redhead who went through this phase NOTHING stuck to my hair unless I bleached it first. I do not recommend bleaching it first. Red/ginger hair is more fragile and will break more easily if repeated bleached. You don't want her hair to fall out. If you go to a hairdressers they will likely bleach the hair first (although they will call it "lightening").

What I did learn is that blue tones neutralise red. So I tended to stick with box colour blue-blacks and purples (which make your hair look obviously dyed or at a minimum just make it darker). Natural tones - browns and blondes will never cover it without bleaching.

if it was my daughter I’d let her. I first started getting highlights (with my mum) when I was 13, just for fun. I’d take her to a salon though because she’s more likely to get bullied if she turns up with a dodgy botched home job, than some subtle highlights or low lights done well by a hairdresser. Call around some respectable salons explain the situation and ask if they’ll do it.

Are children of this generation not moving past all of this? I don’t think we can compare to when we were at school in the 90’s and the 00s where there was a lack of diversity and EVERYTHING was a reason to be bullied. Racism, homophobia. I remember school being cruel and this generation are clearly moving for a more balanced world which is amazing.

my daughter is a red head. I tell her every day how beautiful it is, how lucky she is and she is so proud of herself. I’m sure people will say things as she gets older but I could never imagine her dying it at 12. I love the suggestions from others about confidence building and I’ll definitely be using these tips.