Hair disaster - help please Tatty or other experts!

[CakeandRoses]

I dyed my naturally medium reddy brown hair (around a '5') two shades lighter (a 7) by mistake . I actually loved my natural colour but was starting to get some grey hairs (in hindsight i realise a semi would have been better as i was only about 2% grey).

i didn't like being so light altho it was fine tonally (it was a warm tone) so yday decided to dye it darker/redder and stupidly went a shade darker (a 4) than my natural colour, stupidly thinking I needed to do that to cover the light shade, forgetting my hair was more porous so would take colour well anyway.

i hate it it's now a really fake looking red which is far too strong for my Spring colouring

Can you tell me how I can get it back to my old colour please?

Thank you so much!

Oh yay I'll just go have a look at your pic...

Fantastic!

That's a really good result.

You must be chuffed! Did you use extra strength or normal?

How does it feel? Looks nice and shiny!

Great result!

tatty thank you so much, will get myself to boots and get some ColourB4 and give the medium caramel a go next week. Much appreciated!

I hope your children are more composed now

I'm sooo chuffed!!

I used normal (30 mins). It does look shiny and healthy, slightly dryer than before but like you said, that may well be all the rinsing, plus the effect of the red dye. I used some post-dye conditioner that i had left over from the red one and will do a few deep conditions over the next week.

Thank you tons!

Can you explain the thing about my missing roots?

Can't explain the missing roots except that perhaps there is some residual colour from the brown/red enough to bring down the body of your hair to a coincidentally natural shade which happens to match your natural roots?

That, I would say, is called "lucky"...

It's bizarre. It's like my hair is back to before I dyed it with the first one minus the grey hairs!

I now need to figure out what to do when the grey starts coming thru again - any suggestions please? It's still at a point where I can count the greys - maybe 20 altogether but it's hard to be sure as I've been pulling them out for a while. Wish there was something that just dyed greys and not the rest.

Hmm, its tricky really because if you go too light it will lighten (like before) but at least then you can darken, whereas if you go too dark you can't lighten (without doing ColourB4)

You said your natural colour is about a 5 but I disagree, I think you are as light as a 7, possibly even a "dark blonde" in terms of box dyes. I might be wrong if I saw you "in the flesh" but you are actually quite fair. People think they are darker than they are.

Just going to have a look at your pre pics again and will get back to you with suggestions. Strand tests are no good, you will have to grow some roots of about 1cm at least then do a patch test "in situ" somewhere above your ear in the mid layers...

Right, just had another look. Its barely brown, your natural colour. Almost dark golden blonde or dark chestnut blonde.

I'm thinking Clairol Nice n Easy 106B Natural Dark Champagne Blonde.

Find it here

Can I ask what you used initially to dye it 2 shades lighter, and do you have a picture of then that you can show me?

If you had a root-glow or lightening effect from the Natural Dark Champagne Blonde, you could try the 114A Natural Lightest Golden Brown.

I am considering switching to this shade at some point. I might have to strip or do a full head of highlights to achieve a base shade where I can start doing my roots in it. But unsure whether I want to go up a shade. I like the depth of my colour whilst I can still get away with it - age wise I mean - there will come a time where anything darker than a light brown might be ageing in a Pauline Prescott kind of way...I have a little while before I have to worry about this I hope but one wants to do what they can get away with when they can!

Can the colourb4 be used on hair that has different coloured roots?

I have a build up of nice and easy dark brown and reds but then a nice and easy ash brown on the roots.

Thanks.

Yy, I know what you mean about making the most of it while you can. That's why I held off colouring mine for years then I thought I'd had a fair innings and shuld get rid of the grey before I turned 40.

The before pic shows my hair in a light where it shows the light tones, in a different light it can look quite dark. I'll try to find another pic plus one where it had the first dye on it.

The reason I thought I was a 5 is that the dye was a 7 and said it dyes up to 2 shades lighter and it was def lighter!

Yes, ENorma

It may bring you to the same all over colour of a rusty gingery colour

Probably not though. For build up of dark browns that has happened over time, you might need to do one box after the other (you can do up to 3 in a row, leaving it on for an hour each time, of Extra Strength - I did 2 extra strength in a row one after the other)

Build up of dark browns are hardest to remove but you should still achieve good colour reduction and if nothing else, reduction of build up resulting in the ability to have highlights and that kind of thing without them going terribly wrong and ginger.

Sometimes it will reoxidise a little in the week following the treatment, which basically means it darkens slightly as the week goes on...

But your only other option is to grow it out or to be professionally bleached at a hairdresser...

Oh shit!

I go on holiday next thursday.

Am I likely to end up ginger or green before I go? Will I be ok in the sun and swimming?

Thank you for taking the time to reply, it is mucho appreciated.

I would wait till you get back. Basically, you are not supposed to do a "permemant" or "semi permenant" (i.e anything that uses hydrogen peroxide, which is everything but the simple one-bottle 8 wash dyes which coat the hair shaft) until 7 days and 3 washes after. I dyed mine 5 days and 3 washes after (I just washed it loads and I strand tested so knew what the outcome woud be). The reason is that it can encourage the reoxidisation process which basically means you can end up dark brown again and back to square one. Waste of time, money, and might dry your hair unnecessarily. Best do it "properly"

Therefore wait till you are back and choose a week where you don't have anything social where you particularly want to look good. Summer holidays can be fine, no school run, don't choose a week where you are going to a wedding or something, and hide under a hat or bandanna if the colour it exposes is really bad.

Do the treatment, do several washes and deep conditioning treatments, and then do your permenant colour several days later, preferably a week. If it looks terribly ginger or ginger and grey in the meantime, or uneven, you can use a Nice n Easy 8 wash medium brown which will cover the worst and at least tone it down a bit.

Thank you so much.

Your pics are gorgeous btw.

Oh ta! Past my prime actually the more I analyse it

Don't analyse it

Best not to think about these things!

tatty seriously, step away from analysing your pics (if that's what you're doing) - something about the angle/distance of taking a photo of yourself makes them less flattering than how you really look.

and anyway, I'm in total envy of your coral mastery!

I have now added some more pics of my hair and ordered them chronologically. Have tried to show enough pics of my natural hair in different lights to give you a fair idea of what colour it is as it changes a lot according to the light and what i wear (who'd have thought? )

and thanks again for all your help - you're a marvel! How do you know all this stuff?

You should start charging for your services!

Thanks Cake, I'm not really, but it is an eye opener! You are right about angle etc, its weird, you have to remind yourself you look better in "real time". Its true, I'm always more "pleased" when I see a video of myself than when I see a still, even though I get that "oh fuck is that what my voice sounds like" thing that everyone gets

Coral mastery!!! Haha. I do "like" the spring thing, so much more work to be done. (so much spending hahahaha)

That hair is brown, but just. And it is warm. I personally think you could start with the champagne blonde one, and if that is too "bright", do the light golden brown the next time if it doesn't "dull down". Start light, go darker gradually.

I can't see either tones being terribly far off your natural. You are somewhere between a 6 and a 7, probably closer to a 6, maybe a 6.3

Its a good colour to be because you don't have to worry too much about either build up or lift. Your medium and dark browns do, because they end up all Pauline Prescott. Your blondes have the "brassiness" issue. But if you stay within a shade or so of your natural colour and keep true to "tone" (warm/ash etc) then you can keep slapping a colour over and as long as your condition is okay, reap the benefits of the "refreshing" aspect and the glossing etc etc without building the colour up or getting too light or brassy or whatever.

Charge? Never. No qualifications whatsover, no right to charge, would take the fun away

Sorry for the thread hijack but Tatty you helped me out with my colour a few weeks ago....

Just saw your new profile pic - is your colour in your photo the 117 Natural Medium Golden Brown? Your hair is in the photo is pretty much identical to my natural colour which I'm trying to maintain with difficulty... My grey roots come through so quickly & I'm finding the colour goes gingery on the grey after a few weeks. I really need to touch up every 3 weeks or so but I'm finding it hard to do without getting big blocks of patchy colour building up.

If I use the Colour B4 to get rid of all that buildup can I go right back to using the 117 all over followed by root touch ups? A clean slate as it were? Or will my 117 not be the right shade once I've used the Colour B4?

I am also interested to hear that you're a Spring I've just spent weeks self-analysing myself as a winter & my colouring is identical to yours. Hmm, best start over again... The coral does look really good!

Thanks again Tatty

yy tatty, i always prefer myself on video too. i always feel pleasantly surprised when i see myself on a video and then go into the depths of despair when i take a photo of myself!

Is there any other option to doing a perm colour at this point - given how little grey i've got at the mo?

Hmm, not sure if Clairol do all those shades in a semi-permenant, and I am reluctant to try and shade match with other brands - the beauty of Clairol is its much easier to predict the outcome due to their no-nonsense labelling of shades...