4 months without color
02.11.19
I started going gray in high school. Thankfully, I had a mama who could highlight my hair for me to hide it. By college, I was pretty gray at the roots so I started coloring it every 6 weeks. Most of the time I did box color but a few times over the years I have splurged for salon color. Either way, every 6 weeks (8 weeks if I was on a time crunch like summers at camp) I colored my hair.
Then, last fall, my hair started falling out in chunks. I had bald spots from so much hair loss due to a hormonal imbalance before I had my surgery. I colored my hair right before my surgery and then... recovery took longer than I expected, the holidays began, I was busy. I went and got a great haircut from Hair by Christy Stearns in November and thought "I'll color it next week."
My awesome November haircut from Christy Stearns.
This was with about 4 weeks of white growth at my roots.
I didn't realize at that appointment that I wouldn't color my hair again. I noticed that as the weeks went on my hair was becoming so much softer, prettier, and easier to style. By January, my hair had gotten past just a bit of white roots and more into a strange stage that made me feel like people were going to think, "Poor Amy, she is letting herself go" but I've pressed on. My hair has definitely not grown as fast as I thought it would. In four months, I've only acquired about 1.5 - 2 inches of new growth meaning it may take 18+ months for it all to grow out. Now that I have decided to do this I felt like I needed to make a big statement to let people know "Hey! I have a plan! I'm in the process of something here!"
Top view of 4 months of growth.
The top is more streaky whereas around my face and in the back
it's basically pure white.
02.11.19
Tonight I met with Christy again, did a color test, and came up with a color game plan (I go in two weeks for that appointment and will update with pictures) Until then, I went for a big cut to help have less dark to light contrast.
A big haircut is always so freeing!!
We went for a long-bob cut.
It's still really dark through the back so Christy came up with
a great grow-out plan for me
02.11.19
Here's the heart and soul of it:
I made this decision without even realizing I was making it. I just kept letting it go because I was loving the softer texture and more natural feel of it. I never felt like I had that, even with expensive salon treatments. I fully committed to this decision in my heart before doing any research and weeks before going to the salon. I felt cool, calm, and collected.
A huge part of this decision for me was having a close friend go through chemo, lose her hair and then facing my own testing/surgery last fall. In the weeks before I had test results, I came to the stark realization that if I did have cancer I would do chemo and I would lose my hair. I am thankful for benign results and a true peace about the fact that hair is just hair.
I feel really excited about it now. My hair is naturally almost black so I've had black, dark brown, lighter brown, red, and various highlights in between. It'll be fun to be something totally new!
**Edit: I had worked on this post all day and just added the haircut pics this evening. Then, I ended up seeing a group of friends and telling them what I was doing. Absolutely nothing could have prepared me for their response. I cannot unsee their shocked faces! I have quite a few friends who have done the purposefully dyed white or gray in their 20s and I see it in magazines so I didn't really think I was so crazy for doing it at 31. Apparently it's not as popular as I thought. That being said - I didn't run to my car and cry or buy hair color on the way home. I plan to keep on growing it out and we'll see what happens. I am surprised at how okay I was with their in person responses which gives me confidence that I really am ready to do this*
I will do an update at 4.5 months after my first color blending session with Hair by Christy Stearns
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