:mad: Just this past week I was going to redye my hair to it's natural color for my sister to redo my highlights. My hair is naturally a very dark brown. When I dyed it last Saturday night, it turned black! I had my sister, who is going to school for hair, picked me up some medium hair color and it didn't take. Then I got dark brown and tried again. IT still didn't work. My hair is completely black and I hate it! How can I get it to lighten, either to my natural color or even lighter? At this point I don't care. I just don't want it black anymore!

You made a mistake of dying your hair black and unfortunately when you use black dye no color will take after black. You must go to a salon. They will then strip the color and recolor your hair.

I went through that nightmare once. I didn't go to the salon, but it grew out and I kept doing and getting it cut till it was finally my natural color again.

Good luck.

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Originally Posted by shannonbattles

:mad: Just this past week I was going to redye my hair to it's natural color for my sister to redo my highlights. My hair is naturally a very dark brown. When I dyed it last Saturday night, it turned black! I had my sister, who is going to school for hair, picked me up some medium hair color and it didn't take. Then I got dark brown and tried again. IT still didn't work. My hair is completely black and I hate it! How can I get it to lighten, either to my natural color or even lighter? At this point I don't care. I just don't want it black anymore!

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It sounds like you need a visit to a proper hairdresser who will relieve you of lots of stress and a bit of money.

If you insist on trying to fix at home. You can purchase a Color Remover from any beauty supply store. I hear ColorFix by Robert Craig is the least damaging. You can read about it here. But there are some by Clairol as well, Uncolor and Metalex. Depends on whether you used a semi-permanent or permanent hair color. Color removers will cause some damage to the hair regardless. Either way this will also lighten your hair and leave it in a raw state. So you would need to follow with a toner. To counter the red/orange tone you will result in from the color remover you will need to purchase a green based toner to counter red or a blue based toner to counter the orange. A good line is Clairol Second Nature as which you would use with a 10 dev so as not to create any additional lifting of color from your hair, but will only deposit color. To tone you usually only have to process for up to 10 min. Or follow the directions for the recommended product you select. Use the same level toner of the desired color you want to be. Example: if you want to be a level 5 (medium brown shade) buy a level 5 color. Strand test the color often because color deposits faster and will take darker on hair that has damage.

Sweetie, color does not lift color. Using a medium brown or dark brown hair color will not make your hair lighter. Black hair dye is the hardest color to remove. If you use a hair color mover, it won't completely remove the color. In order to go lighter, you will need to use a lightening product. I recommend that you get your hair professionally done. A hairstylist will most likely use a higher volume-peroxide developer with the selected color to achieve your desired color, minus the brassy tones.