Getting Back to My Roots

I have made the decision to discover my natural hair color and hopefully keep it that way. I write "discover" because I truly don't know what my natural hair color is after 26 years of altering it with various colors and highlights in order to hide my very dominant silver. I have had this desire on and off for many years now but never mustered the courage or determination to go ALL the way through with it. A few years ago when the urge struck yet again, I thought the way to do it would be to cut my hair as short as possible.
Summer 2006?) I soon lost my confidence and my nerve. So after a couple of months my vanity got the best of me. I ran back to the salon for the usual cover up.
I first noticed the stray grays when I was in my early to mid twenties. I began hiding them myself by using the semipermanent type of coloring I could buy at the drugstore. I had very interesting results! After a few years of that, I turned myself over to the pros and began my constant and fervent battle of the roots. Every three weeks, I was in the salon keeping my gray under wraps. I shudder to think of the amount of money I have spent over the years on professional hair color and highlighting. Yikes. The first step was to talk to my colorist/stylist. I can honestly say it's not what someone in that profession with a regular customer such as myself wants to hear but fortunately she is very understanding and perhaps holds out hope I will come to my senses after a while like I did before. After all, she's been down this road with me when I had her cut it down to an inch all over!! She told me that to make the transition a little easier (it's never really easy) we could just heavily highlight my hair so that as the roots start to grow in, the difference won't be quite as stark as it would against darker color hair. So that's what we did last Tuesday, May 6th.
I have mixed emotions about this decision. After all, I have to admit that I have always been quite vain. I believe the vanity comes from a place of insecurity and self doubt. I feel the world's pressure to fight the aging process at every turn, but most especially when I look in the mirror. Let's face it, hair that is gray, silver, platinum, ice, whatever name is used, still screams AGING or OLD!!! I am now at a point in my life where, at 52, I am comfortable with who I am and the fact that I AM aging and older!! It's not only okay, it's awesome! I am ready to let the "real" me shine. So here I "grow". I have decided that throughout this journey of "growth" (in more ways than one) I will keep this blog to have a place to post my before, during, and FINALLY photos as well as a place to write about my progress, my doubts, my fears, my emotions, and any other feelings, thoughts, or ideas that come to me during the process. I will also share the interesting and varying reactions I receive from family, friends, and sometimes strangers. I am really excited (and somewhat anxious, too) to see what I'll look like and how I will feel about it. I read a great book about going gray called, Going Gray: What I Learned about Beauty, Sex, Work, Motherhood, Authenticity, and Everything Else That Really Matters and you can read about it here. I also found a wonderful website that has given me a lot of encouragement and added to my determination to see this all the way through. You can see it here. Feel free to leave a comment. Positive thoughts and supportive encouragement is always appreciated!! :) See you next month!