Going grey...do it gracefully or dye it!

[ilove]

I woke up last Monday (ON my 40th birthday!) to discover I have suddenly sprouted a LOT of grey hair!

So,do I give in with grace or do I dye? And if I dye, what to get? What's best? I am a brunette with bright blue eyes, shoulder length hair but a couple of large bald patches from alopecia.

No -it's saying that salt and pepper rarely looks good, or groomed, imo.

Grooming=gravitas.

I don't dye my hair due to any external pressures from anyone. I do it because imo I look better with a few highlights to "lift" my skin tone- and yes, make me look a bit younger. Who really wants to look old?

If you don't care about how you look, fine, but I do and will keep making the effort until I am old (er) and very wrinkly.

BTW, someonemade the point that they might start colouring, or leaving it to go grey at 40 or 50 - when they were "older" Let me tell you that when you reach those venerable ages, you will not be, or feel old!

Loook at Lulu- she's 60!

I do care about how I look, I just don't accept that looking older = looking worse.

And with my complexion (ash brown hair, blue eyes, pink cheeks) there are no highlights which look natural. Blonde, copper, golds, reds, browns are all far too warm for my skin tone. So it would either be to keep it as it is (which I think looks artificial when your face is clearly older but your hair doesn't "match"), or go for salt and pepper, which in my opinion can look groomed if it's cut and styled well, just as much as artificial and high maintenance highlights.

If other people have the time and inclination to keep up the maintenance on dyeing their hair then all power to them, it's just not an important part of looking groomed in my opinion. I'm not frightened of looking older (maybe because I've never been a stunner so am quite used to adapting to what nature has given me?). It's not that I want to look older than I am, but I certainly don't mind looking the age I actually am.

My mum stopped dyeing her hair in her late 40s and her hair looks much better now than it ever did dyed.

I know i posted earlier but i'm with babbity - though we might both sound a bit too pleased with ourselves - i deffo sounded a bit pompous in my post - but i'm surprised and a bit pissed off that so many people are so negative about looking their age. i know what Babbity means about gravitas. We're grown ups ffs whats wrong with looking like one? And i disagree that you can't look groomed with grey hair -you do have to work harder at it though.

I get a stick up my arse about it because i think there's something a bit twisted about women having to look young to be attractive in the 21st century. And grey hair might not seem so ageing if more 30/40 somethings wore theirs with pride

have to admit to being a bit freaked by my first grey pube though maybe a touch of grecian 2000 needed down there!!

OK, let's put all our 'first impressions' theories to the test then:Guess my age

Is your grey even though? Because when i stopped dying it, the grey was just in 2 clumps at the side and a thick streak in front, it is pretty dark and so it looked awful!

I think a lot of the women with goodlooking grey hair still put clolour in to even it out.

I got my first grey hair at 11 apparently this is very common with black hair...

I second the new perfect 10 stuff being really easy!!!

Fanjo - I noticed my first one in the school toilets when I was 17 so I sympathise.

After years of home dyeing I'm just off to the hairdressers this morning to spend a fortune getting some of the dark dye removed and highlights put in. I'm trying to look my age by lightening my hair now, but there is no way I'm going white at 37. No way.

Have you tried Perfect 10 by Nice and Easy? Lovely natural colours but leave on longer than ten mins to dye the grey. I'd also buy lighter than you want as it comes out darker. I'm 48 and been dyeing hair since mid-thirties. Don't much mind the salt and pepper look at the top but bright white around the temples. I'm NOT going to look like Cruella de Ville. I'd have bright white streaks without dye. Also have to dye mine every two weeks as grows fast so i'd need another mortgage to have it done at the hairdresser.

I've also noticed that the grey that comes through is much coarser and much more difficult to style. It's very difficult when you have dark hair. I've always loved being dark (green eyes, pale skin) but know that you need to lighten the colour as you age or it looks witchy. If only hair dyes came out looking like they do on the box? Why can't they?

I agree, dye it. I found m first grey hair last year at the ripe old age of 21

Also, white eyebrows. Now you have to pluck those even when it makes you look lopsided to do so. On a positive note, as someone who inherited black excess hair all over the place to have it turn white is fantastic. Lot less plucking and shaving. My leg hair also getting less strong - great. So it's not all bad news.

I posted on this thead when it was first alive, and couldn't contemplate the idea of going grey!

However, I have just had all my hair chopped off (short short!), and am letting the dye grow out, I am so bored of dying it, and thought if it was really short then I won't have the whole growing it out stage.

So far i have a little bit of distinguished grey at the sides, but who knows how it's going to look as the last remnants of dye grow out....

I have to post on this one

Until recently, I was a strong advocate of going grey and to hell with what everyone else thinks

(hate going to the hairdresser)

But then one day I got dressed for a special occasion and everything looked reasonably OK except my hair (salt and pepper and lacklustre) - there was a real imbalance in the colour of my dress and the colour of my hair ifyswim

So I have reluctantly succumbed

Daniel Field is good

(recommended on here) - excellent info about hair -dyeing on the site

www.danielfield.com/template/catalog/FAQ.php

I'll have to change my nickname now ....