What happened and what should I do.

Here is the story.
I have dark brown hair, most of it was virgin except for some very old highlighs near the bottom.
I went to get some nice golden/beigh highlights to blend with my natural color. I clearly said NO RED!!! She listened and it looked beautiful, except she thought maybe it needed a toner. I went home and came back the next day for a cut and also to do the toner as it seemed like it was a tiny bit brassy (however I totally could have lived with it).    

I told the stylist I liked the highlights and wanted to make sure the toner wouldn't change it to much. She said it would be very subtle and thought we should do it, too.   ANYWAY, I think she left it on way to long.. she got caught up in conversations with people and never set a timer. After a half hour or more she washed out the toner and when I looked in the mirror all the highlights were GONE and my hair was deep, bright ,saturated RED.

I was in shock and so was she. She kept saying this has never happened before and asked if I was on medication or on my period, which I am not.
She tried to cover it up with another color, (which she left on for 5 minutes and kept chekcing this time) and still it was red, but now a darker brown and red). She did another color after that to try to still get out the red and it mostly worked. My hair now is dark brown again (althought not quite as dark as my natural color,), with some slight reddish tones), it looks like a solid color.

She said she wants to dye by hair back to the dark brown and re-do all the highlights. Or if I don't want to do that she will give me my money back (which I told here wasn't the point), I am just disappointed and worried about the health of my hair)

I am wearty to do all new hightlights right now. To start with, I have very fragile, porous hair that breaks easily. I almost didn't do the hightlights for fear of damaging my hair more than it is. I really want hightlihts, but am worried that another round of processing will overprocess my hair. The last think I want is dryed out brittle hair.

WHAT SHOULD I DO? Should I go get my money back, since I don't have hightlights? Should I listen to her and have her do them again? won't this seriously damage my hair (she said it wouldn't becuase she didn't use bleach).

and WHAT IS A TONER anyway?   Will the RED underneath start to pop through?

HELP, I cried for 2 days about this and I just don't know if i should just learn to live with it. It makes me sad to go back to my natural dark brown, knowing that I just stressed the hair by doing the highlights. It really isn't as shiny anymore as it used to be, so I;ll just have the same color, but with dullness. I was willing to sacrafice some of the quality to have the lighter color, but I feel screwed.

Please, I need suggestions. Why did it turn RED!


Edited by akasara - October 30 2007 at 10:13pm

I would also get my money back if it was me I had the same thing done to me except they didnt leave the bleach on long enough and I ended up with orange highlights, then I had another hairdresser leave it on too long while she done what the hairdresser done to you and served other customers didnt set a timer and when she washed it out bit of my hair was snapping off and did for bout a month , so I would advise not doing anymore to your hair except hair conditioning treatments and lots of them, and after a couple of weeks get a silver toner and put that in it to tone down the red ..  just let your hair get some condition back before you start dyeing it again... and some hairdressers are just sly bitches and dont giv a stuff what u look like when you leave,  they just try to cover it up