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

[Bat]

My hair needs to hurry up and fill in so it's an actual color lol with talk of hair levels I'm wondering maybe my hair wasn't a level 5 like I thought

[Stray_mind]

My hair needs to hurry up and fill in so it's an actual color lol with talk of hair levels I'm wondering maybe my hair wasn't a level 5 like I thought

I always thought your hair was level 3 or so from what i saw. But it's hard to tell from photos.

It may also be a regional thing. I have seen different color charts.

[Bat]

I always thought your hair was level 3 or so from what i saw. But it's hard to tell from photos.

It may also be a regional thing. I have seen different color charts.

It's definitely not dark enough for a 3 I'm thinking maybe a 4 max

[Stray_mind]

It's definitely not dark enough for a 3 I'm thinking maybe a 4 max

I have only seen like a couple inches of your roots haha. I have looked at various pics and yeah my hair is definitely closer to a 5-6 when in natural light when i compare it to the pictures. I think 6 is too light already though. I think my teacher might be mistaken with that 4. But then she was looking at my hair level when my roots were not properly grown in yet. Still, it's interesting that there is not much contrast between my natural black dye and my roots now. My mom said she can barely tell there is regrowth. It only becomes apparent at certain light and angle.

I am curious about your hair now once it regrows.

[Aerya]

I have only seen like a couple inches of your roots haha. I have looked at various pics and yeah my hair is definitely closer to a 5-6 when in natural light when i compare it to the pictures. I think 6 is too light already though. I think my teacher might be mistaken with that 4. But then she was looking at my hair level when my roots were not properly grown in yet. Still, it's interesting that there is not much contrast between my natural black dye and my roots now. My mom said she can barely tell there is regrowth. It only becomes apparent at certain light and angle.

I am curious about your hair now once it regrows.

I'm no hairdresser, but I definitely think your teacher was mistaken! If your hair was any lighter, it would be in the dark blonde category. I would say a 6, maybe a 5 if your hair is darker than it appears in the pictures. A 5.5 maybe? I'm not entirely sure how the lighting conditions should be when determining hair color level - maybe Bat can chime in here? I think cloudy daylight is what is considered the best to determine skin tone, so maybe it's similar for hair?

Our hair colors are very similar and mine looks very different depending on lighting, too, from sort of blonde-looking in bright daylight, to a darker brown indoors. It also is a bit of a chameleon - I've grown out darker dyes too, and my hair blended very well the first few inches, at least indoors. The difference became more apparent as my hair grew. Even now, growing out light brown-ish dye, my roots changes from looking too dark, to too light, with different lighting.

The hair color level charts do seem to vary a bit though, so it's not like it's a clear cut science. But as Bat pointed out, 2 is natural black hair. That makes 3 a super dark brown, so dark it's almost black, and 4 a dark brown. I think?

[Bat]

I have only seen like a couple inches of your roots haha. I have looked at various pics and yeah my hair is definitely closer to a 5-6 when in natural light when i compare it to the pictures. I think 6 is too light already though. I think my teacher might be mistaken with that 4. But then she was looking at my hair level when my roots were not properly grown in yet. Still, it's interesting that there is not much contrast between my natural black dye and my roots now. My mom said she can barely tell there is regrowth. It only becomes apparent at certain light and angle.

I am curious about your hair now once it regrows.

I can see it's much lighter than the dye you used at least

My hair is slowly filling in and man I have a lot of grey at the sides definitely glad I'm trying natural for a little bit to see. I won't have the option again

[Noctifer]

5 Months and a couple of days. Finally it feels like we are getting somewhere.
My original plan when I decided to stop dying me hair red in September. After I finished up the red dye, was to go like dark (or maybe medium) ash blond if I still like the idea in 6 months time but try to fade out the red.
Well that time is almost up and kind of decided to postpone that to earliest midsummer if it happens at all.. kind of courious to see what becomes of my natural hair color because some days it looks a lot lighter the I recall, and even in my child hood pictures it seems darker then now. But they are from the 90’s early 2000 so..

[Aerya]

Great progress, Noctifera! Your natural color is taking over the top of your head I feel like my colour has gotten lighter, too, but I'm not sure if it's just a fault in my own perception or if it has actually changed.

I am at almost three months without dye - just two days to go, so I figured I might as well take some pictures today. Maybe if I take regular progress pictures, I will hold myself more accountable. :P The colour difference shows up more in pictures than it does in real life, in the mirror it appears more blended and brown, rather than orange. But it works well for showing the progress. I am excited to see how my natural colour (and texture!) looks when it starts growing out properly.

[stardust lady]

I haven't been keeping very good track of who else here is growing out henna, but I'm very happy to report that (at least in my opinion) the transition/demarcation is becoming less and less obvious over time.

Its been almost a year and a half since my last henna, and after my last henna I did do a black semi-dye, then a ColorOops, a few Sun-In sessions, and then in April last year a balayage. But the demarcation was crazy obvious after the balayage still. Now that it's been almost a year it's much less obvious. I have a full 6-7" of regrowth (less on bangs since they grow slower).

Here is an album of the progress so far: https://imgur.com/a/sFvm3jC

My hair has some golden highlights in the sun that help a little bit with the blending of the regrowth, but mostly I think the henna has just gradually faded. I mean it's definitely still there, but it's less intense and it is a smoother transition. I'm glad I finally stopped dying, I'm very happy with my decision. I hated worrying about my roots all the time and the orange henna made me look like a clown. Such a pretty color on other people though!

[Aerya]

Great progress, stardust lady! The demarcation looks very blended, like an intentional ombre.