I gave up dyeing my hair years ago, and the breakup was painful for me because I used to dye my hair every three months and I loved it. I decided I had to give it up a few years ago because I thought it was making my hair more brittle and thinner. I never thought I'd be able to have fun and color my hair again, especially once I jumped on my green train, until I discovered henna. I dyed my hair with henna a month ago, and I would say it was a success. It's very subtle, just how I wanted, with the few white hairs I had, now a reddish-coppery highlight. The rest of my hair has a slight glint of auburn in it, but looks dark brown indoors. But best of all, my hair is shiny and was extremely soft for the first 2 weeks. Soft like….kitten hairs soft. Or like, I used a ton of leave-in conditioner. If there was a "like" button for my hair, I would've clicked on it myself (and I normally dislike my hair). I thought I would change it up during my whole "no poo/low poo" challenge by hennaeing because I heard henna was good for your scalp, and boy, did it need help during this detox. I did this the first day of week 4 into my low poo-ing (sorry, I know it just sounds wrong).
Hennaing your hair is no easy task. There are lots of steps and it is time intensive, but it's a great investment in time if you want to dye your hair naturally (or with less chemicals). First, it's time intensive. You have to mix up the henna with something slightly acidic to enable the henna to release the dye and let this mixture sit for 10-12 hour period. Once that's done, you have to apply it, which is no easy feat for one person. I did this by myself and wasn't able to section out my hair, so I just sort of put it on everywhere and prayed I didn't miss any obvious chunks of hair. Before you apply, you have to cover the ground with towels (I used a giant piece of shipping paper I got from one of my many Amazon purchases), wear some old grungy clothes you don't mind staining for life, and 2 towels dedicated to hennaeing (one to put around your shoulders to catch the henna that falls the the second to go around your head). And don't forget to wipe it off IMMEDIATELY if it gets anywhere, because henna stains. The only place it's really safe is in the shower with the glass and the ceramic.
Once you've managed to put henna all over your head, you have to put seran wrap over your hennaed head, then I put a towel over the seran-wrapped layer to keep the henna warm (keeping henna warm helps the hair uptake the color) and as an added layer of protection to catch any henna that decides it wants to jump ship. Then put the second towel around your shoulders just in case you have a henna accident, that way the towel is there to catch it and it doesn't land anything not henna-proof. After all that, you need to leave it in your hair for a few hours.
At around 2.5 hours, I started to get henna drips down my forehead, which had to be immediately wiped off (henna stains skin), and was not pretty. Do this by wiping it off with a napkin wetted with water. When you wipe off henna with a napkin, the napkin looks like you just wiped up baby poop. I was afraid to throw this napkin in our community bathroom trashcan for fear of my roommate thinking I took a #2 and unnecessarily and rudely, threw toilet paper in the trashcan.
How do you mix henna you ask? There are a ton of different recipes out there, depending on what your current hair color is and what color you want it to be. I would check out this page, which compiles a number of different recipes with pictures of the resulting hair colors:
http://www.hennaforhair.com/mixes/index.html
I ordered my henna from Morroco Method International and from mehandi.com, but my order is on backorder with mehandi.com, so I used the Morrocco Method henna first. I purchased a "Light Brown" and a "Red" henna from them.
Here's my recipe:
-2 heaping tbsp. Light Brown Henna
-4 heaping tbsp. Red Henna
-less than 1 c. black tea (black tea steeped for 15 mins.)
-juice from 1/2 lemon
-a few drops of argan oil (they actually tell you not to do this, since oil won't help the henna stick to hair, but I did it because I was afraid the henna would be difficult to remove from my hair)
After I mixed the henna, I covered the mixture with sedan wrap and let it sit for 12 hours on my kitchen counter (make sure it's away from heat). My mixture was a little more watery than I wanted it, so make sure you add in the liquid slowly. I also realized 6 tbsp's wasn't enough for my shoulder-length, fine hair, so if you have super thick hair or it's longer than this, use more. You need enough to thickly cover your head with henna--like you're frosting a cake. Don't be stingy with the mixture--coating it thickly is the way to go. I let the mixture sit in my hair for about 3 hours and rinsed the henna off in my shower. The easiest way to do this is to fill your tub up with water and dunk your head in there to help rinse it off or to put a giant bowl in the tub, fill it with water, and dunk your head in there to help ease the henna out. I opted for the second option and to my surprise, most of the henna came out easily. I finished with a shower and didn't wash my hair with shampoo or conditioner, and it was the softest it's been in a long time. I did have an orangish-tannish tint along my hairline from the henna doing it's thang on my skin too. Didn't bother me much and it was gone after a shower or two.
A few things I'll be doing differently next time:
1. I'll be using more than 6 tbsp's of henna--this wasn't enough for me. I think I'll be using 200g= 10 tbsp.
2. I may not mix it with the Light Brown--I'm curious to see if it'll turn my hair a bit more dark auburn. I wouldn't mind seeing it a bit more red.
3. I want to try just mixing with lemon juice and distilled water instead of tea.
Here's a great resource if you're interested in dyeing your hair with henna (it's kinda long, but really interesting and contains good info):
http://www.hennaforhair.com/freebooks/hennaforhair.pdf
How do you mix henna you ask? There are a ton of different recipes out there, depending on what your current hair color is and what color you want it to be. I would check out this page, which compiles a number of different recipes with pictures of the resulting hair colors:
http://www.hennaforhair.com/mixes/index.html
I ordered my henna from Morroco Method International and from mehandi.com, but my order is on backorder with mehandi.com, so I used the Morrocco Method henna first. I purchased a "Light Brown" and a "Red" henna from them.
Here's my recipe:
-2 heaping tbsp. Light Brown Henna
-4 heaping tbsp. Red Henna
-less than 1 c. black tea (black tea steeped for 15 mins.)
-juice from 1/2 lemon
-a few drops of argan oil (they actually tell you not to do this, since oil won't help the henna stick to hair, but I did it because I was afraid the henna would be difficult to remove from my hair)
After I mixed the henna, I covered the mixture with sedan wrap and let it sit for 12 hours on my kitchen counter (make sure it's away from heat). My mixture was a little more watery than I wanted it, so make sure you add in the liquid slowly. I also realized 6 tbsp's wasn't enough for my shoulder-length, fine hair, so if you have super thick hair or it's longer than this, use more. You need enough to thickly cover your head with henna--like you're frosting a cake. Don't be stingy with the mixture--coating it thickly is the way to go. I let the mixture sit in my hair for about 3 hours and rinsed the henna off in my shower. The easiest way to do this is to fill your tub up with water and dunk your head in there to help rinse it off or to put a giant bowl in the tub, fill it with water, and dunk your head in there to help ease the henna out. I opted for the second option and to my surprise, most of the henna came out easily. I finished with a shower and didn't wash my hair with shampoo or conditioner, and it was the softest it's been in a long time. I did have an orangish-tannish tint along my hairline from the henna doing it's thang on my skin too. Didn't bother me much and it was gone after a shower or two.
A few things I'll be doing differently next time:
1. I'll be using more than 6 tbsp's of henna--this wasn't enough for me. I think I'll be using 200g= 10 tbsp.
2. I may not mix it with the Light Brown--I'm curious to see if it'll turn my hair a bit more dark auburn. I wouldn't mind seeing it a bit more red.
3. I want to try just mixing with lemon juice and distilled water instead of tea.
Here's a great resource if you're interested in dyeing your hair with henna (it's kinda long, but really interesting and contains good info):
http://www.hennaforhair.com/freebooks/hennaforhair.pdf
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