Apparently almost a third of British women under 30 have started going grey and two-thirds blame it on stress, according to an article at the Daily Mail.
John Frieda have termed them GHOSTs – Grey Haired Over Stressed Twenty Somethings
How kind. Men are ‘silver foxes’ and women are ‘ghosts’.
This article struck a chord for me as I recently received an email from a reader who was concerned about grey hair and she was 26. My sister found grey hairs when she was a teenager so I know it can happen at any age. I really wouldn’t mind going grey early as I colour my hair and grey is the most subtle regrowth for blondes.
Sarah Harris is 31 and is featured in the story as she has left her hair naturally grey, or silver as she prefers to call it.
Read the full article at the Daily Mail here and let me know if you are a ‘GHOST’ or tell me about your thoughts on grey hair.
Ella says
Our culture has declared that grey hair on women signifies old age. This is a patriarchal lie!
Grey hair may show that we are not teenagers anymore, but it doesn’t say ‘old age’. I am a dyed redhead feeling a sense of unease at my fake hair colour that has to be religiously updated every month. I want to be natural and free from the never ending responsibility of hair colouring.
I remember watching the film ‘Moon Struck’ several years ago and thinking that Cher looked much more beautiful with grey streaks in her hair, which her character had. Later on in the film Cher’s character dyes her hair black and it looks horrible and fake.
It’s time to listen to our inner voices and choose what we think is beautiful ourselves, instead of being told what’s beautiful by the likes of Clairol or L’oreal.
K says
I’m in my teens still, no greys yet and don’t expect them for a while. But between trying to convince my 50 something year old mother to go grey and wondering what my own experience will be when I start to get grey hair, I’ve ended up here. Personally, I think grey hair is beautiful. Sarah Harris has perfect hair and I think it’s very unique on young women. The more I think about it, the less I like that women feel so pressured to dye. I’ve heard the people who say “but I’m too young for grey hair”. Who says grey hair has to make you an old lady? I plan on letting my hair go grey naturally, whenever that may happen, and I only hope I still have the confidence to not dye when it does.
Hair Romance says
Love your attitude K, I think more of us should feel comfortable to wear our hair as we want.
kurohana says
I found my first white hair when i was seven, and now at 25 only two more white hairs have appeared since then. I’ve never dyed my hair so i guess it doesn’t bug me. My father has had white/gray hair for as long as i can remember and I’ve always liked it but my mother dyes her hair every 2 weeks.
Tina says
It’s not grey it’s SPARKLY! I’ve known that grey doesn’t always mean old, went to high school with a guy who had salt & pepper hair at 14. I started going grey mid to late 20s, which I hid either with hair dye or parting on the opposite side. Now at 35 I’ve got a noticeable “Rogue” streak but a few others are creeping in on my canopy. Love the streak, not so fussed on the others, am considering going more “natural”.
Hate the GHOST monkier though.
Hair Romance says
SPARKLY is the best description Tina! Love it x
Anne says
GHOST.
This 50 something is insulted! :/
Suz says
I’ve had grey hair since I was 18 and started to colour it regularly a couple of years later. I’m now in my early 40’s & still coloring – sick to death of it but the whole top of my head is grey & the bottom half is v dark, so I think it would look weird to go natural.
My biggest annoyance though is that grey hair is frizzy – I haven’t been able to find anything that will smooth it naturally, and keep it healthy. Straightening works, but my hair ends up looking coarse & ‘dead’ – so I wear it up for a few days & wait for a few nights of sleeping on it to flatten it.
If Anyone knows of a natural product that smooths with minimal fuss please let me know – I’ll be buying shares in the company 🙂
Hair Romance says
Hi Suz, that is an issue with grey hair as the texture can be dramatically different to your hair before. To smooth coarse hair, I recommend conditioning treatments. There are so many good ones on the market, and coconut oil is a great natural conditioner.
MomLaur83 says
I've also had grey hair since my early teens! I've been pulling them out but was recently advised by my new hair dresser to leave them because it's worse to thin than to go grey! So I have had to embrace it somewhat. I have 3 kids 6 and under and I think that has definitely contributed to the most recent sprouting of grey…but my dad was pure white when he was mid-thirties, so it is in the genes! I guess we'll see how it goes whether I colour it or not 😀
Anonymous says
I'm like Kim. My gray hair started coming in at 20. It's genetic–Dad started at 16. I got a Rogue stripe. It used to worry me and I plucked at it until the stripe was big enough that I looked like I was losing my hair in that one spot. I finally decided that I liked it and left it alone. It's quite the stripe now at 33 and it has been joined by a few more smaller ones along the hairline. It is interesting to change my look depending on where I part my hair!
Beth
clementine says
I'll be turning 28 in less than a month and this past month I found my first silver hairs. They have a very silvery shine to them and catch light which makes it kind of look like a highlight. I've only found 2 so far and they're right next to each other where my hair falls into its natural part. (I switch the side of my part each day so my hair doesn't get too used on one side.)
I don't know how long I'll go without dying my hair. When I was a teenager in the 90's I always wanted to dye my hair but my mother forbade it and now I've grown out of that idea. But the more I think about the silver hair I've gotten I'm not sure if I'll keep them, but if I dye my hair I think I might go with an easy coloring of purple or blue or dark green so my brown hair remains brown but the silver picks up this hint of color.
For Sarah Harris to go silver at age 30, she's got some proverbial big brass balls. While I would love to have a head full of silver when I'm older and wiser, I don't think I would want to at such a young age.
Brittan-Morgan says
I found my first white hairs at age 11, just after surviving a traumatic hurricane. I periodically found more and more, and at 26 I find it necessary to dye my hair its origional color. The white I get is a bright silver white, not grey at all and I am considering just letting it go once I turn thirty. I think with my fair skin, and dark eyebrows it would look stunning, but I just can't get myself to embrace it while I'm still in my twenties.
Hair Romance says
@neigeblanche I'm really interested in stress on hair now, I had not thought about it before but your comments are echoing what I'm hearing. I'm going to look into more as I want to know why it happens.
neigeblanche says
I found mmy first grey hair at 24. Since then, I have been getting more and more, mainly through stress as my family are not known for going grey prematurely. Being vain, I do dye it but would love to be brave like Sarah Harris. I think she emanates a very low key sophistication which might not be so obvious if she had dyed it.
Hair Romance says
Amazing comments on grey hair – I love it!
@Breanna – I feel the same about my history teacher who had bright orange hair, it was crazy and fabulous and I couldn’t imagine her any other way. All white hair is quite rare and almost looks platinum blonde, it’s quite a desirable shade of grey so you’re lucky
@AKB Hi Amanda, I know, I don’t think I could do it but I love changing my hair all the time. I think I would miss getting my hair done too as I find it relaxing.
@Kim I didn’t know that Rogue look could actually occur naturally, sounds cool!
@swatchgirl Hi Lara, I’ve been seeing a few grey shades of platinum around lately, especially on shorter styles. Do you think it’s more acceptable on young women but once you’re in your 40s or 50s it’s seen as too ageing?
@Zsanica – That’s awful that you were teased about it. No wonder your hair is affected by stress now. We invest a lot of emotion into our hair and our appearance. If you love your grey hair you should wear it with pride.
Zsanica says
I am one of these "GHOSTS" they speak of.
I found my first white hair when I was fourteen and I was not pleased about that so I ended up pulling the hair out. Of course it just kept coming back and I ended up being taunted by some boy about it in high school.
I'm in my late twenties now with quite a lot of white/silver hair that I colour. Each stressful time in my life has caused more to appear. The most noticeable increases came when I worked as a nanny and over this past summer when a very serious relationship ended abruptly.
I wonder if I could ever be as confident as Sarah Harris is and just embrace the bits of silver hair I have. It really does look fantastic on her!
swatchgirl says
I've been seeing grey hair since I was 18 – luckily it's growing out super silvery, so I'm going to have some amazing bright grey hair.
I can't lie, I /love/ grey hair. I'm 27 now and I'd be over the moon if it was all totally silver tomorrow. Younger women with grey hair – natural or artificial – look stunning in my eyes.
Kim says
I found my first gray hair in the 9th grade. Now, at 22, I have a full stripe, about an inch wide of gray about half an inch back from my hair line (think Rogue from X-Men).
I love it! My mom graduated from high school with a gray patch and my two sisters in their mid-late 30's have lots of gray so it's hereditary for my family. Sometimes I cover it up by parting my hair on the opposite side but in general, I like it a lot in contrast to my nearly black hair.
AKB says
Sarah Harris is brave! I don't know if I would be willing to gray anytime before 60. Why does it scare me so much? My mom has had salt-an-pepper hair since her thirties, but she dies it regularly. My dad, however, is in his mid-fifties and has just begun to have a few speckles of gray. Major roll of the dice for me!
Breanna says
My high school art teacher was only 35 and had a full head of grey hair from the early twenties. It suited her, and I don't think I could have imagined her any other way!
The women in my family generally go straight to white, so I doubt I'll have the grey phase.