After many years of coloring my gray, I suddenly had an extreme reaction to my hair dye. It started with itching and oozing about 8 hours after I got it dyed, followed by initial swelling around my eyes starting about 36 hours after. By the 48 hour mark, I had swollen eyes. This morning (60 hours later), when my face was no longer recognizable due to swollen eyelids and swelling around & underneath my eyes, I knew I needed to see a doctor, so I went to urgent care. I got a shot of cortisone and a Rx for prednisone. It’s been almost 8 hours since my shot, and the swelling has reduced a bit. I am fortunate I didn’t encounter breathing or swallowing difficulty. I will be scheduling an appointment with an allergist.
My aunt was allergic to hair dye. And she was a hairdresser! She made a career of only doing cuts and her husband (also a hairdresser) did all the dye jobs.
No, nothing new. I have been in touch with my hairdresser (she is also a friend). She feels so bad - she has never had this happen. I have been considering going gray, but I had hoped to grow it out gracefully! My D is getting married in a year, and I am actually glad it happened now if it was inevitable … at least there is time to grow it out.
I know on the package of hair dye I use it says to always do a test, even if you’ve used it before with no issues. I guess there’s a reason for that? I confess I did the allergy test one time and I haven’t done it since.
My mom suddenly became allergic to hair dye. It’s good you got the shot because her reaction continued for months.
Also, her first reaction was not that bad with mild itching, but the next was worse with itchy, open welts in her head that would not heal. It seemed to get worse over the first few weeks before it got better.
She really doesn’t want to go gray so she went all around getting patch tests at various salons including organic. Finally, she found a product that she did not react to.
If it were me, I would not take the risk, and I don’t think the OP should either. NEVER. Not with that reaction.
However, she recently realized that she was reacting to a supplement she had started to take. I think perhaps her body could handle a limited allergen assault, but she became overloaded. I’ve also had situation like that and had a kid go through it, not with hair dye but with something else.
So it could be something else sensitizing you right now, but I still would avoid coloring again.
My brother had a respiratory allergic reaction to his wife’s hair dye a few months ago. His throat swelled up and he felt like he was going to faint. They called 911 but he recovered without the EMTs’ assistance and didn’t need to be transported to the hospital.
Wow, this is crazy! (and yes, I just applied root touch up tonight to my temple area…) Makes me a little skeptical of what must be in this hair dye potion!
do not wait that long next time anything like that happens. (straight to the er or at least urgent care center) that could have turned into Anaphylaxis real quick.
I had the same unfortunate experience as @kelsmom. When I first began using color products about 15 years ago, I found that I would have itching beginning 6-8 hours after application that would subside about 48 hours later. I switched salons, and whatever color they used did not cause the itching. So I continued to color without incident for about 5 or 6 years. The episode that resulted in the full blown oozing, welting, and swelling occurred when I went to a new colorist/salon and she used 2 steps to color correct. I did not seek medical attention at the time, but realized I most certainly should have after reading about the possibility of anaphylaxis.
After searching the internet and reading about PPD and related dyes, I went back to both salons and had them check the labels. The PPD is the ingredient that caused my reaction. The problem I ran into was that neither salon had ever encountered anyone before with an allergy and couldn’t assist me with label reading and ingredients-leaving me with the impression that I cannot really trust anyone but myself. I color at home now with a John Freida product that is PPD-free, but it does leave my hair dried out and the color (which is a permanent color) is not as long lasting and does not cover greys as effectively. PPD is in most of the color products that are sold in drug stores, and can also be present in some henna products.
I have read about some cross over sensitivity in individuals that get tatoos and go on to develop a PPD allergy. For that reason I am also concerned about any medical imaging testing in the future which would involve contrast dye injection.
Allergies can and do just appear to pop up out of “nowhere”. There is no mystery that hair colour is chock full of pretty hard core chemicals. How there is no direct cancer risk in the use of hair colors is a constant surprise to me (previous heavy use of said stuff).
I did some reading, and it appears that any permanent hair color contains some PPD (or similar agents such as PTDS used in Madison Reed, aminophenol etc). However, they can also be mixed and used like a tone on tone (semi-permanent) color that will gradually fade over 10-20 shampoos, and in this case they would be free of PPD or PPD-likes. Has anyone tried this?
