I cut my hair, and I dyed it using Henna
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| From henna |
I have no neck!
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| From henna |
It was really hard for me to capture the true color on camera, I think my hair is the shade in between the picture above and the picture below
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| From henna |
It’s like, burgandy, and I started off with medium brown with a WHOLE BUNCHA roots growing out. The roots don’t really dye, because henna can only make your hair darker, not lighter. BUT the roots do have a red tint to them that you could see up close or in the light.
So, allow me to elaborate on why I chose henna as opposed to regular hair dye and what I learned in the process. I became interested in henna because Lush sells their own henna hair dye [they call it hair caca, haha i'm serious] and was planning on dyeing my hair anyway to get rid of the roots, but I’m always iffy about dyeing my hair with commercial dye because of house damaging it is and I already put my hair through a lot. So I was intrigued by this Henna, because they say that it’s natural and it leaves your hair in better condition than before you dyed it. Well, a lot of hair dyes claim that it will condition your hair as it colors, but I guess I was more apt to believe in the Henna because it doesn’t require ammonia and because I browsed through the Lush forums and saw before and after pictures of people who used Henna, and their “after”s really did look healthier than the “before”s so it’s like the proof is in the pudding.
How it works is, the Henna comes from a plant and its ground up and crushed for you to make a paste with. The paste then leaves a red stain in your hair or sometimes brown or almost black if other things are added to the henna. After doing my research I was really excited about getting the party started and henna-ing myself! But I didn’t want to buy mine from Lush because theirs is 20 bucks, and yeah you get more than one use out of it, but I didn’t want to make that big of an investment at first. So I look around online, and find cheaper options, but the problem with that is I would have to wait for it to ship, and I’m wayyy too impatient to wait for shipping. So I was thinking what if I went to an Indian grocery, like how I did when I went to get my coconut oil. Because I’m sure it would be inexpensive there since henna is such a common thing in India, and I would be able to get my hands on it right away. So, I decided on making another trip to the Indian store.
*Oh this is off topic, but I figured out yet another reason I might want to look around an Indian grocery…I was talking to my Indian coworker and she said that the only makeup she would use is kajal, which is like eyeliner to us, but it is in a bullet form [imagine a pointy lipstick]. And kajal is supposed to be a healthy alternative to eyeliner too! So, I might go try to find kajal next…
Before I hit up the Indian store, I remember reading something online about a dangerous ingredient in some Henna mixes, but I didn’t quite remember the name of the ingredient until later on….when I bought some Henna and realized mine had that in it! The ingredient is called PPD, apparently it is a common ingredient in almost ALL hair dyes because it is cheap and it makes hair dyes darker. So if you wanted a dark henna dye, make sure it uses indigo instead of PPD. The websites I read had stories of shady mendhi [the henna tattoo designs] artists that would use straight PPD and say that they can give you a “black henna tattoo” and that people would have very bad reactions to the PPD. Here are the sources that I found that warn against it
http://www.hennapage.com/henna/ppd/index.html
http://www.hennaforhair.com/ppd/index.html
To make a long story short, I used the henna that I bought that has PPD in it. PPD was the last ingredient on the list, and I figured since it’s in hair dye anyway and I never had a reaction, I should be ok. I did a strand and allergy test the day before I dyed my hair too. Now, just cuz I took a risk and used that particular hair dye doesn’t mean I would recommend it to anyone else. I guess the only reason I decided to use that dye was because I bought two packs; one was a red dye and one said dark brown. When I did a strand test with the dark brown henna, I didn’t notice a change at all, so it seemed like if I dyed my whole head with the brown henna I might as well have done nothing.
I really like how my hair turned out. I read that with each henna session, the color intensifies and I would like my hair to be a deeper red, I think that would be fun and a nice change of pace from the brown that I’ve had for over a year now. And I’m now a believer that henna is conditioning to the hair because my hair turned out soo soft! I know after dyeing normally, I can feel the damage that was done and my hair didn’t feel good after commercial dyes. I really really like this henna stuff, I’m glad I tried it, I almost wish that my hair was naturally brown so I could continue to have such vibrant results with the henna, haha but I guess I gotta be happy with what God gave me…and then tweak it 
