Using Lush henna hair due

Hello all! I am back with a more upbeat post...not (for once) about babies and motherhood but about beauty! Well hair colouring to be more specific. After having my son my appearance somewhat took a backseat in terms of priorities...especially my hair! It got so long it was almost bum length. All well and good except having a baby to look after meant long, mermaid hair wasn't exactly practical! It was also highlighted with blonde balayage highlights (which I loved and do miss a bit) and the maternity pay that I currently am on doesn't really cover having my hair professionally coloured reguarly, so I decided a change was in order!

Now I have zero patience. Once I get an idea in my head I want to to it right away. And I can't stop thinking about it until I do. So rather than getting my hair dyed uniform, natural brown at the salon I decided to go it alone and buy a box dye. I chose a Revlon coloursilk one in a warm light brown colour and enthusiastically wacked it on over my highlights. Well it turned bloody khaki didn't it?! It looked HORRENDOUS! Never, ever dye over blonde without first putting some pigment back into the hair or you are likely to be left with a rather unflattering shade of khaki/grey! So then in a panic (again should have contacted a hairdresser at this point) I covered over this with a bright red semi permanent dye. This turned out pretty well to be fair but it didn't take aswell to the previously khaki areas and I felt the colour was a little too dramatic on me. At this point I decided to book a consultation with the hairdresser for a colour correction. I turned up and enthusiastically showed her a photos of what I wanted (warm brown hair with caramel balayage, ombré highlights...basically what I had to start off with!) and after performing a strand test the hairdresser called and to my dismay revealed my hair was too damaged to take anymore colouring/bleaching. She advised me to try and fade the colour (I was already washing my hair three times a day with head and shoulders at this point!) and condition lots but mainly to leave it alone. Did I take this advice?! Did I hell!

I immediately went and purchased a box of regular use colour B4 determined to get rid of the bright red! This worked fairly well...I just had orange hair for a couple of days. I then got a Nice n' easy permanent dye in a warm light brown shade and went over the top which again turned out okay. But I still wasn't happy with the colour. The Nice n' Easy nearly choked me with the ammonia smell as I was applying it aswell, and I wanted to try a more natural approach (plus I was getting a bit worried my hair might fall out). I did a bit of research online and decided to purchase some auburn Surya henna powder. You add hot water to the powder, mix it to the consistency of melted chocolate and then apply it all over your hair. Henna needs heat to work so you need to apply something to your head to trap the heat in e.g. a shower cap (I clingfilmed my head, and then put a woolly hat over the top...attractive!) I left it on for two hours (two hours smelling like I had been smoking a joint) and then finally rinsed it off. Colour was a lot more even than the box dyes and my hair felt much healthier but I STILL wasn't happy with the colour. Too red yet again. So then I had a look on the Lush website and found their henna blocks. I chose one called 'caca brun' (apparently 'caca' means poop in Spanish...so yeah shade poop brown took my fancy!) I did more thorough research this time at before and after pictures of the results of caca brun and decided to give it a go. The great thing about henna is that it is GOOD for your hair and you can use it as many times as you like to build your desired colour without doing any damage. Lush offer other shades some more red and then the caca brun and caca noir which both contain indigo (another natural plant dye)  to make them darker. The blocks also contain other natural ingredients including cocoa butter which is super nourishing. I used the block in much the same way as the powder. I had to break it into chunks and then I dissolved it in hot water until it was the right consistency. I washed and dried my hair without conditioning it before using this (you are supposed to do this I was just too lazy the previous time!) then applied it in the same way as before but left it for 3 hours this time. Trust me three hours sitting with your head in clingfilm and a woolly hat in June is not idea but the results were so worth it! My hair is now a rich, chocolatey brown and I love it! It's still very reddish but not too 'in your face' red just a nice deep brown red. And it feels so strong and soft!

There are some downsides to henna, it's a long process. It's messy (my God is it messy) and the blocks take ages to rinse out thanks to the cocoa butter in them BUT it's so worth it! No damage to your hair, it actually conditions the hair, if you have kids you don't have to worry about them (or yourself) breathing in any chemicals because it's all natural. And the colour takes really well even to
damaged hair. After you have done the henna and rinsed and dried you need to wait around 24 hours to let it develop further and see the true results. My colour deepened in this time and looked even nicer. I think henna is always going to make the hair quite red so if you like ash colours then it might not be for you. It's probably wise to do a strand test before using it to see what the colour will look like and to determine how long to leave it in your hair for (there's no set time limit). I can't comment on how it would cover grey as I don't have any grey hair yet but I would assume they would just turn out lighter and maybe resemble highlights (again patch test to make sure!) If you have any henna based questions do let me know...I am no hair professional (CLEARLY) but I will do my best to answer them!

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