Five Homemade Solutions to Remove Hair Dye

If your hair coloring results aren't to your liking, you can take advantage of some of these natural ingredients to remove the dye.

Choosing the right hair dye can be a difficult task. That’s because the results can often be unpredictable. For instance, the color might be too dark or coppery or one you didn’t expect. Luckily, there are some homemade solutions to remove hair dye if you don’t like the results.

Today’s article contains five solutions to use instead of resorting to scissors or bleaching.

Why remove hair dye?

You must keep in mind that your hair isn’t a “blank canvas”.

Furthermore, the color of natural hair isn’t uniform, even though it may look that way. In fact, all hair has lighter and darker areas. Naturally, this influences the hair coloring result.

Thus, the results will depend on your natural hair color, its highlights, dark areas, traces of previous dyes, and so on.

It’s perfectly normal to feel uncomfortable and want to change a color that’s not close enough to what you wanted.

You have two options:

• Wait a couple of weeks to see if the dye lightens a little as you wash your hair.
• Remove the dye at home. However, this can be a rather harsh process, so isn’t the most recommended option, according to hair specialists.

Here are some homemade dye removal methods.

Vegetable oils

Olive oil and coconut oil are hydrating substances that can help treat damaged hair. They gradually remove the hair dye while moisturizing your hair at the same time. You should heat it up a bit so that it’s warm enough and bearable when you apply it.

It’s worth remembering that most of the remedies used to bleach hair tend to dry it out.

Ingredients

• 2 cups of water.
• 2 cups of olive oil or coconut oil.

Method

• Heat the coconut or olive oil in a pan of boiling water until it’s warm (don’t overheat it).
• Wash your hair well and remove the excess water.
• Apply the oil from the roots to the tips, wrap your hair up in a towel, and let it sit for one hour.
• Rinse with warm water.

2. Vitamin C tablets

This method should tone down your hair by at least a couple of shades without damaging its natural color. It won’t work if your hair has been colored with hair is colored with dyes that contain ammonia. 

Ingredients

• 1 shampoo bottle.
• 2 tbsp of water.
• 3 vitamin C tablets (the effervescent kind).

Method

• Dissolve the vitamin C tablets in the water.
• Pour the mixture into the shampoo bottle and use it when you wash your hair.
• You need to do it for at least a week to see any results

3. Laundry detergent

This is a harsh method that might overdry your hair but some people swear by it. It’s as simple as washing your hair with laundry detergent.

• Don’t use too much detergent and don’t use it too often.
• Carry out a conditioning treatment after using this method. This is essential to counteract dryness.

Ingredients

• Plenty of water.
• Conditioner.
• 1 tbsp of laundry detergent powder.

Method

• Soak your hair and apply the detergent from the roots to the tips.
• Scrub your scalp gently (keep it away from your eyes and mouth) and leave it on for five minutes.
• Rinse with plenty of water.
• Apply the conditioner and keep it on for five minutes. Detergent tends to dry out hair so it’ll counteract the damage.
• You’ll have to repeat this procedure every other day for a week before you notice any results.

4. Lemon rinse 

Lemon has multiple uses and one of them is lightening hair. However, it’s rather unpredictable as it’ll only lighten the tone of your hair. Be careful to not get it in your eyes or on an open wound as citrus fruits contain a form of acid.

Ingredients

• The juice of five lemons.
• 4 or 5 tbsp of water.

Method

• Wash your hair with shampoo as normally do.
• When it lathers, add the lemon juice and massage.
• Leave it on for about 5 minutes and rinse with water.
• Apply conditioner and let it sit for 3 to 5 minutes.
• Rinse with water. Repeat this process as many times as you want as it’ll be a while before you notice any results. They’ll be permanent though.

5. Lemon hair mask

According to popular wisdom, you can also apply a lemon mask to your hair for a few minutes. Allow it to dry in order to remove the dye.

This method is also quite harsh and tends to dry out the hair, so be careful.

Condition your hair

Finally, keep in mind that anything in excess can damage your hair. It’s advisable to use natural remedies and condition your hair to keep it healthy and shiny, and also to prevent any further damage.

Finally, these home remedies to remove hair dye are healthy and non-invasive. In fact, they won’t damage your hair but will actually strengthen it.