[Bonita--]

I went to a salon today for a consultation and I was told that I would need to do a treatment before I color my hair. First let me explain how damaged my hair is. Currently I have about 3 inches of dark brown roots, and a yellow/white blonde colour ontop and underneath is dark brown. Last time I bleached my hair I waited too long to do it so my roots grew out very long, and as a result I have a little orange gap in my hair. The white has faded and there's a lot of yellow in my hair. It has also turned green apparently because I live in an apartment building and the water makes it go green. I want to keep the blonde ontop but I want more dark brown underneath, however she said that she can't give me a white blonde ontop because of how long my roots are and how damaged my hair is. She said that she will get a better result doing highlights instead of bleaching it all, but I only want the blonde highlights if it's going to come out white blonde and not yellow or orange. If it's not going to come out white blonde then I want to do my whole head dark brown.

She told me before she dyes my hair she wants me to do a treatment to take out the green tints so my hair doesn't break off. I will explain what she told me to do and then ask questions about what I don't understand.

She said to take 8 or 9 aspirins, mix it with warm water, add baking soda, put it on damp hair, let it sit for 10 minutes, then rinse and wash my hair.

So my questions are: What are aspirins? Does she mean the pills you take to get rid of pain? How much baking soda should I add? And if I decide not to put anymore blonde in my hair do I still have to do this to avoid breakage?

If anyone has heard about this before and knows what I should do please let me know I would really appreciate it. If I don't do it on my own I'm going to end up getting her to do it and it'll cost more money so I really want to try and do it by myself.

[tickle]

Bonita, she is putting you on. Yes, aspirin that you take for pain. I have never heard of such a treatment, please don't go back to her. Baking soda is a mild abrasive to use for cleaning sinks (environmentally safe) but doesn't make any sense on hair.

ms. tickle

[Perito]

It has also turned green apparently because I live in an apartment building and the water makes it go green.

...

She told me before she dyes my hair she wants me to do a treatment to take out the green tints so my hair doesn't break off.

She said to take 8 or 9 aspirins, mix it with warm water, add baking soda, put it on damp hair, let it sit for 10 minutes, then rinse and wash my hair.

What she is warning you against is the copper in your hair. Copper, and many other metal ions (but not aluminum) can be very bad actors when they come into contact with hydrogen peroxide -- or for that matter any peroxide. Those metal ions catalyze the decomposition of hydrogen peroxide. Hydrogen peroxide is what they refer to as "developer" in both bleaching and coloring hair.

What she wants to do is, I believe, called a "Malibu treatment", but whatever it's called, the purpose is to rid your hair of the metals that are discoloring it.

If you fail to remove the copper, here is the possible scenario. You or someone else puts bleach on your hair. The copper immediately starts catalyzing the decomposition of the developer. You get a lot of foaming (oxygen being released) on the head and the reaction generates a lot of heat. You end up with a badly burned scalp, and hair that is a messy mass of garbage. If you get the coloring/bleaching mixture off fast enough to avoid a second or third degree burn to the scalp, your hair will still be ruined and will have to be cut off.

Now, the aspiriins are a substitute for the chemicals that she would treat your hair with. The purpose is to chelate or bind the metal ions so they can be washed out of the hair. Unfortunately, aspirin is not a great chelant. There are better ones, but I don't know if they're available in drug stores. The thing about the baking soda is baloney. Unfortunately, a lot of people think baking soda is good for a lot of things. It's actually not very good for most things. What you want is a product that contains EDTA. That is a terrific chelant and will remove the copper.

As for being able to bleach your hair white, I guess I'll have to defer to your colorist. She does not sound like a dummy!

[Bonita--]

What she is warning you against is the copper in your hair. Copper, and many other metal ions (but not aluminum) can be very bad actors when they come into contact with hydrogen peroxide -- or for that matter any peroxide. Those metal ions catalyze the decomposition of hydrogen peroxide. Hydrogen peroxide is what they refer to as "developer" in both bleaching and coloring hair.

What she wants to do is, I believe, called a "Malibu treatment", but whatever it's called, the purpose is to rid your hair of the metals that are discoloring it.

If you fail to remove the copper, here is the possible scenario. You or someone else puts bleach on your hair. The copper immediately starts catalyzing the decomposition of the developer. You get a lot of foaming (oxygen being released) on the head and the reaction generates a lot of heat. You end up with a badly burned scalp, and hair that is a messy mass of garbage. If you get the coloring/bleaching mixture off fast enough to avoid a second or third degree burn to the scalp, your hair will still be ruined and will have to be cut off.

Now, the aspiriins are a substitute for the chemicals that she would treat your hair with. The purpose is to chelate or bind the metal ions so they can be washed out of the hair. Unfortunately, aspirin is not a great chelant. There are better ones, but I don't know if they're available in drug stores. The thing about the baking soda is baloney. Unfortunately, a lot of people think baking soda is good for a lot of things. It's actually not very good for most things. What you want is a product that contains EDTA. That is a terrific chelant and will remove the copper.

As for being able to bleach your hair white, I guess I'll have to defer to your colorist. She does not sound like a dummy!

Oh man, all this is making me think twice about doing my hair blonde. I've had that happen to me before where my scalp has burned. They ended up using cold water on my head the entire time I was at the salon because my scalp was so red, and it took a few hours for it to go away. It was horrible and it hurt a lot. Ontop of that my hair came out like a ball of dead hair. It looked horribly damaged.

Do you think I would be better off coloring it brown? My hair is very damaged, I straighten it a lot and I'm scared to even try doing blonde again because I don't want to damage it even more. I used to have nice long hair but since I started coloring it blonde it's all damaged and it broke off and now it's short. I was thinking maybe I would keep blonde in my bangs, and a few pieces ontop but that's it. If I decide to do it all brown would I still have to do the treatment?

[Perito]

You need to get the copper out of your hair even if you are going brown. Developer is used in all shades of haircoloring. And, once you get it out, you need to take steps to make sure you don't get more copper into your hair. This can involve washing your hair with distilled or deionized water -- or better, to get a water softener.

By the way, copper pipes don't usually leach out enough copper to cause problems with your hair. So, I may be wrong. The greenish color may be due to something else, but I don't think so.

Iron can also cause the problem I mentioned here (decomposition of hydrogen peroxide).

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hydrogen_peroxide

[Perito]

I'm pulling a "senior moment" here. I forgot the obvious. I guess I was thinking too much about chelants and chelation. Hopefully this is better late than never.

Vinegar is a mild acid and it can quite effectively remove hard-water build-up. If it is copper (or iron, or any of a number of other metal ions) in your hair, a rinse with white vinegar (approximately one half cup per quart of water) after every shampoo will remove it. You can try it with a little stronger (even straight) white vinegar to see if it will take out the deposit.

You can also verify that your hair is safe for coloring by simply doing a strand test. Take a swatch of hair. Don't clip it from the head, but lay it on a piece of aluminum foil. Mix some haircolor with developer (or bleach with developer) and apply it to the strand. Let it process for the normal time and shampoo out. If you see a lot of foaming (it will be obvious), then you have metal ions in your hair and should not proceed with coloring. Otherwise, you should be good to go.

[Bonita--]

Thanks so much for your replies. I actually went to another salon yesterday and spoke with a girl who said she would do the treatment for me for 30$. I would prefer to do it myself but I'm scared because my hair is very damaged and I don't want to do anything to it. I've decided to do a dark brown color all over and then maybe in a few months add some blonde back to it, since I want to grow my hair anyway it will never grow as long as it's blonde. Thanks again for your help.