Hair dye allergy after years of colouring, what alternatives work?

[Toystory123]

Hi,

Has anyone got experience of having a hair dye allergy? I’ve just had a patch test and have had a minor reaction. I’ve been having colour on my hair for years so surprised I’ve now developed a sensitivity to it.
Normally I’d have (blonde) highlights with toner but understand that toner can no longer be used. If you have an allergy to hair dye what do you tend to get done to your hair? Not sure I want to spend a lot of money on highlights and not be happy with the end results because of a lack of toner.

Me. I dyed my hair for years and years. I’m 71 now. Then about 10 years ago I developed a severs allergy. I tried every supposed ‘safe’ dye, moved to foils so scalp not touched (ha!) and one morning after another ‘safe’ option as I lifted my head the pillow case came with me- my scalp had been bleeding in the night, whether from scratching or just a sore…obviously I never dyed again I was dark brown and had to do the badger, with the lower parts turning ginger as the dye wore, off for a year. I’m grey now and wonder why I went through all that- the pain, the cost, the trepidation. Good luck.

You do realise you don't have to dye your hair?

Yep, dyed my hair from about 12yo then early 20s suddenly became allergic. It’s all dyes except crazy colours and it’s generally the PPDs in the dye which is in pretty much all of them. You can try henna but even some hennas cause a reaction. Anything in the temporary or ‘glaze’ ranges I can use so I use to go with bright colours like pink and blue but the bleach did a number of my hair quality so now I use the Glaze range just to add a bit of depth to my light brown hair and accept that that is the limit of what I can do. Unfortunately you’ll never know how bad the reaction will be till you do it, I’ve done patch tests that were mild and decided to risk it then ended up at the Drs having to get steroid lotion for a scalp covered in open sores. Not worth it.

Do NOT use henna.

Ever.

The first time I used some from lush my hair turned a muddy orange colour. I did my research and got some high quality henna powder online. It went black. Jet black.

I looked like a corpse. No hair dresser would touch it with a bargepole because of the henna, colour remover resulted in patches of slightly reddish black. Even tied back it looked awful.

It was lockdown. I ended up shaving my head.

Just don't.

Whew. Ok, thank you all for the advice. It’s so random how it can suddenly just happen. Think I’m just going to start the long process of growing the blonde out and hoping for the best. My reaction wasn’t too bad, dry, flakey skin but don’t want to repeat exposure and react worse - some of the sores etc sound really painful!
Really interesting how foils can still affect you even though they’re meant to be safe but does kind of make sense.
Ill embrace the natural (and guess silver lining is saving a lot of money)

Same with me - huge reaction in my forties after dying it for years. I grew it out and now am grey.

(During the growing out phase, for special nights out/photos, I perfected combing a little brown mascara through the greyest patches to soften the contrast. Worked really well!)

Crazy colour worked for me but that's all.

Oh I feel for you . I became allergic to ppd 20+ years ago .
Don’t let the mild reaction lure you into thinking you can repeat it , the reaction gets much worse each time .
Don’t attempt to tint your lashes or brows , I actually passed the patch test and then practically lost my eyebrows , literally weeping wounds , it was horrific .
Over the years I had some success with Wella Color Fresh , it’s basically a tinted shampoo , it was fine when I was still dark but if you have a high percentage of grey it will stain green and purple and be impossible to remove .
What is your natural colour ?

At 45 I developed an allergy, and for the last year have been using Patrice Mulato dye at home, after reading recommendations on here. There's some older threads with MNers' adventures with non-allergy hair dye, and it seems to be the best of the bunch. I've used it three times now, am intending to carry on doing so, dyeing every 8 weeks. It's not perfect, but I like the result.

The brown mascaras a really good tip, thank you!
Natural hair colour is light brown but currently have very light blonde highlights with years of build up so it’s a contrast rather than looking like intentional roots
Anyone who uses a hair dye is your hair brown?
Also, anyone who fully grew their colour out - how long did it roughly take?
& yes going to miss getting my eyebrows tinted (even though I definitely leave it too far in between) but always feel like a treat and makes a difference

I’m allergic to hair dye but I can use Josh Wood (it’s PPD free). www.boots.com/josh-wood

I wasn't allergic to hair dye, until I was.

It wasn't the worst reaction (intense itching) but I am not risking it.

I've blended my grey in by having foils to lighten the darker bits as the grey grew through. Then the dye doesn't come into contact with my skin and I get no reaction. Once, the hair dresser forgot and put a colour on top and I had the same reactions, so it wasn't just home dye I'm allergice to.

I was fine till I hit menopause. I then had a few years of grey hair, I hated it as mine is not a nice grey it’s a sort of Brillo pad colour. I then tried Daniel Field hair colour. They specialise in allergies and very gentle stuff as treat women with or who have recovered from having cancer. I can dye my hair again with zero issues.

I had a free 10 minute online consultation, really nice woman and great customer service.

I used henna for years without a problem but it shouldn’t be used on grey hair as grey hair is more porous and you end up with orange hair. There is such a thing as black henna and that is probably what you bought.

I developed a PPD allergy almost 10 years ago.
I now use Leganza colour conditioner and it's great. I used two different colours at the same time , a chocolate brown and a mahogany to give it a bit of depth and it works great.
Took about a year for the old dye to work it's way out but I have a much more natural colour now and at £10 a bottle which does at least 8 applications it's much cheaper too.

I developed an allergy after a patch test a few years ago. The reaction only came up after 48 hours but it was still a reaction, slightly scaly and itchy. I really wasn’t ready and I tried various other brands patch testing them but the same thing occurred. I ended up having to grow it out because, even though I had an Aveda test seemed ok, the wait with no issues and then bing! 48 hours! reaction! was starting to do my head in. And by then the dyed hair had grown out such a lot and it was a depressing effort that I gave up. I still wish I could keep dying it. But that’s life!

I have the same allergy. I have to dye my hair myself as no salon will do it. I take a citrazine anti histamine and colour myself using wella koleston and peroxide 6%.
if my get a reaction after I take another anti histamine.

Self acceptance.

my allergy is so bad I can’t even enter the salon. I cut my own hair now.