To be grey or not to be grey?

[Supersares]

So I’ve been thinking about stopping dying my hair to let it go grey naturally and would love to hear from anyone who has done the same. For context, I’m 49 with naturally dark brown shoulder length hair (currently dyed but with increasing greyer roots!).
My youngest is still in primary school so wouldn’t want to be mistaken for her gran and DH is 5 years younger than me so I’m concerned it would age me too much if I did ditch the dye…but I like the idea of saving money on hair dresser trips and potentially improving the condition of my hair too. Anyone else in a similar position?

Your natural black /very dark hair and grey streaks to me sounds beautiful and very dramatic. A lot of the photos of women with grey hair looking stunning on the internet are this colour combination. The fact that you have pale skin possibly means you are cool skin toned (though not 100%) and “winter” colouring, grey would look good on you. Do you have blue or dark eyes ? I know what you mean about blonde etc not looking right. It looks worse to you now as it’s root line and very definite. Once it was grown out it wouldn’t be as glaring. You could have lowlights put in to help blend it as it’s growing out or use a semi permanent if you were going anywhere special if you don’t want to go cold turkey.

@HolidaysPleaseNow meant to also say that it could also have been the wrong shade of blonde for you as if you’re cool colouring you would need very ash or platinum blonde. However this would be very high maintenance until you were almost entirely grey as roots would look very dark coming through even after two weeks.

I notice that a lot of people who go grey become quite evangelical about it.

I've let an inch grow out to check against my skin tone. It makes me look shite. I'm not going grey, no matter how much you and my mum insist.

@CortieTat
Did you get your colour analyses done in the UK and would you recommend the professionals?
I used to always be happy about the colours I chose when I had dark hair but now that I’m grey I feel off with a lot of my fave colours but welcoming some I wasn’t comfortable wearing before.

I think I need to treat myself to some professional help so I can understand this phenomenon however I hear so many bad things about some people in that line of work, I dont want to waste time and money.

These threads always go the same way, with posters asserting that grey hair makes you look older. Because, apparently, looking younger is the goal, or should be the goal, of every woman. And they have never seen a woman under 70/80/90 (delete as appropriate) look good with grey hair.

Fuck that. There was a similar thread a few days ago where some women posted photos of their grey/greying/silver hair. They all, every one of them, looked wonderful, as do the women who have posted here. It's a very sad day when women feel compelled to post photos of themselves just to prove to other women that they don't look like 'old hags' or 'witches'. Kudos to them as I'm not brave enough!

And, oh, you need to be well groomed when you have grey hair, or apparently you'll look 'frumpy'. You need a sharper haircut (plenty of maintenance to compensate for 'letting yourself go' with the colour) and a full face of slap, preferably with bright red or fuchsia lips, to stop you looking 'drained' (another favourite ) and potentially fading into obscurity.

There is also disbelief that women with grey hair ever receive compliments from complete strangers. It does indeed happen. I have had a few myself. When I was trying to decide whether to ditch the dye, it was seeing other women looking great with grey or silver or white hair, that made me decide to go for it. I honestly wish I had had the nerve to tell them I loved their hair.

By all means continue to dye your own hair (yeah you have my permission 😆) but stop with the reductive language around women who make a conscious decision to allow their natural hair colour to grow, just like you make a conscious decision to continue to colour yours.

To me there is a subconscious social phenomenon at play in which going grey has become a marker of wealth

Interesting. Can you expand?

Wealth or social class?

Well said

If you have the money then go for it and see someone professionally, however it’s pretty easy now to look online and see what colours suit your skin tone, as far as I’m aware it’s your skin tone that’s used in deciding what colours suit you and not hair. But I’m not a professional.
Someone at work did it for me once (donkeys years ago she was American and I hadn’t heard of it at that point) it involves putting different coloured clothing or scarves etc near your face without make up on. My hair is much lighter now as I was dyeing it almost black at the time but the same colours still suit me for example white looks much better than cream or ivory and silver jewellery better than gold as I’m cool skin tone. Tbh I don’t think you need to do all that if you Google it you will see loads of photos of cool/ warm skin tones and the colour combinations that work. Also if you have a free make up consultation at a store they will be able to tell you if you’re warm or cool toned and show you colours that suit you , if you wear it of course.

Of course you can look good with grey hair but generally I'd say women who look good with it look good anyway. I'd say it's similar to being overweight...you can look great as an overweight person but you look great despite it rather than because of it.

Fwiw I have grey hairs and am overweight so I'm not saying that from a point of smugness.

It kind of reminds me of that trope by which posh people wear old, scruffy clothes, don't style their hair, etc. Why is that? I think whatever is at play there is the same as for going grey.

If you are broke and can't afford to eg get your nails done, buy nice clothes, invest in skincare, is grey hair going to have the same effect?

In a sense, going grey could be a subconscious type of humblebrag: I don't need to dye my hair, because I have invested in my looks in other more expensive and less visible ways.

Just a possible theory!

Some people believe we should grow old gracefully. I say screw that. I intend to fight ageing with every ounce of my strength, using all the tools modern science can provide. And as soon as medicines that reverse ageing become available (hopefully this decade) I’ll grab them with both hands. I hate the ageing and decay of my body. I bitterly hate and resent it. I hate the way my knees creek and the way young people look right through me. I know “it’s natural,” but so is cancer and halitosis and tooth decay. Doesn’t mean we’ve got to like it. F- grey hair. And F- ageing!

But about those of us who genuinely don't give fuck about what people think and are more focused as some pps have already very eloquently said, on our health, well-being, and confidence? That has nothing to do with money or class.

For what it's worth - although I dare say I could afford it - I have never spent money on having my nails done, most of my clothes are from charity shops, and my skincare consists of rubbing my face with my hands while in the bath or shower then a quick rub over with E45 cream to stop my face feeling itchy.

Maybe it's simply about self-confidence and self-worth?

To be fair this is the style and beauty board. When people post for advice I assume their goal is to look good.

To be honest, I've read lots of threads like this and I think as a rule, most people who post are likely to be too personally invested in their own decision to give objective advice. This includes me: I went grey, I'm happy with it and I cannot conceive of spending all that time and money trying to fight the unfightable. This has nothing to do with my self worth by the way - I'd just much rather spend my spare cash on clothes.

But that doesn't mean my choice would be right for you.

The only other thing I'd say is, do you know what your new hair colour looks like? Cos I do find it baffling when posters talk about going to all that trouble to cover up something they've never actually seen properly.

These threads come up all the time and it's the same responses all the time, with the same photos all the time.
Truth is you're not going to know if you like it until you try it. I tried it, it looked shit on me so I started dyeing it again.

You look lovely

I had to stop having my hair coloured owing to cost. I was naturally dark dirty blonde,so the front went pure white. I had to change my wardrobe, especially tops, they didn't suit me anymore, I looked completely washed out. During the first lockdown, I decided to stick with it. A huge amount of people thought it was hi lighted. Bit more money now,had it cut from past shoulders,and lo lites, keeping some of the white,so it looks more natural.

I have seen your photo before and ABSOLUTELY love your hair! I grew out my colour during lockdown and am so pleased I did (treated myself to a long wished for Mulberry handbag with the savings). As a PP said, I love the confidence I feel having done it, but if I don't do my hair or put make up on I definitely look older. I also now make sure I have my hair cut every 4 weeks and my nails and eyebrows done too - to make me feel put together.

Which box dye do you recommend please?

Maybe it's simply about self-confidence and self-worth?

You can still have self confidence and self worth if you dye your hair though. Its not either/or.

I dye my hair because I like it. I dont give a fck what other people think of it, it's my choice to dye it and the colour suits me and it's pleasing to me when I look in the mirror. I personally dont suit grey hair- it looks bloody awful on me so for me, self worth is changing something that I dont like on myself.

I'm 43 and I dyed my hair black for years...the grey was getting ridiculous so I grey it out. I now stick a bleach London grey lavender toner on it if I'm going out or bored of the grey.

Yes, the evangelical zeal can be quite something.

Saying things like people who go grey have more self-worth. Tiresome silliness.

I also agree. Go grey if you want- totally fine and up to you. But the insults to the rest of us who choose not to are completely unnecessary and reek of insecurity.