To Dye Or Not To Dye?

It's pretty much agreed upon by everyone that colouring hair is damaging, and that to attain extreme hair lengths, it's best to stick with one's natural colour.


However many of us, for whatever reason, choose to dye our hair.  For many in their teens and twenties, it's to experiment with colour.  For those of us who are older it may be to cover the silvers.  That is the case for me.  I use L'Oreal's Preference hair colour in Medium Blonde.  It's not to ashy and not too golden--just right for me.

While I know many beautiful women with salt and pepper or silver hair, it's just not a look that I'm comfortable with.  I feel as though I'd disappear if my hair was its natural colour, which is now predominantly white.


I may or may not be correct in that assessment, but I am not prepared to give up my blonde locks.  Whether or not that may change in the future, I don't know.


I do know that by the very fact that I'm colouring my hair, I am limiting its ultimate length. While my real final goal is tailbone length hair, I may have to accept that I won't be able to grow healthy looking hair beyond waist length. I guess I won't know until I get there.


There are some things that I've learned that have helped keep my coloured hair in better shape than it's been in the past.


There has been research done that shows that the application of anti-oxidants before colouring may help to reduce peroxide damage. Ktani, a member of the Long Hair Community, found that coconut oil has these properties. I was one of her first guinea pigs, and I've been coconut oiling my hair before colouring for over a year and a half now. While the evidence thus far is merely anecdotal, I've been very pleased with the results.


I apply coconut oil all over the length of my hair, right up to the roots before a touch-up.  I leave it on for a minimum of 15 minutes and sometimes as long as several hours before I apply the dye to my roots.





I make sure that I rinse very, very thoroughly, and I use a lot of colour safe conditioner afterwards.


Additionally, I try to go as long as possible between touch-ups; I go about 6 weeks.


With regular deep moisture treatments in between colourings, and my regular small trims, I'm managing to keep my hair looking and feeling relatively healthy, and I'm happy to say, split-end free thus far.


So while I would never recommend that anyone dye their hair, I know that many will anyway, so I thought I'd share some of the tips that I've learned.  While they may work for me, they may not work for everyone.  And remember; dying your hair is a commitment.  It does require upkeep, and should you decide to go natural, depending on the colour you use, there will be demarcation during grow-out.  Not everyone is comfortable with this idea.


However, for me, it's a small commitment of time and energy, and it keeps me feeling happy.  Feeling happy with my hair is all that I really want from my hair anyway.

Ah, The Controversy!

I had no idea that my choice to wear bangs was so controversial.

I came across this article from the New York times.  It was written almost three years ago, but I suspect that the opinions likely remain the same.  There are so many things wrong with this article, I don't even know where to begin.

I have no doubt that there are women who get a particular haircut believing that it will somehow change their lives.  I think most of us have had that feeling about either a haircut, a fashion accessory, or an article of clothing at some point in our lives.

However, this article makes such sweeping generalizations that I can't believe the Times printed it.

First of all, there is a statement that women with bangs over the age of 30 are making a cry for help and are trying somehow to recapture their youth.

Secondly, there are numerous statements that imply that women have bangs cut have unresolved childhood issues or are somehow emotionally unstable.  The quoted hairdresser actually asks women who ask for bangs if they're on their period!

Thirdly, the article quotes a businesswoman as saying that no one with blunt bangs can be taken seriously in business.

Also, there are a lot of implications that women who wear bangs are high-maintenance women trying to be "cool".

While everyone is entitled to their own opinion, I was shocked that there were almost no arguments to refute the ones I mention.


I am so tired of being told by society and media how I "should" look or dress at my age.  Is it so wrong to just want to wear hair or clothing in which I feel comfortable?

Myself, I have bangs because they are the most easiest style for me.  My hair is so fine that when grown out, my hair won't stay out of my face without a clip or hairspray.  For me, this is a no-maintenance, no-fuss style.

It's certainly not that I'm compensating for growing older. I don't think I'm anymore emotionally unstable than the next woman.  This is just me.  And I'm okay with that.  When will the rest of the world let us just be okay with who we are?

Long Hair Over 40

It doesn't matter where I look or what I read.  It seems that just about everyone in the world of fashion and the professional hair styling pundits seem to agree that women over the age of 35 or 40 should not have hair any longer than shoulder length. 

Well, I'm not buying it.  Undoubtedly, there are many women who for a variety of their own reasons like to keep shorter hair and of course, many look lovely.  But there are still others who want to wear their hair long and get it cut because they think they "should".  So they end up getting "mom" cuts that they don't really like, but that makes them feel as though they are part of the crowd.

It is those women to whom I write today.

Do you feel more age appropriate with shorter hair, or do you just feel old?  I know myself that when I had hair above the shoulder, I felt more matronly, and it just didn't feel like me.  Do I want to be younger than I am?  No.  But I do want to be myself, and being myself means having longer hair.  I just feel happier with it.  And I really believe that being happy with oneself is a truly important thing.

Of course, one might find that it's not appropriate to wear one's hair loose in a business environment, but there are a wealth of hairstyles that are both business-like and attractive.  Wearing hair up doesn't have to mean a severe updo.  There are plenty of styles that are serious and at the same time flattering.  It might take a few experiments to find just the right style, but I guarantee that there is a hairstyle that is both attractive and businesslike for everyone.

Also, is it really so terrible to still feel feminine and sensual after the age of 35 or 40?  These days, women live much longer, and 40 is not what it was 50 years ago.

I look at some lovely older women such as Faye Dunaway and Meryl Streep.  Both of them wear hair longer than shoulder length and in my opinion, they look lovely, and yes, sexy.  Is that a crime?

I think that in 2010, we women can feel confident in being ourselves whether that means wearing shorter hair or longer hair.  We can define what it means to be a woman of a certain age.  We don't need to listen to the so-called experts.  While there are some who say that an older woman with long hair is just trying to relive her youth, I don't agree.  I think it's all about looking the way we want to look and feeling comfortable in our own skin.  To me, that's what  being a woman is all about, whatever the age.

Here is a photo of me with short hair when I was 37 and below a photo of me with longer hair at 48.  Yes, I clearly look older at 48, because I am, but I look the way I want to look; not the way an "expert" or society at large tells me.  It makes me happy and I like how I feel. And I'm good with that. 

My Mission

When I was approaching my 45th birthday in the summer of 2006, I made a decision to grow my hair as long as it would grow. Why? Well lots of reasons. First of all, I'd always wanted long hair, but all my life I'd been told that my fine hair was "thin" and wouldn't look good long. I was inspired by some of the older women who were sporting long hair and I decided that I was going to do my own thing and just see how long I could grow it. I wanted to have the hair that I always wanted, and I decided that the social conventions of women having shoulder length hair or shorter after the age of 40 was irrelevant to me. I had a notion of me as an old lady with very long hair which my grandchildren would ask to see take down out of a bun or braid. I also had a sense of the growth of hair as being a measurable way to somehow chart the growth of wisdom that I hope to gain with maturity. Some reasons might seem silly, but they're all very meaningful to me.

In trying to learn not only how to care for my hair, but also to learn how to style it, without blow-driers or curling irons, I joined a long hair forum, The Long Hair Community. I began learning how I had been previously abusing my hair with heat styling products, using ultra light blonde shades of hair dye that were far too harsh on my hair, and not even brushing and combing my hair properly.

I came into my long hair quest with fairly damaged hair, but I vowed to change all of that, and I was doing pretty well with it. However, there were a few things I goofed up on.

First of all, about a year into my journey with my hair closing in on waist length, I had the--ahem--bright idea to dye my hair medium brown. It was almost immediately that I knew I had made a mistake. My predominantly white natural roots popped out almost immediately after colouring. This made it necessary to colour far more often than I had been with a medium blonde shade. Oops. So it wasn't long before the previous damage became more apparent than ever. So I chopped off 5 inches. Back to square one.

My hair was actually looking great at this point, because the hair that had been previously damaged by "ultra light" blonde hair colouring was just about gone. However, now I was stuck with this brown shade that in some places was almost black. While I enjoyed being a brunette for a change, it really was far too dark for my colouring. I hung in with it until March of '08.

Now, how does one safely go from dyed dark brown to blonde without damaging one's hair. Well, the short answer is it really can't be done. So I bleached out (ouch) the brown, and started colouring with medium blonde again. But the damage! I couldn't live with it. So another 5 inches cut off. And there was still plenty of damage. Another 3 inches off. Still more damage. I just maintained my length until January of this year 2010, when most of the damage was cut out and I decided to start growing again. By February, the length of my hair was back to where it was when I first decided to grow it. Back to square one yet again.

It's now April of 2010, and my hair, when measured from the hairline on my forehead to the tip of my ends is 24 inches, as pictured above. My current goal is to reach BSL length, which means "Bra Strap Length". I hope to be there before the end of this year. By summer of 2011, I'm hoping that my hair will be at waist length.

I'm on my way again. I'm still dying my hair, but in my low-maintenance medium blonde shade. Now I have the knowledge of hair care, and I've learned my lesson about trying wacky colour experiments (I promise). I've learned lots of protective hairstyles, which are featured in my hairstyle/haircare website. This time, I'm going to do it!