It's time to face the inevitable. I'm going to let my hair go grey.

[Critters2]

I think.

[Shine]

1. Well, good luck with that.

:)

:hi:

[Critters2]

3. Thanks. I'll prolly chicken out when the roots really come in. nt

[Radio_Lady]

2. My sentiments exactly... I even think I'm going to change hair stylists.

I wish my hair was more fully grey, like some women I see.

I have kind of a grey patch on the top, and more salt and pepper around the sides and edges. I have no idea what my natural color looks like.

How long have you been coloring yours? How old were you when you started to tint your hair?

Here's when I started -- at age 15 in Florida, where the sun bleached out my brunette and had my mother's hairdresser put JET BLACK Loving Care on. I must have been the first Goth girl!

[Critters2]

6. I was in my mid- 30's when I started.

In the summer, my hair would bleach out to this really nice looking auburn. The rest of the time it was dark brown. I decided I liked the auburn, so I first started using a tinting shampoo, but then went to permanent color.

10 years later, I don't really know what color it is, but I suspect it's going to be REALLY grey. Oh well. My mom was completely gray by the time she was 30, and I beat that. But I'm tired of dealing with the chemicals. The possible connections between hair color and cancer make me uncomfortable, too. Clearly, these are strong chemicals. Can it really be good to let 'em sit on my skin for 20 minutes at a time?

So, I'm gonna take the big step. Probably.

Great photo, btw!

[Radio_Lady]

8. There are some very stylish women at the Mall where I walk in the morning.

They're slim, effervescent gals over 50, all with natural gray hair. I've stopped a few and asked them about their hair experiences. I'm going to be 68 years old this year, and it's time for a change.

I worked for the Clairol division of Bristol-Myers Squibb as a technical consultant for almost ten years. Before that, I was a colorist for the Goldwell line of German haircare line.

Yes, there is a lot of debate about whether color causes cancer and other diseases. Last December, the European union eliminated 22 different haircoloring chemicals from the marketplace because of undesirable results.

We had a pretty big discussion of the subject earlier last year. I'm going to try to find the link for you.

Good to speak with you on the DU.

Radio Lady in Oregon

[Generic Brad]

4. Wear it as a badge of honor

Be proud of your gray!

[Radio_Lady]

5. Oh, Brad! You even have a GENERIC BRAD BAR CODE!

How clever! How adorable!

If you ever upgrade to BRANDED BRAD -- you'll be more expensive and have a new package.

[CaliforniaPeggy]

7. My dear mycritters2!

Well........you just saw my pic......

That color is my own........

I have never colored my hair........

It just always sounded like too damn much trouble to me....

For many years I was a dish-water blonde......and the gray/silver came in slowly....

Now, I love the color!

Let yourself be yourself!

You can do it!

:bounce: :bounce:

[Critters2]

10. Peg, it was indeed your photo that inspired my post.

I've been thinking about it, and do so more firmly every time I see an attractive woman with gray hair. I saw yours and thought, "I'd look quite nice with hair that color!"

The trick will be getting it to grow in without looking like a skunk mid-way through.

Hope I come out looking as good as you!!

[Radio_Lady]

13. I wear a lot of hats, so it will be pretty easy to hide the regrowth.

Also, my husband said I should just cut it way back so I'll look more like him. Ha --ha! Maybe I could pull that off if I looked like -- actress Natalie Portman???

[Critters2]

14. Hats!! That's a great idea!!

Another great pic, btw!! Great smile!

[Radio_Lady]

15. Thank you. By the way, I think auburn hair is the most beautiful color.

We lived in Boston for almost 30 years. With almost 1/4 Irish population, there were a LOT of redheads.

[Critters2]

19. One of my grandfathers was Irish and both grandmothers Scottish

So I have very Celtic coloring. Pale, pink skin, green eyes, and dark hair that bleaches auburn. Or at least I did. We're so fair that my sister has been hosptialized twice for sunburn!!

I lived in Boston for 4 years--went to seminary in Newton. Where did you live?

[Radio_Lady]

25. You sound absolutely beautiful. I lived on Commonwealth Avenue in Brighton when I moved to Boston

in 1972. I was the first woman to have a weekday call-in radio program on WEEI, and later, WMEX.

The following year, I married a widower from Sudbury, Massachusetts, and lived there until 1998, when we followed my daughter and her husband to Portland, Oregon. We're at approximately the same latitude as Boston, and about the same amount of precipitation (37 inches). However, it falls as rain here in the Willamette Valley, with snow usually only on the mountains. Our winters are rarely very cold, but there is a general partly cloudy condition here from about October to June. Then it turns suddenly fully sunny and very dry for the summer months July-August-September. There is no better place to be than Oregon in the summer!

[Radio_Lady]

11. Hi Peggy! How are you? We're going to be down in Novato and the San Francisco area

next August. Any chance of getting together with you? That would be scrumptuous!

Check out our Las Vegas pictures if you have a chance. Posted tonight at:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=105x6159247

[CaliforniaPeggy]

16. My dear Radio_Lady!

Well, I'm quite a lot farther south, in Los Angeles!

And August? I may be travelling myself.......no firm plans just yet!

Have a great time in San Francisco! It's one of my fav cities.......

:hi:

[Radio_Lady]

26. Oh, dear. I must have gotten my geography mixed up! Sorry about that!

I would have sworn you were in northern California. Furthermore, it all right there in your personal information. "Manhattan Beach, CA" -- I don't know why that didn't ring a bell. We even discussed UCLA once upon a time. My memory is getting weird, especially when there are so many people here in the Lounge. "Mea culpa..."

Have a great trip in August, and take lots of pictures, wherever you go. We're headed to Hawaii in March during spring break. We're going back to Maui for 12 days, then to Oahu to meet up with our daughter, her husband, and their two kids for another seven days. That's a good way to break up winter, right?

Another Grandmother for Peace,

Radio Lady in Oregon

[dolo amber]

9. Critters are losers

I mean, quitters are losers. Or never win. Or something. :think:

[Critters2]

12. I'ts been said before. In a Lounge losers thread!! nt

[Nicole]

17. I decided to do that as well

I quit coloring it a couple of years ago. I started life as a blonde, then it turned to brunette. Now it's reverting back to blonde. I've got blonde & silver-grey mixed in with the brunette right now. My hairstylist asked me who I was cheating on her with. :rofl:

I'm looking forward to seeing what it looks like when it's done. If I don't like the end result then I'll color it.

[flvegan]

18. Hair is hair.

Let it go grey. Or orange...or pink or bald. Who cares?

You're still (can I say this?) terribly, completely sexy in my book (pre and post pitbull discussions).

You have a good heart and a good mind. The two very best qualities in the world.

[Critters2]

20. Wow. I really am flattered. Thanks so much. nt

[Savannah_H]

21. GreyHead

I never thought I could stop perming my hair; but I did. Now it's soft and shiny.
I never thought I could EVER let my hair go grey; but I did and it's okay. I lived.:shrug:

[Critters2]

22. I'm sensitive to something in perm solutions.

They completely burn my skin. So I learned to live with rail-straight hair.

Not so with dye. And, yeah, I figure I'll live. It's making the transition that I'm trying to figure out.

[Radio_Lady]

27. Thyoglycolate acid, perhaps. But there are perms now that don't burn.

They work just as well.

When did you have your last perm? Putting waves in the hair is now much kinder to the scalp than even ten or twenty years ago.

[hickman]

23. Don't. I did and I hate it.

I'm fixing this next week. The grey just is not me. I don't recognize myself anymore. F##k this. I'm going back to the color I grew up with. Medium dishwater blond with white and gold highlights that come out every summer. Summer sucks but it has to be good for something.

[Radio_Lady]

28. Enjoy your tinted hair! If I were more grey, I'd love to tint to blonde.

But it won't happen. I have my father's salt and pepper hair, kind of like Ronald Reagan.

[HughBeaumont]

32. Like the commercial says: I love my dad, I'm just not in a hurry to look like him.

Every two to three months, that grey dish is OUT. My hair (which I still have all of, THANK YOU MOM) and my number are the only things old about me.

[graywarrior]

24. I let mine go gray about 6 years ago.

Could never get back into coloring it again.

[Radio_Lady]

29. Whatever floats your boat... hey, are you ever going to take the duct tape off that duck?

He's been wiggling ever more each time I see him. Is that possible?

[patricia92243]

30. My Mother dyed her hair til she was 85. Mother knows best - at least for me!

[murielm99]

31. I did that last year.

I was a natural blond, and my hair was white-blond until I was 14. It was still very light when I got married. I cut my hair short and let it grow out to its natural color.

It came in ash-blond with silver highlights. I liked it.

My mother spoiled it for me. She was a redhead who is going blond. She kept harping and harping about how she had no gray hair, but her daughter was gray. She kept telling me she was shocked by how gray my cousins were getting.

My husband has beautiful silver hair. His hair has been that way since he was 29. My 27-year-old daughter will have hair just like her father. I think it will be beautiful. I pointed this out to my mother.

Every time she saw me she ridiculed my hair. I got sick of the whole thing and went back to coloring my hair.

[Robeson]

33. Oh well a touch of grey, kinda suits you anyway, ...

...Thats all I had to say, but its all right... :-)

[China_cat]

34. Why not?

After all, you earned every one of them.

[RebelOne]

35. I will never allow my hair to become gray.

I was born a blonde and will stay a blonde until the day I die. I am 68 years old and have been dying my hair for 52 years.

[tigereye]

36. bravo for you!

I'm not quite ready yet. My hairdresser says I have the "good grey", but...

Still doing the highlights thing. If I could go silver like Emmy Lou Harris, I might be more willing....