<p>If I don’t tend my eyebrows I start looking like '40s character actor Oskar Homolka.</p>
<p>Another “natural woman” here. Never dyed my hair, though I’ve been tempted. I’d like to see more women stop dying theirs so I won’t feel pressured (I have elementary and pre-school kids, and have been mistaken for grandma a few times). I think it is environmentally correct to give up on all those chemicals: “Gray is Green” should be the new motto.</p>
<p>Mary13–keep the “Bride of Frankenstein” thing until after Halloween!</p>
<p>^“Gray is Green”</p>
<p>:) I like that.</p>
<p>nope…dye it now. Have to touch up roots every 3 weeks! It is a pain.
Went grey. Looked at photos and was shocked how old I looked. Asked several times if my kids were my grandkids so I gave in.</p>
<p>I think grey is great if you have white hair, blonde hair, good skin or a decent “jaw line”. I have none of those. Mine is dirty looking grey/brown. I quit sunning when I was 24, and learned about the effects, but the damage was done, and is haunting me today with splotchy wrinkles. Had I known, I would have quit much earlier, but the warnings weren’t out there yet.</p>
<p>No one in my family has a decent “jaw line” In fact, it almost doesn’t exist at all. Makes you look about 10-20 years older than you are.</p>
<p>I envy you with grey hair that looks great. I envy jaw lines too ;-)</p>
<p>Gray is definitely green in your bank acct. I am amazed at how much money my friend (not wealthy) spends on her hair to keep her hair golden blond.</p>
<p>I SWORE I would not ever color my hair. BUT the plethora of grays take on a texture, shape and style of their own and are unruly. As a person with ALOT of hair, mega waves and a tendency to frizz, it really helps me style my hair when the gray is gone. That said, I am using Gray solution by Nice and Easy. It has a restructuring conditioner that makes the allows my color resistance hair to accept the color and it’s very nice that the ‘formerly grey hairs’ have been tamed to the point that they will ‘go’ in the same place as the rest of my hair. I spend less than $10 a month and do it myself. Basically I just get hair very close to my ‘original’ color.</p>
<p>I will admit that I have a 61 yo bf with a full head of brown hair and it sucked having grey hair when he does NOT.</p>
<p>My wife colors her hair - I wish that she didn’t as we generally don’t bother with appearances.</p>
<p>I actually considered graying my hear when I was in my mid-20s. I had a consulting business with a friend and his hair was gray in his 20s. I looked like a little kid in my 20s and I wanted to be taken more seriously by prospective clients.</p>
<p>When I added up that I was spending over $1000. a year to get my hair colored I decided to give it up and send my kid to college instead!</p>
<p>My hair is halfway there; I don’t have nysmile’s courage to cut it short and be done with it.</p>
<p>^Actually, the way I initially went through the “growing out phase” was to have it highlighted. Because my original color was dark, there was no way that I would be able to go “cold turkey”. The stylist highlighted it to help the gray blend in a bit more. That lasted for the first 2 months or so. Then I got my hair cut and one more highlighting session. After the 2nd highlighting session, I had to go through the really hard part of dealing with the growing in of the gray. At around the 5 month mark of growing out the color and growing in the gray, I was almost in tears because of the yucky uneven color of old highlights, some original dark, and half-way grown gray. My stylist put a rinse in it and that really helped to blend in the gray and older highlights. The rinse bought some more time for the gray to grow in more evenly. About 6 weeks after the rinse, I got a shorter haircut than my usual and this helped to get rid of a good amount of color that was still in the ends of the hair. </p>
<p>Yes, growing it out was a rough period and often times I was tempted to color it. My husband kept reassuring me that if I could stay brave through the process, I would be happier in the end. I started the process in Sept. of last year and by June of this year, it was complete. I can honestly say, I’m so glad that I stuck to it and didn’t cave in and dye it back. It looks very nice and the short haircut balances with my rather small face.</p>
<p>Pageturner–stick to it. You’ll be very happy in the end. It’s also very nice to know that when the wind blows, you don’t have to worry about your hair blowing upward and your roots showing. :)</p>
<p>Plenty gray here but you wouldn’t know it Color my hair with an $8 bottle of rinse every month. Light brown makes the gray look like highlights. Never have gotten my hair colored at a salon. Husband (natural blond, the rat) said he is not ready for a gray haired wife. That sealed it for me.</p>
<p>RE: Gray Wig… I’ve heard that the folks who buy hair for wig making will pay the very highest price for natural gray hair. Perhaps that’s why the gray wig was more expensive – supply and demand, and all that econ stuff.</p>
<p>RE: Funny stories… I am a middle school teacher, and I colored my hair for years, then grew weary of the maintenance and went with the gray that had been there since my late 20’s. Not long after accepting and embracing the gray, I ran into a former student who was with his little brother at the annual history fair. Hair was the last thing on my mind, until he spotted me, and exclaimed, “Mrs. Smith! You dyed your hair gray!”</p>
<p>Still makes me smile to think of it. :)</p>
<p>Grizzmom, I think you’ve given all of us the perfect way to finance college!</p>
<p>Ah, well, my hair is light-ish, so the gray (actually white) isn’t too jarring. I’m determined to get through this! Thanks for the support!</p>
<p>fafnir, some years ago, my best friend, who is eight years younger than I am, and I were at the salon she frequents for haircuts. The person who usually cuts her hair (and mine, when I go there) was out or busy or some such, so her husband, who owns the shop, cut our hair. He did my friend’s first; she had been highlighting her hair for years at that point to hide the gray. </p>
<p>Then he worked on me, and made some comment about my having so much less gray hair than my daughter… meaning my best friend!! She has a young face and I look my age; that was not the first time someone took her for my daughter, either! She and I both found this hysterical. </p>
<p>I don’t have a lot of gray yet (I’m 52), but definitely have some. Some of my eyebrow hairs are white, and the hair that has turned seems to be either white or silver. Since my hair is thinning as I get older, I don’t care what color it is so long as I get to keep what hairs are still there!!</p>
<p>I’m 55 and highlighting still takes of my gray so I have that done, but only for special occasions since I am very late to gray. </p>
<p>What I hate are my eyebrows now. What is it with eyebrows getting longer as I get older? They have to be trimmed when I get them shaped now and that is so freaky to me. Maybe they’ll get long enough to braid.</p>
<p>^^weird, my eyebrows seem to be thinning. I’ve never plucked them. I have dark hair and always had very dark eyebrows (no silvers) but they seem to be disappearing.</p>
<p>My family is blessed with silver white hair early on… some would consider that a mixed blessing 
However the family members that left well enough alone had the most beautiful thick head of platinum hair! So I stopped coloring when I was 35 years old. Now I have salt and pepper hair with two wide silver streaks that frame my face. I started wearing my hair short and spikey which shows it even more. I’ve gotten alot of positive comments and I know I love it. It has changed consistency-coarser and a bit wild.</p>
<p>I love this thread. I color my hair…started graying in my late teens (also family curse…my dad’s hair was snow-white at 18). I started coloring it when I moved to my current home from overseas, so no one would see a difference. I was 34. I’m 50 now and I’ve colored it ever since. I also keep it short because it stays healthier. There is occasionally some thinning but I think it would be thinning anyway, I’ve always had real thick hair. It is the one girly thing I allow myself and I always go to my hairdresser to have it done. For me, it’s well worth the expense and I will keep doing it at least until I retire.</p>
<p>So…a couple of funny stories. Before I started coloring it my husband came up behind me when I was wearing a gray jacket and said he didn’t know it was me because my hair was so gray, he assumed it was someone older (needless to say I NEVER wear gray, lol).</p>
<p>I went to a family reunion a few years ago and my brother and my cousin both asked me if I colored my hair…since I’m only a couple years younger and both of them are completely gray…I consider that a “well…duh!” moment.</p>
<p>Oh, and one day we picked up my college aged daughter at the airport when she came home for Christmas. It was the day before my hair appointment and we stopped to eat and were sitting in the sun. The sun highlighted the half inch or so of now-nearly-white roots and everyone in the family made a comment about how strange it looked and that I should definitely keep coloring my hair, lol.</p>
<p>And my favorite part about coloring my hair? My husband is 11 years younger than me, but he looks older than me now thanks to his graying hair and beard. :D</p>