I’m Going Gray. Here’s What I’m Going To Do.

May 6, 2008

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At 32, I have quite a bit of gray hair. And I seem to get more with each passing month. My Dad was totally gray by my age, which is totally foxy on him (he still gets the ladies looking twice) - but on me? Not so much. Plus, my hair is so dark that the white hairs show up like white pet hair on your black pants.

I’ve been thinking of coloring over it but I’m not about to put some nasty cancer causing chemicals on my scalp. Even the temporary colors contain ammonia. If I wouldn’t even clean my house with it, I’m surely not going to let it soak into my skin. According to to this article,

“Most concerns surround dark-coloured, permanent dyes used every four to six weeks. Scientists are particularly worried about two chemical ingredients, para-phenylenediamine and tetrahydro-6-nitroquinoxaline.

These chemicals have been shown to damage the body’s genetic material, and to cause cancer in animals.”

Yummy!

When I’m mostly gray, I’ll let it go natural, like Jamie Lee Curtis and that supermodel Carmen. But, I’m not ready for that yet. It might be the better part of two decades before I’m that gray.

So I went hunting for some non-toxic, natural hair color alternatives. I knew about henna, but the trouble with henna is that it’s going to give you a reddish tint even if you pick a brown color … and I don’t want that. I don’t think it would be flattering to my skin tone.

I did some searching around and found several products that fit the bill. Good gray coverage, no nasty chemicals. While they’re priced a bit higher than what I could find at the local drug store, that’s ok with me. Cancer is pretty expensive. :)

Herbatint contains no ammonia and is free from “aggressive chemical ingredients”. It gets great customer reviews at Amazon, and users say it makes their hair really shiny too, which would be a plus. It’s very hard to make hair as coarse and curly as mine shine.

This product gets a safety rating of 6 on SkinDeep’s database.

Another one that looks promising is Light Mountain Natural Color. It’s recommended by The Safe Shoppers Bible and is non-carcinogenic. It’s priced a bit lower than Herbatint.

And this product gets a safety rating of 1 at SkinDeep - excellent! This is probably the one I’ll go with.

A third product I found is Naturtint Permanent Hair Color. Again, this one gets great reviews and it’s packaged in ecofriendly, biodegradable packaging which is a plus. SkinDeep gives this product a safety rating of 6.

After I color my hair I’ll come back here and post my own review. Stay tuned. :-)

Posted by carrie | Filed Under Natural Beauty 

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Comments

10 Responses to “I’m Going Gray. Here’s What I’m Going To Do.”

  1. Treece on May 6th, 2008 4:03 pm

    I gave up the battle this fall. It’s so much easier, cheaper, and I no longer have the Bride of Frankenstein skunk stripe. My husband still loves me, so all is good.

  2. LaTara on May 6th, 2008 4:08 pm

    I am so into the gray. I started graying at 28 and tried to cover it a few times. But I am now starting to really embrace it at 39 and move on. I just wish it would gray all over instead of in spots.

  3. carrie on May 6th, 2008 4:09 pm

    You look great Treece! I will do the same when I have “enough” gray. When I was researching for this post I came across a picture of another supermodel who went gray. She’s really young, but it looks totally punk rock.

  4. Tiffany Washko on May 6th, 2008 5:51 pm

    Awesome…can’t wait to hear how it goes.

  5. shelley on May 23rd, 2008 12:12 pm

    Okay, so I have tried the first two haircolors and they were awful. I also tried the henna from Lush and that did not cover any grays at all. When I checked, the ‘all natural’ color I am using right now has the harsh chemicals!! SO, now what?

  6. carrie on May 24th, 2008 8:02 am

    Thanks so much Shelley for that comment. I wonder if some of us have really resistant gray? I actually didn’t buy the hair color the last time I went to the health food coop, because they didn’t have the shade I wanted.

    Maybe a hairdresser could give you tips on making the hair color work better? I wonder if it would help to leave it on longer or maybe use some heat (like sitting under a hair dryer) or something?

  7. shelley on May 26th, 2008 8:09 pm

    Hi Carrie:

    The funny thing is a very good friend of mine is hairdresser, however, the only exposure he has is with dyes that consist of all types of chemicals! That is what people want and the natural dyes just dont have the market. Which leaves me with my question, what do I do?

  8. Adelaide Cole on July 7th, 2008 3:18 pm

    READ the herbatint ingredients and i believe you’ll see the cancer-causing phenyl-whatever-it-is. AVOID herbatint and other “cover gray” dyes in the health food stores. read the ingredients and you’ll see that they all contain the chemicals, which they must in order to do their job. they shouldn’t be selling them in health food stores.

    the ONLY one that is truly free of these chemical toxins is the LIGHT MOUNTAIN COVER GREY. but mixed results. i’ve tried it three times. first time: success. second time: some coverage but not great. third time: the gray went green. now i’m sitting with tomato paste on my hair to get rid of it and wondering what to do next without having to run to cancer-causing clairol.

    solution: accept the mousy brown and gray that’s come with age and get over it all.

  9. Elise on July 25th, 2008 6:48 pm

    Try Just for Men. It doesn’t have ammonia. It’s only on your head for 5 minutes. I’ve always had luck with gray coverage and I have very stubborn, 90% gray hair.
    There’s also a new Touch of Gray product that they have.
    I don’t know why they market only to men. The product works for anyone.

  10. shelley on July 30th, 2008 1:15 pm

    Elise: My thoughts on your suggestion is that when a dye does the job in 5 minutes, the chemicals that works so fast would be at a higher level than say Clairol. What do you think?

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