Resisting the urge to colour?

[Neverremember]

I have a love/hate relationship with my virgin almost APL length hair. I am trying to grow it out beyond this awful length and keep it natural but it is proving very hard.

My hair is medium brown. It can look lovely in the sunlight but in most light conditions it just looks dark (but not sexy black dark), dull and boring. However, I do not have a single grey hair yet and since I am 26 I suspect that will soon change. I was trying to enjoy my colour until I start showing silvers but I. am. so. bored. The length is not helping. It will be at least a year until it gets long enough for me to enjoy it at its natural colour.


I have half a mind to go get a dark blonde box dye and lighten it. Or a black dye. Or to spend 150 £ I don't have at a hairdresser trying to get a rose gold I will need to maintain every 3 weeks on a student budget. Why, hair. Why are you not pretty.

I guess I want to know if you think it's worth hanging in there ​or if I should just do something to make my hair more enjoyable even if it means my ends will suffer a bit for it.

P.S. I do not blowdry or heat style my hair.

[animetor7]

How light is your hair? You could try using a temporary vegetable dye like manic panic. This will not damage your hair and will fade out, so you'd be back to your natural color eventually. There is also a wide selection of colors available in vegetable dyes in natural and unnatural colors both, so you'd have a lot of variety to play with. The only risk is that if your hair is too light, vegetable dye can stain it, even though it is supposed to be temporary.

[Neverremember]

It's not light, it's a medium brown with a lot of red in it and I am neutral to warm toned. I think I want to go lighter and it's doubtful I can do that without lifting at least a little bit. Also, while I would love to get a funky colour on, I work in an academic environment and have to teach, which kind of limits my options. Unfortunately, it's not considered very "professional", whatever that means.

[animetor7]

You don't have to get a "funky" color with vegetable dyes. Those exist, yes, but there are also natural tones.

ETA: lighter isn't going to happen without lifting, but you could get brighter by emphasizing the red tones in your hair.

[samanthaa]

What about some positive reassurance? Try posting a picture of your hair color in one of the threads dedicated to said color, and I'm sure you'll receive a lot of comments and compliments that may reinforce your desire not to color.

I found the "Ash Brown Hair Pride" thread: http://forums.longhaircommunity.com/showthread.php?t=112776&highlight=brown+hair

My search skills are failing me; maybe someone knows where the other brunette pride threads are.

Maybe you can try enhancing your color with coffee or tea rinses or even black walnut hulls. All are temporary.

ETA: Warm-toned medium brown with red highlights? Honestly, your hair color does sound really pretty!

[PixieP]

Adore hair dye is vegetable based semi-permanent like Manic panic, but they have natural tones. They have several browns and blacks, and also reds if you want to bring out the warmer tones. It won't help you go lighter, but it is a way to play with colours without any damage or permanent commitment :)

[HairPlease]

Manic panic makes black. Maybe give it a try--they fade pretty quick if you don't like the result, especially on virgin hair. Good luck.

[Llama]

Manic panic makes black. Maybe give it a try--they fade pretty quick if you don't like the result, especially on virgin hair. Good luck.

This is what I would recommend as well.

[sumidha]

Honestly I think you should wait a little longer before permanently altering the color. At APL your hair is still kind of coming into it's own, and you might find that you have natural highlights and sun bleaching that give the color more dimension once you hit BSL or waist.

ETA: Whoops, misread part of the post, but I still do think playing around with temporary colors is a much better idea than bleaching. :)

[Deborah]

Maybe try to overcome the boredom with new hair styles or new hair toys. There are so many on this list working hard to overcome damage from changing their hair color. Don't do something impulsive that may take years to fix if you are not thrilled with the result.

[Baby]

Your hair sounds like my color and since I moved I love it. I used to, well not dislike it but I wanted it darker. But since I moved I have a bathroom with "better" lighting so that when I look at it now it looks good. My hair is at bsl with some sunblech from this summer. Previously I have used a shampoo+conditioner with chocolate and sage(Faith in nature) that is supposed to darken the hair or enhance brunette hair, me myself didnt notice a difference but my mom did. Also when I washed with indian herbs people at my school noticed some darkening, even if I didnt myself.

[OhSuzi]

You sound like your still wanting to grow it further, so this may not be ideal, but you could dip dye the ends?
Either with dye or something more permanent, like bleach and then whatever the desired colour.
That way you can add a contrasting colour / a new dynamic to your hair, but for work you could still bun it, so the ends wont be seen.
If you felt that the ends were getting damaged from the dying & what not, just trim em off Ok so you'd lose an inch or two depending on how big a chunk you dyed in the first place - but that's better than damaging all your hair with dye or choosing a colour you then regret all over your head.

Or perhaps just add a few foil highlights on top, get an extra dimension to your hair colour, again without damaging all your hair with colour and if they're subtle enough it wont matter if you grow the highlights out rather than worrying about expensive upkeep.

Another uption is to try washing your hair and adding natural ingredients for a very slightly different colour e.g. lemon juice / camomile tea / raw honey / cinamon these are supposed to either lighten your hair very gently over time due to the very small amount of amonina / peroxide in them / some ingredients give a reddier shine.

I used to make a concoction of cheap conditioner, honey, cinamon, apple cider vingegar. I only kept it up for about 3 weeks though, I didn't notice hair colour change but it was shinier and softer.

[queenbee1]

I think you should try the two week rule. It generally is for haircuts but i think it would be helpful applied to your case. If after two weeks you still want to dye your hair: go for it. You have virgin hair, if you use a good dye it probably won't damage as much, but you'll have to be careful with heat. I dyed my virgin APL brunette (almost black in color) hair ash blonde without bleach after waiting two years (instead of two weeks) and it turned into a really nice brown and i do love it. No regrets haha. Don't see any damage but then i haven't used heat on it either.
I say go for it! Just don't make a hasty decision. You don't have to use bleach since most dyes do contain peroxide. Garnier and loreal are good ones to use if you don't want to bleach beforehand.

[Eastbound&Down]

I say hold off for a bit longer, I know I have fallen into that cycle for years and breaking out can be a pain. There is also a thread dedicated to growing out dye and going natural, I would stop in there for some encouragement!

[lapushka]

I think you should try the two week rule. It generally is for haircuts but i think it would be helpful applied to your case. If after two weeks you still want to dye your hair: go for it. You have virgin hair, if you use a good dye it probably won't damage as much, but you'll have to be careful with heat. I dyed my virgin APL brunette (almost black in color) hair ash blonde without bleach after waiting two years (instead of two weeks) and it turned into a really nice brown and i do love it. No regrets haha. Don't see any damage but then i haven't used heat on it either.
I say go for it! Just don't make a hasty decision. You don't have to use bleach since most dyes do contain peroxide. Garnier and loreal are good ones to use if you don't want to bleach beforehand.

Yep, I'll link the thread:
http://forums.longhaircommunity.com/showthread.php?t=139091

[kidari]

I color my hair because I have greys starting in middle school... that and it doesn't bother me that I can't grow my hair super long due to all my coloring. Although you can learn how to color correctly and take proper care of your hair, the bottom line is that virgin hair is always most ideal for growing long. Even with the most resilient hair that is extremely well cared for you will experience breakage and dryness among other things, especially if you lighten. For me the pros outweighs the cons.

That being said, you should really reconsider before you do it... because once you color you will find yourself always coloring (roots, fading, unevenness, you name it). The problem is when you color it's best to use restraint and patience (two things that are difficult to practice no matter the situation). You should see threads where people have finally gotten so sick and tired of the upkeep but now experience major issues trying to go back to natural. One thing I have witnessed is when my hair was so healthy and I did ombre on it, the stark contrast in the two textures was so difficult to deal with. Even coloring yourself at home it is pretty $$$ and if you mess up it costs even more money to get it fixed by a pro. You see a lot of people going through the painful process of growing out old dye/damage but at this moment you have the clean slate already that a lot of people wish for.