orange/white/reddish hair

I am new to this board, very interesting reading.  here's the 411, naturally dark brown hair, which has been highlighted for years, went to the salon on saturday for highlights, which she put in with foils, then she applied "color" to the other hair which was not in the foils, she starts to rinse out my hair and she says oh, the hair with the color are now orange, she puts more bleach/highlights, now i'm white/white/red, so sunday i bought "medium blond" over the counter hair color, went more red... so I bought a "lift" over the counter, the highlights went grey, the rest of my hair red...so monday I go back to the salon and tell them to fix, they applied more "bleach" so now i'm white on white again with some red.  I want to go back to brown ASAP, can i do this?  the hair salon didn't want to put a rinse/toner or any brown, but can i do this now?  HELP HELP

I'd suggest you go to a different salon next time.  If the one you went to isn't going to fix their mistake by giving you brown, you may want to try getting your money back, however, you did some do-it-yourself in between going to them so they may say that what you have now was not their mistake. 

Dying white is very complicated (you usually have to do it twice with the correct opposing colors to get coverage, and even after that it will fade), then you'd need to do something different with all the red.  A good salon can certainly do it, but I agree that you shouldn't do it yourself at this point.  Not only will choosing the correct colors for the different parts be difficult (and impossible at a drug store), but even dividing your hair into the right parts to do it would be difficult.

Your white hair is going to be very damaged, and whatever color you get on that will fade kind of quickly, but you may still be able to color it.  It depends how tough your hair is. Your new salon should DEFINITELY strand test to make sure they don't break your hair off.  As for waiting, waiting 2 weeks isn't going to change anything as far as your damaged hair is concerned.  Waiting a day or two for your natural oils to build up on your scalp would help protect your scalp skin during the dyeing though.

hi all, THANKS for the responses, by the way, what is a "soap cap".  i went to a new hair dresser today to stop in and talk to someone, they put a non-peroxide color to take me back to brown, its temporary, i'll be back in a week if not sooner to reapply color because my hair was so white/orange/red, not to mention damaged.  it looks nice, brown, its been a while but i'm sticking to my new color, brown, i can see the lightness coming through already so i may be back to see him within the week, he said the color doesnt damage my hair since it doesnt have peroxide, basically a temporary color that will wash out eventually.  too much work to be a blond, must be happy as a brunette!!  GO BROWN!! LOL LOL thanks everyone

hi all, well, its been 2 weeks since the "semi-temporary" brown color has been in my hair, its definately washed out a lot, so its kind of light brown but still with "reddish" tone near the roots, i went to the salon last wed, exactly 1 week after they fixed the "orange/white/red/grey" that was in my hair, he didn't want to put more color in yet, wanted my hair to "rest", so i go today at 1:00 for another application of semi-permanent brown, hopefully it will work out.  Just wanted to give everyone an update, great web site, I"m glad we're not all alone in this "Hair" craziness!!  Any suggestions before I go, its 9:30am NY time now!! 

Tell them you want to be blond in the future, and ask about what would be a reasonable timetable and course of action for achieving that, given the current state of your hair.

hi all, just love this site, well its been since late June that my hair was overprocessed with bleach so it turned orange/red/gray (see original message above), so the new colorist has been putting semipermanent color, he did the first process about a week after the original disaster, it came out a "nice brown", i was shocked, been a dark brown my whole life and been "highlighted blond" for over 10 years, so after about 2 weeks most of the color washed out, he reapplied and made the color a bit stronger and it stayed on longer, it looks ok, getting used to the brown, now its been over a month, the "reddish" tint is coming through a bit (i can notice it), they cut my hair a bit shorter and the condition seems better.  Just stopped in the salon today (i've been stopping by each week so they can see how its doing), i think it needs to have a more permanent brown as now my dark roots are coming and the rest of the hair is really lightening.  should i go to a new colorist?  thanks all, GREAT SITE

hi,

i kind of had the same issue you did. i have natural dark brown and asked for a few blond highlights around face. i ended up looking like a freakish skunk with orangish  blonde reddish chunks all round my entire half of my hair. all the chunks are breakind and a lot of my hair is now 2 inches from my scalp. count your blessings, hehe.

anyways,i too used a demi perm brown color to tone the ugly chunked out highlights and had a drab reddish mudd looking brown , but anything was better than the ugly chunks.

i used a color shampoo once a week and it really helped control the brassiness of my color. it was made by ARTEC and the color was called cocobean for dark brown hair.

 then a month later i did another demi color with a 1.4% in a very dark brown and i am loving it. it looks a lot better because the damage is less obvious in the darker color.  i miss my pretty blonde hightlights but i went to a new stylist while mine was out on vacation and i will live to regret for two years of regrowth, boo hoo

but best of luck to you. just wanted to share your pain.

lilly