I have been coloring my hair forever... (prematurely gray) and I was coloring my hair using Nice and Easy Natural Dark Brown... and well, it turned out black. Which was fine for a while, but now I am tired of it. This color has been on my hair for a while and I have tried Dawn dish soap, and Head and Shoulders to try and lighten it up, but no luck. I have even tried a new color to try and lighten it up, but it won't take. What are my other options since this color has been on my hair a while?

ColorFix, Color Oops, and Igora Phantom are all sulfur-based color removers. They work quite well.

Color Zap and Effasol are bleach-based color removers. They work well also, but are harder on the hair.

There are a number of other color removers also.

You do have to re-dye your hair after using color remover. The purpose is strictly to remove artiticial dyes, so don't expect it to be a nice color after you use the remover.

Lighter colors won't lighten darker artificial pigment. That's why your other color didn't "take". The purpose of color remover is to remove the artificial pigment so that a lighter color will "take".

Here's a link that shows how to use ColorFix. Other sulfur-based color removers are used similarly. Be sure you understand what is happening before you do it.

The biggest problem with this kind of color remover is that people don't wash it enough to get all of the artificial pigment out (people are "afraid" to dry out their hair, I guess). You have to wash the bejeebers out of it. The "Processing Lotion" that's used after everything is finished, is to redevelop any artificial pigment still remaining and to get rid of the last traces of thiol (sulfur-based chemical). If all of the pigment isn't out of the hair, the pigment will "redevelop" at this step and the hair will turn (at least a little) darker at this point. You then have to do another round with ColorFix because you didn't get all of the artificial pigment out.

Instructions for using ColorFix