<p>I have been doing my own single process color for years–my hair grows really fast, so I touch up the roots about every 3 weeks. One key is to NOT put color all over your hair (to the ends) very often at all—JUST do the roots. Otherwise your hair does get darker and darker. </p>
<p>I also have my stylist (who raves about my base color that I do myself) blend in highlights about once in 3 months. I just have to be careful when touching up the roots…</p>
<p>I use Garnier Nutrisse color, and my hair feels its best when it’s just been colored.</p>
<p>I stopped coloring my hair almost ten years ago, but when I did I used a much lighter color which ‘covered’ the gray and looked like natural highlights. My hair is composed of red srands, brown strands, blonde strands and black strands and “looks” like plain old brown hair and when gray strands started coming in I colored with a darker blonde color and it worked great for twenty years (I started getting gray hairs at age 28). I agree that it is far better to go much lighter than your hair color so you don’t have what my husband color uni-color hair.</p>
<p>I would be all gray if I didn’t color. If you want to color your hair so it is lighter, just tell your stylist you want a change and want to go lighter. If she won’t listen, yes, you need to find someone else. I usually get my roots touched up every 5 weeks (my hair grows really fast) and then do an all over color with highlights every 2nd or 3rd time. A couple times I haven’t been able to get in when needed and used those foam brush on color touch up things at the store, it works pretty well actually. I think it said to leave it on for 10 minutes but that was not enough for my hair.</p>
<p>As for Jamie Lee Curtis–she is a lot older than I am. I’m just not ready to look like someone’s grandma!</p>
<p>My hair still grows like a weed and I go in every 3-5 weeks for a one step process. Fortunately my now salt and pepper hair creates its own high and low lights. I have to say that it looks great. It is insane, I know, but I go to someone who is quite reasonable and after partially growing my hair out a few years ago it was obvious that with my aging, freckled complexion I needed to color because I. Looked. Horrible.</p>
<p>My colorist suggested going a shade or two lighter than my usual auburn a few years back and I fought her on it for some time. She was right. She took me a tad lighter and closer to my childhood color (strawberry blond). As the hair grows in the line of “demarkation” is is much less noticeable and though the auburn color that she used was as close as you can get to my once adult color, softening it by making it a bit lighter actually softened my face as well, so to speak. </p>
<p>I will be in the color my hair game for a while I would think though if I ever get to a consistent silver I would give growing my hair out another go.</p>
<p>I have both high lights and low lights done and my color is many shades lighter than my natural color. I’d look dreadful if my hair was it’s natural color which is now darker than when I was young. </p>
<p>I’d never do my own, it would be disastrous, I’m sure. I go every 5-6 weeks depending on what is on my social calender. This time I am waiting 7 because I have a wedding on the 22nd and want color to be as fresh as possible. </p>
<p>I will never go gray, ever. Yuck. My few friends who have look 15 to 20 years older than the rest of us. But, to each his own.</p>
<p>I also do a mix of low and highlights, along with a base color to cover the gray. My stylist uses two or three different shades when he foils, and I know that he changes the color slightly each month, so that my hair looks fairly natural and sun streaked. My base is a dark, reddish blonde - pretty close to my natural color. My color would probably last six weeks or so, but I need a monthly trim and I don’t want to add an extra appointment to my calendar.</p>
<p>This is so interesting to me because I am 55 and have never colored my hair. I literally mean never. It just never occurred to me to try it. As I have gotten older, I realize I may be the only woman I know who hasn’t! I am 55, have medium brown hair with a small amount of gray starting to show. You can only see it when you look closely because I have some natural highlights as well. I do admit to wishing I had a prettier hair color, but not enough to go through the hassle of coloring it and dealing with roots, touch ups, etc. (Not sure what I will do when it all becomes gray, but am learning valuable info on this thread).</p>
<p>Going gray over here guys! I colored between the ages of 44 and 55. Stopped about a year ago. Was blonde as a young woman. Now have some natural blonde, lots of natural brown, and a HUGE dramatic swath of gray up front. I get a kick out of it. And, oddly, I feel younger now that my hair is almost all real. </p>
<p>I have to say, the photos I put on my blog that show my gray elicit some of the most heated debates in commentary of all the topics. People have VERY strong feelings about women letting their hair gray. It’s been fascinating to participate in what feels like a little anthropological lab.</p>
<p>Heartart–give me one more year and i will be another 55-year-old who has never colored my hair. Also mouse brown with lots of gray threads and gray patches at the temples.</p>
<p>Alum–sure does always feel like an anthro lab whenever this discussion comes up.<br>
somehow we don’t think men look horrible, or old, when they have graay hair (except in Just for Men ads!) </p>
<p>I’m mostly just trying to keep life as simple as I can. Don’t wear make-up either. I hpe I’m not ruining people’s days when they see me!</p>
<p>I’ve never colored my hair. It’s light brown with streaks of gray now- used to be brown with natural blond highlights. I must be strange, because I don’t mind it. I think good skin tone and condition, keeping one’s ideal weight, a good haircut and fashionable dress and appropriate make-up are far more important than hair color when it comes to aging well, all of which I find much easier than the inconvenience, expense and toxicity of coloring my hair.</p>
<p>moonchild - I confess to following your strategy. Can’t say I’m at my IDEAL weight, but it’s good enough, I walk a lot, I pay attention to my clothing and makeup, and so on. Anthropologically, I feel like having gray hair allows me to wear more form-fitting clothes than if I was still coloring.</p>
<p>Yikes. I can’t believe I just said that “out loud.”</p>
<p>I’ve never colored my hair either. It’s long since gone gray, mostly. I get a really good cut every six weeks. I know it’s really good because when I see pictures of the back of my head I think wow that looks really good. I often hear, “I’d go gray too if it looked like yours.” But I think it’s not that mine looks so good, it’s more that people have demonized gray hair so much that they’re surprised it doesn’t look awful.</p>
<p>Besides, what difference does it make if I look my age? I’m 61. Is that something to hide?</p>
<p>I do my own bangs too. Years ago in some parenting magazine I read how to do your children’s bangs-you lightly twist them to a loose point, and snip at the bottom. This creates fringy bangs. I know how to do straight-across ones too-you put a piece of tape across and cut beneath it. I was nervous at first but I finally did my own and I’ve never had a problem. Why pay someone $10 to make a single cut when I can do it in 10 seconds myself?</p>
<p>Even before I was gray I liked coloring my hair sometimes. And I don’t always do the same shade now. It’s like trying a new style or pair of shoes. </p>
<p>My youngest D is all about hair-has long, slightly wavy hair down past her waist. She loves researching styles online and has taught herself how to make clip-in weaves. She’ll put in strands of honey-brown highlights, add on curly ponytails-there’s even a way to turn old socks into a bun form. I wish I had longer hair just to let her play with it. I tell her she can earn some good money in college doing her friends’ hair.</p>
<p>Wellspring-I have read any number of times how difficult it is for older workers to get hired, and our age group is often the ones being let go first to make room for younger, cheaper workers. Age is DEFINITELY something to hide if one is job-hunting in this economy. I know that isn’t what you mean, but I have been trying to change jobs for a few years now and wasn’t even getting interviews. I did as instructed on a job-hunting site and left off the year of college graduation and earlier jobs-and got a job offer that week. Not a coincidence. And the interviewer and I talked about our same-age children so she knows my age. It just didn’t stop me from getting in the door. And I’ll keep hiding my age until D’s friends stop asking why her grandmother is raising her.</p>
<p>Interesting. I got hired about 11 months ago - hair was already going gray, full disclosure of 1978 college graduation. But I probably present “young,” if you will, given that I have both long hair, and a lot of familiarity with young person stuff like social media:). Also, I think that the fear of hiring the older worker comes from fear that they will be a) stuck in their ways b) low energy. So if you can show evidence that neither is the case, you’re in better shape.</p>
<p>Also, I didn’t have to worry about getting in the door because I was brought in by someone I’d worked for before. Big difference.</p>
<p>I love a bargain and I am not afraid to do many things myself. With that said the one thing I am terrified of doing is coloring my own hair. I also am particular about who cuts my hair. I don’t think I would mind gray if my hair grayed in strands. My temples get almost white and it looks like I have no hair. I don’t wear makeup and I think that would help if I decided to try going gray.</p>
<p>I have strawberry blonde hair, and had been using a mixture of cassia obovata and lawsonia inermis to “punch it up a little bit”. It was very close to my own color so there wasnt any grow out and it made my hair a lot shinier( because it fills in the cuticle).
My mother never really went grey ( she had blond hair & her lighter strands just looked like “highlights”). My dad however started getting a lot of grey in his beard when he was 40, so much so that when he went to his college reunion, they thought he was a prof! He wasn’t flattered.
I usually used the henna about every three months or so, but it is a pretty involved & messy process and a few years ago I let it go for about five months.
Oops! I was shocked by big time grow-out!
I ran to the hair salon and had my hair foiled to match the roots.
H says they actually lightened it too much, but I can’t see, so I couldn’t tell.
In any case, it aged me quite a bit and I looked older than I was instead of younger.
Which freaked me out!
I tried to get used to it for a couple weeks & then started using the henna again.
However, I also began to grow my hair out, as H thought it was the combination of the hairstyle & the hair color that was aging.
Now my hair is to its now natural strawberry blond color and I don’t have any grow out, although it isn’t as nice and shiny as it was, but that may mean I just need another oil treatment. ( I put jojoba oil in my hair overnight and wash out in the morning)
A new hairstyle may make a difference.</p>
<p>sseamom- I completely agree. I DO try to look younger and it has helped me professionally. I, too, present young and am tech-savvy and social media savvy. It does help that I color my hair (it would not be a pretty gray at this point). It isn’t just that employers fear older workers won’t adapt and are “set” in their ways- it is that they don’t want to hire a bunch of health problems and don’t trust that you really want to stay around for a few years!</p>
<p>Another never-colorer here, age 54. I have very dark brown hair, with strands of gray woven through it, but unless you look closely you can’t see the gray. I’ve had friends ask me where I get my hair colored, and then I tell them to take a good look. </p>
<p>I’m going to see how I look as more gray comes in, but am hoping I never have to start coloring.</p>
<p>In the minority-- I like my gray. I started going gray in my twenties and have never had the desire to color it. By now (58) it’s my signature. As dearest H says, at least someone in our marriage has hair!</p>
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