I am about to either ruin my life or do something incredible

[Anordinarymum]

I have long hair. I have been dyeing it for years. Since lockdown I have not had it cut and am sick of dyeing it and feeling unimpressed with the colour.
I'm not sure what my colour is but I know it's a mixture of white and grey.
The problem I have the white hair goes ginger when I dye it so...

Tomorrow I am going to buy some dandruff shampoo and baking soda and attempt to strip the colour.

I have super conditioned it but it is processed with all the dye so I am prepared for a not good result.

Long term? I want to dye it silver grey.

Wish me luck please !

I would welcome any tips from anyone else who has gone down this route . Thanks

How did it go?

Would you consider a colour remover, or going to thebhairdresser?

I think people suit the grey hair colour which is the same as the shade of grey clothing they suit.
So tanned models with dark eyes suit steely blue grey.
Whereas many British with pale skin suit a blondey grey, if you know what I mean.

I started to go grey in my late teens/ early twenties. Got fed up of dying it so did what you’re planning, Head & Shoulders, colour stripper I bought in Boots. Had about twelve months of it not looking great as it gradually changed but by age 25 I had completely snowy white hair. I loved it & still do, kept getting asked where I got my “ platinum blonde”. colour done ! Wouldn’t go back to the pfaff of dying it for anything.

Add crushed Vitamin C tablets (about 10) to your colour removal mix, it worked really well for me at lightening a way too dark colour. Had to do it quote a few times though over a few days!

Sounds like it will look really good

@Darklane your hair sounds lovely ❤️

Fascinated. Didn't know there was such a thing!

I'd love to go back to 'normal'. I actually asked my hairdresser at the last visit to take me back to my mousy roots with just a tiny few strands of ash blonde.

Yet I've still got yellowing hair which, under a certain light, looks like a cheap ginger dye.

I have a ginger coloured daughter who's hair I adore - so am not critical of orange:flame coloured hair. It just looks like naff hair dye on me😫

I hate to piss on your parade but going back to your natural colour is really difficult!

I think you'll need something like Colour B4; a proper heavy duty colour remover. Also, brace yourself, if you've been dying your hair a dark permanent colour (brown?) then the dye won't completely lift off. You will probably be left with a gingery sort of sludgy colour underneath.
You can cover or tone this with a semi permanent dye. Something like a dark ash blonde.

I'd just advise seeing a decent hairdresser to be honest. These things rarely go well, especially on whims. I think you'll need a poppe colour remover if you've got years worth of dye in the lengths too.

Do you dye your hair at home OP? If so again I think box dye usually gives a fairly flat result. Much better to let a good colourist sort it, they can blend your roots into your lengths and start the process of growing out the dye over time with it still looking put together rather than having to endure chunks of time where it doesn't look how you want. Hope it goes well either way though. Let us know!

WelshMoth I think your hair could be fixed by using a purple shampoo with toner in it. That will neutralise the yellow brassy tones. I'd recommend Lee Stafford Bleach Blondes toning shampoo. It's not just for very blonde hair. Use like a shampoo, leave on for 5 mins, rinse and condition.

I've had great results on my dark blonde hair with this.

I was talking to a hairdresser the other day about putting some highlights in my dyed brown hair in order to start blending in grey roots. She did a strand test which went ginger, and asked if I'd been using box dyes. She explained that box dyes are much stronger than the dyes used in salons because they are marketed as being able to cover greys for all home users. If I had had salon dyes then she might have been able to lift the colour but as it was, with years worth of box dyes, she thought it just wouldn't work without completely wrecking the condition. And even then it might not work and I'd need to apply toner frequently. When I could see the result of the strand test it made it very clear what she was talking about, so I've gone for lowlights on the roots and will slowly get the colour cut out.
My point is, I think you could easily end up with very brassy looking hair, and maybe you should check it with a hairdresser to avoid disaster!

Thanks for the replies. I don't want to go to a hairdresser because of the cost. I haven't done anything yet. I'm still considering my options.

My hair is about a half inch of no colour since I have not dyed it for a while and then the rest is box dyed.

It is long and in good condition.

This stage is one a lot of women must agonise over as it is a sort of transition - a final decision if you like, and I am a bit scared that I will become instantly old when I am so not.

@Anordinarymum, use semi-permanent dyes in a slightly lighter shade than now. They will cover the regrowth a bit.
Nice & Easy do one and is fine, reasonably priced (often 2 for £x in boots, wilko or superdrug). It contains some peroxide so might not be wonderful for the condition of your hair in the long run, but it's fairly foolproof.
The colour lasts about 24 shampoos IIRC and I'd recommend a colour shampoo or maybe using conditioner before washing.

I wouldn't be too afraid of trying to go grey. You can always dye it again if you decide you don't like it!

The main difficulty is actually returning to your original colour. It's usually a painstakingly long process and never looks great until the previously dyed parts are grown out and cut off.

All permanent hair dyes contain some hydrogen peroxide (bleach) which will have irreversibly altered your hair colour. The tip above about using lighter semi permanent dyes (once you have stripped out all the colour you can) is a good temporary measure, until the roots grow.

There was a long running thread on here called Embrace The Grey which might be worth a look. It had lots of tips on how to stop dying hair and the transition to grey.

Look at Grombre on Instagram. Fantastic inspiration for ditching your dye. Sorry don't know how to copy link from Insta

Reading your last post op made me laugh. Deciding to go grey probably was the most significant decision I made in he last 10 years. And I had no support. Everyone thought it was a bad idea. Now I get compliments and told it looks distinguished! I think it suits me. Once it's mostly grey (I'm about 35/65 split atm) I would like to get dark lights, but I would like them to be a darker grey rather than the salt and pepper I've got now.

Why not pixie cut, cut the colour out and quite literally start again?

When I decided to go grey I used Colourb4 a few times on my hair all over, and then bleached the front which I could see was totally white. I still had to grow out where it had been dyed but there wasn't a big line to deal with.
If I was planning on dying it silver, I'd just go for it with high lift bleach, olaplex, and then dye it.

Op I've not coloured my hair since January.
I washed my hair in head and shoulders to help fade the colour( it was box dye dark brown) and used root touch up sprays till it looked obvious what I was doing.
My grey is now nearly jaw length and the rest of my hair is red/ light brown.
I use blue shampoo to blend it all together and plan on having it cut as soon as the grey grows some more.

I am enjoying reading the responses. So many different views on getting to the same destination :)

I'm now considering my options of which there are now more than I realised.

I don't want to make a big mistake here as (said by others) your hair is important.

I may go for a consultation at the hairdressers just to see what they say about my hair in relation to the next step to take.

Thank you ladies ! Please keep coming with your stories. Isn't it a comfort to know you are not alone

I tried to get rid of my dark brown colour and i wrecked my long hair, tried to get it back into decent condition and with lots of product it improved but never felt as silky smooth as it had. I went travelling for two months and after putting it up in unflattering frizzy bun all the time decided it was time to take the plunge in Vietnam and had it cut short, came home to lockdown and the colour fading so bleached it out and box dyed grey, maintained it over the last few months by using bleach London smoky grey shampoo and conditioner and am just about to go and get it cut again today, hope this takes off the slightly fluffy bits and gives me a decent style so my true colour of silver grey shines through.