The FastDay Forum

Ballerina, you're on a roll babes!

I have grey hair, I'm in my late sixties and I just couldn't stand the bother of constantly colouring it to cover up a 'navy blue parting' (that was my dad's expression). My hair was a light brown and didn't start to turn grey until about ten years ago. I keep it short and I think it looks OK, my face is too wrinkly for a different hair colour to make me look younger. My mum had white hair from and early age and my sister is the same, she has been colouring her hair since her 20s.

...And PennyForthem I completely agree that men with dyed hair look awful, but I suppose if it makes them feel better about themselves then why not?

I remember being a little girl and loving my mother's salt and pepper hair. I thought it was so cool to have silver threads. Now, at 58, mine is also salt and pepper and I will let it go naturally, as she did. Besides, I'm lazy, cheap and not fond of spending afternoons in the "beauty shop". My husband's is going at the same rate, so we match.

I think completely grey hair can look fantastic if it looks good with your skin tone. I have a friend with wonderful silver hair which looks great on her. My natural colour is mouse I think but it's been a long time since I've seen it as I've been highlighting my hair since my teens. I am completely white around my hairline at the front so my hairdresser Puts colour in there. Could run a small country with my hairdressing bills but I'll probably be colouring my hair forever.

I have a long plait down to my waist which is very light brown at the bottom and white on my head, all natural, with a few long white streaks all along it. In my youth I had my hair streaked, it's doing it all by itself now!

Lovely to read your different views on this. It is unfair that men can look more distinguished with grey/silver hair & yet it somehow is thought the same colour hair on women is ageing. I also have seen some stunning looking women with silver hair but I suspect mine will turn out to be a sort of iron grey with some silver bits around my face because my Father was iron grey when he was thirty & I have his colouring. My Mother who was blond & blue eyed sort of faded into ashy blond & continued to look elegant so I have no template to really work to. I think I will have my shoulder length hair cut to an ear length sort of bob & leave any regrowth to its own devices & see what that looks like. My hair has become much wavier since menopause, sort of reverting to childhood when I had ringlets even with waist length hair, so it will just become curlier the shorter I go. If I hate it, & I know I will have protests from my hairdresser not colouring it, I can always put some colour back on. I will be pleased though not to spend a fortune on colouring & just have it well cut. I will see how I go after my restyle!

My mom went completely white at about 37 after a bad accident. She had lovely slightly olive skin and snapping blue/grey eyes. Wow!

I, on the other hand have kind of pale, freckly skin. I used to have kind of butterscotch-coloured hair that lightened in the son. I'm quite white/grey naturally now, but look washed out. So, I colour it lightish ash-blonde and it's working out okay. I'm 65 , but I think I look and feel younger.

I had an interesting experience with a drugstore tint--found myself looking online for info on how to get rid of lavender hair (read lots of stuff about Kelly? Osborne). I was relatively successful. Then I found an online site where you reply to questions about your hair, upload a photo of yourself, and then they send you the formulation that they think will work. Good news, it worked!

Ladies, grey hair is AWESOME. I get mine dyed grey/silver at the hairdresser's because I love it. Plus, I like to think i'm a little quirky

I originally had reddish brown hair but spotted my first white hair at 25. I dyed it for years in assorted colours. I once went black but it made me look like death warmed over. As the grey crept in I went blonder and blonder till I decided I couldn't be bothered anymore. Too much time and money I could be doing other things with! I last dyed it in Jan 2012. Now its a mixture of grey and silvery white. It looks like it has highlights and folk ask me where I get it done but I just tell them I grow my own. I'm lucky it's in good condition and quite shiny. Every second or third shampoo I use one of those blue shampoos which doesn't actually make it look blue, it just makes the white bits sparkle. My sister has a similar colour but my brother, who is the oldest, hasn't got any white hair at all, it's still really, really auburn.
I reckon it's a personal decision for everyone but I must admit that a solid dark shade on an older person can look very aging, just what they are trying to avoid!

Ladies, grey hair is AWESOME. I get mine dyed grey/silver at the hairdresser's because I love it. Plus, I like to think i'm a little quirky

I've run into a lot of people who feel this way! I've had grey hair since I was a little kid. My mother claimed that she found the first ones when I was an infant. It runs in the family. A cousin had snow white hair before she was 18yo. Mine has gone slower. I've had men and women, strangers and friends, tell me to never dye my hair as they like grey and white hair so much and love to see it natural on a person. Fewer people have tried to convince me to dye it.

My hair stylist claims she can take 10years off my face if I let her dye it, but I'm too lazy to keep it up. So it stays.

I say do what makes you feel good about yourself.

My OH is silver haired and has face fuzz which ages him, but he says it hides a saggy face. He went from blonde to grey at an early age not long after we married which he goes to great lengths to tell people, I don't know to what he is inferring
Anyway I don't know how much grey I have because its always coloured, I have gone a bit lighter so it blends in, but daughter is a hairdresser and beauty therapist so she keeps me in fine fettle and besides since I have lost weight I am going back to my thirties to enjoy wearing clothes I should have been in then instead of the shapeless baggies I wore.
Have you noticed how married couples morph into one another, like wearing same colour clothes unintentally. We often find that if one comes down in black jeans and leather coat the other will too etc. I'm always ready before OH so we don't see what each other is putting on. Ita spooky.
I think its a personal thing so try the grey and if you don't like it put a colour back on.
Chris x

[carorees]

I started having highlights in my hair to accentuate the coppery tones years ago and when the grey hairs started appearing, I just kept on. Now I have multicolored highlights (blonde, copper and dark blonde) with my natural hair adding grey and dark brown colours. So, I do color my hair but not to hide the gray as such.

Off to the hairdresser for a top up today in fact!

I have hair that is described as strawberry blonde, and the red bits have all been going white since my early 20s! Luckily as the base is blonde, it just makes my hair look lighter, but I do have highlights to blend it all in a bit.
My mum, who had bright red hair naturally, has been dying her hair since her early 20s too and she looks great, much younger than her age, which would not be the case if she left her hair all white.
That said it's a personal decision and I think your natural colour and skin tone play a big part!

I LOVE my hair - I've always thought it's my best asset !!! I LOVE being a red head, though I do have to colour it nowadays as it's got a fair bit of white in it!! My mum is and my nan was, completely white and I'd be happy to go like them, but in the meantime I sooooooooo want to stay with what was my natural colour. The colour that I dye my hair is not as vibrant as my natural colouring of when I was in my 20s. I see pics of myself at that age and truly don't remember it being that vibrant - but it was !!! Regret that no-one's ever nicknamed me Ginge/Ginger (maybe I should have taken that as an avatar on this forum). Have thought that if I ever do go completely white then I could always go for the soft pink/mauve that seems to be in fashion at the moment. Hey - why not.... "When I'm old I'll wear purple" .... great poem!!
Alternatively, a nice shade of green !!!!!!!

I am 64 and a salt and pepper grey - or at least I think I am because I haven't seen my natural hair colour for years! I have my hair professionally low-lighted every ten to twelve weeks, which avoids the re-growth/roots issue and looks quite natural. I am not yet ready to test out how grey I am, but both my mother and father didn't go a good shade of grey until well into their late seventies, so not much chance for me, at least for a while!