Giving up the dye/bleach and growing out natural? Share your progress.

**Hatsumomo** · April 17th, 2009, 05:33 PM

Apologies if there's already a thread like this but....

I thought it would be a good idea to start a thread for those of us who're growing out an unwanted colour and going natural (in the colour sense). Unless you shave your head (which has other problems!), it's a very drawn out and boring process so we need support haha!

I thought it could go something like....

Hair history (how you ended up in this mess

)
Goal
Current length
Length of virgin hair

Anyhoo...

*I joined here with hair around 28 inches and all the one length. I think it vaguely resembled my natural colour.

I then hennaed because an ex liked it red (pathetic I know). Realised I didn't suit it.

I then had it cut to 22 inches in September 2008 and have since been maintaining between 23-25...

Had a long layer and a fringe (nose-length) put in on the 11th of March. It was 23 inches overall in length.

*My goal is to have my henna out completely and get to waist length and then see where I go from then. I'm looking to have it all natural by Christmas 2010 at the latest.

*Current length on April 18th 2009 is 24.5 inches overall and my fringe is down to my bottom lip.

*My virgin hair is four inches long.

**Arctic** · April 18th, 2009, 04:44 AM

I'm growing out henna, and have been thinking starting a thread like this

I'm not sure if I'll never henna or colour my hair again, but for now this is what I want to do, I want to see and feel my real hair! I have been colouring since I was 13, chemical colours at first. About 5-ish years ago I started hennaing, and kept doing it because it made my hair stronger. The warm henna colour doesn't suit me very well, I have cool colours myself but the benefits were bigger to me. Then.

Now I'm bored and want my own colour back.

I would have liked darker henna red but the stuff I used was too weak for that, it only gave me orangey brown glow. Then in the end of 2007 I tried new brand of henna which gave stronger colour. It was mix of henna and other herbs. It looked so good in photos, a real red, but in real life it was still orangey. But it was better colourwise by far and I might still use it if the whole brand wouldn't have been discontinued.

At first I looked for other similar henna mixes but months went by and now it's been 7 months since my last henna.

I really love unnatural reds and purples and dark cool browns in my hair, but... but... When I used regularly chemical colours my hair never grow past shoulders.

**iris** · April 18th, 2009, 06:06 AM

Great idea for a thread! I've been growing out henna since February 2007, I'm well past the worst of it now, but the first year was hard for me, and the second year wasn't all that easy either

.

History:
I hennaed for about five years. I never really liked henna on me, it did look sort of striking, but I hated the orange color that came out in the sun in particular, and it never matched my eyebrows, and it was just too dramatic a change from my natural color (a dark ash blond). I just never felt it was me.

At the end of 2006 I started having serious scalp reactions to the henna - it would get incredibly itchy and angry after henna, so bad I wanted to scratch my scalp until it bled. Stupidly I tried a few more times with different hennas, leaving out all additives etc, but it only got worse. In February 2007 I finally bit the bullet and gave up.

Then came dealing with the grow-out. I had a really strong line of demarcation going on, my natural color roots looked like a pistachio green next to the hennaed length. People were constantly looking at my roots when they were talking to me. It looked awful. I have no pictures of this stage. It was just bad. At some point I started covering my roots with red wash-out dyes (stargazer eggplant and rouge), which worked, but it was a lot of work (had to be redone every week). I also tried a henna gloss on just my roots in this time, which was a mistake. (very brassy)

In the summer of 2007 I started experimenting with lemon juice and conditioner on the length to take some of the henna out. This worked to some extent, but also made the length look more orangey, which was not a good look for me. Finally in January 2008 I was so fed up of the whole thing that I bleached out the henna from the length with household peroxide. I did extensive strand tests and came out with the length mostly intact, but a calico mess of a poop yellow color and some bright orange. Which I then spent months on figuring out how to tone it to a shade somewhat resembling my natural color. I tried tons of things and got a good feeling in the end for what shade of blue/violet I needed to counter the poop yellow/orange, but everything I used to tone it down would also wash out quite quickly.

Finally I discovered elumen dye, which has better staying power on the peroxided hennaed length than anything else I've tried (still not perfect though), and since then I've been able to have a life again LOL. I also use a light gloss of elumen on my roots now, to blend in my whites and make my natural color a bit more interesting. I can take or leave it though, the difference with my color the way it grows out of my head is subtle enough that I don't feel I HAVE to dye my roots. Freedom at last!

Goal:
To be rid of the hennaed/peroxided parts. I still see orange on some of my ends in the sun, and I want that gone. It is gone now from my shorter face-framing layers, and I really love that.

Current length:
I'm somewhere between APL and BSL, have been for years, and while I would like to get to waist, I would like to be rid of the henna more

. This is mostly psychological though, most of the time I can't even see where my henna used to be.

Length of virgin hair:
My hennaless hair should be around 14 inches now. Because of the peroxide and the toning it's thankfully hard to say where the exact line of demarcation is.

That's my saga

. I may edit in some pictures later.

**AmselJoey** · April 18th, 2009, 10:26 AM

This is right up my personal hair goal alley!

Hair history:
I have been messing with my hair's natural color since using Sun-In in the 6th grade. I henned last June in an attempt to get light brown and wanting to do so naturally. While the color was beautiful, the warm tones did not match my cool coloring. I put up with it until recently, when I had my hairdresser dye my hair to a darker brown shade. I like the color but, of course, can still see the orange in the sun!

Goal:
To have completely virgin waist-length hair

Current Length:
Well I haven't measured in awhile, but it's past BSL and inching towards my elbows. Though I did cut off two inches a month ago for health.

Length of virgin hair:
Millimeters, since I just dyed it!

Sending good luck and LOTs of patience to us all!

**Unnamed** · April 18th, 2009, 05:14 PM

First I should say that I've been growing out dye (not henna, but it's black, so just as difficult to remove), and I actually sorta 'like' the two-tonedness stage, more or less (now, anyway). Actually vaguely wonder what the ends would look like if I could get 'em to a purple colour (and if I could).

My hair was last dyed in mid-October, 2004, so 4.5 years ago.

Hair history
Did not like that my hair kept changing colours, plus was rather multi-toned. So when I was 14 it got dyed blonder. It stayed that way for about 5 years. Then decided I'd try to dye it back to the natural colour (dark ashy blonde).

Well, that didn't work. The dye was too dark (came out a dark greeny burgundy if that makes any sense!). Way too dark to fade close to natural colour, so I did backup plan: Dye it black!

A little bit before I joined here I had planned to stop dyeing it (after about 3.5 years of the black, more out of laziness etc. than anything else), but wasn't sure the best way to do that given the fairly large difference in colour.

Eventually just stopped and decided to try and fade the dye as much as possible (lots of long/heavy soaks in olive oil took of the edge/inkiness of the black). Did get some bleach to see if it'd budge it, and nope. Only got it to a orange-red in the lightest bits, and a dark red in others.

About two years out it started fading some, and the ends took on a reddish tinge, and the darker sections were becoming more of a plummy very dark brown.

I used colorfix on all of it about 3 years in, and, doh, it got the bleach strand to yellow. The rest went to a light reddish brown to a med reddish brown...for about a week before it oxidized back (which is why I hadn't tried it earlier). By then I kinda liked the colour change, though, plus would have to bleach all that, and pretty well impossible to not get it on the new growth. I may do another bunch of rounds with the colorfix sometime.

Over the last year or so it seems like the dye has faded much further on its own. The dyed hair is presently more of a dark reddish brown (in the middle), and a medium reddish brown to auburn colour closer to the dye line, the ends, and the sides. It's no longer actually 'black'.

Hair was 31.5" the last time it was dyed, and hairs up on the top were 27.5" long, and hairs closer to the nape were 19.5" long.

Goal:
End goal is terminal length, which will include no more dye. Won't reach terminal until well after the dye is gone, though, due to shedding that I'm still dealing with now.

Current length:
51.5", or just shy of knee. I've not trimmed much at all due to end 'goal' above (just 1.5" between one purposeful trim and one accidental one). I have lost length (a few more inches worth) from shedding.

Length of virgin hair:
About 24" to 26"? Or around 24-25" to be conservative. It's just faded dye by 26", but at 24" pretty much completely goldish.

In pics it looks like the new growth is around tailbone or a bit longer overall. The top layer is about hip, and the underlayer should be close to classic length.

**AnneAdeline** · April 18th, 2009, 06:19 PM

Hey everyone! It's good to see that others are going through the same thing. Especially those of you who have made it past a few inches. Good growing!

Hair history: Four years ago I went from my natural color to bleached and blue. Did different crazy colors for two years or so. Eventually I found henna and decided to try it. Fast forward to a couple months ago when I decided to stop dyeing. I'm curious as to what my hair color will be like now, and also just want to stop dealing with the hassle. A few weeks ago I tried a semi-perm red dye to cover my roots. Meh. Can't decide if it's worth the effort.
Goal: Waist + virgin hair. I'm not quite sure how long I want my hair in the end, but I figure waist virgin would be a good start.
Current length: Just waist. (yay!)
Length of virgin hair: An inch or two. Surprisingly, it isn't that noticeable at this stage.

**Arctic** · April 19th, 2009, 04:54 AM

Nice to see we are not alone

I have been eyeing the Salt and pepper thread, as people there are growing out their dyed hairs, but I don't really belong there, I only just found my first white hair a little while ago.

But reading the forementioned thread has been inspiring in many ways. First of all my view of greys have changed complitely since coming to LHC (to the positive). And secondly, I have started to think, how many people actually start to dye their hair to cover the greys. I on the other hand, have been dyeing my hair all these years when I could have enjoyed my non-grey own hair. Now that I do still have only couple sparklers I want to let my real hair colour grow (not that grey hair wouldn't be any less real).

I am lucky not having visible greys, my sister for example started to get lot of silver in early twenty. Like I said my view of grays has changed to a positive one, but still I have not used to even think about greys. I hope I don't offend anyone, that is not my purpose, I just wanted to say that I want to enjoy this non-grey colour while I have it.

**akka naeda** · April 19th, 2009, 05:40 AM

I guess I can post here too as well as the salt and pepper thread

Hair history
I hennaed for years (half my life) because I loved the colour of henna on my dark hair. I started getting a few grey hairs when I was 20 (? can't remember really) but not many and as they were scattered through the length the henna made them look interesting. I never hennaed to purposely hide them though and I knew that at some stage I'd have to stop the henna because it makde white hair go orange. The white hairs finally became so obvious at the front that I stopped henna in August last year, when the sun shines I still think that perhaps I have enough dark hair at the back to get away with more henna, but it's too much of a PITA to deal with making sure I segement out the white streaks properly.

Goal
As long as it will grow and still look good, regardless of the overall colour.

Current length
Just below knee, about 54"

Length of virgin hair
I have a centre parting, when my hair's loose the henna starts just below my eyes, that's about 7". I wasn't sure how else to measure it, but 7" in 9 months sounds about right growthwise for my hair, possibly a bit on the short side.

**Arctic** · April 19th, 2009, 05:50 AM

Originally Posted by AnneAdeline

Length of virgin hair: An inch or two. Surprisingly, it isn't that noticeable at this stage.

My roots are also not very noticeable, there is not much contrast darknesswise between my real colour and henna. Henna ofcourse is orangey and my real colour is ashy brown, but you can't really see that I'm growing henna out in photos for example. I have about 7 cms of virgin hair now (slowly growing hair, less than avarage).