The One Year Anniversary of My Transition to Silver Hair

It is the one year anniversary of my transition to silver hair.

Well, the actual date I decided to go silver is a little hazy in my memory. But it was about this time a year ago, and I am so grateful for my journey thus far.

I Love Silver Hair

Before I made the plunge and quit dyeing my hair altogether, I was afraid I would lose a lot of things. But I have only gained things from letting my hair go silver.

I have gained magic, adventure, confidence, joy, freedom, sparkle, and even patience.

And I feel like I am a different person in a lot of ways because of my transition to silver. I could write to you in depth about the ways I have changed, but I thought I would let pictures I have taken throughout the year tell the story instead.

Guys, there’s a lot of selfies in this post. 

And I really like selfies. I use selfies as therapy, as a photo-jounral, and as artistic expression. But there is close to forty selfies in this post. That’s a lot, even for me.

I hope you will pardon me and know that I share all these selfies to help tell the story of my silver hair adventure. But even more so, I want to share them because I hope the story they tell gives courage to anyone else who is thinking of ditching hair dye and is afraid to begin.

So Without Further Ado . . .

Here is my silver hair adventure by month.

December 2019 and January 2020

When I decided to stop dyeing my hair at the end of December 2019, I was dyeing my hair about every two weeks. I was so tired of the mess, the trash, and of feeling bad about my silver hair. I needed a different way to live.

If you notice in the third picture, you will see that I already had a lot of silver hair in the lower layers of my hair. For a long time, I had only been dyeing a few inches near the part of my hair. I am really glad I did that because it has made the transition a lot easier.

February 2020

I was really excited to stop dyeing my hair but nervous, too. I thought people might notice and think my hair looked strange. No one ever said anything. I would probably would have ignored them if they did because even early in February, I felt like ditching the dye was one of the best decisions I had made in a long time.

Early April 2020

My silver stripe was really starting to show here. I thought it looked both cool and really awkward sometimes. I thought about getting my hairdresser to lighten my hair to make the transition less visible. But, I also felt like the pronounced silver-brown demarcation line symbolized a profound time of transition, which this time definitely has been. So, I decided to just let it grow out naturally.

April 2020

April still felt pretty awkward. At this time, I still felt like silver was kind of a new guest I was getting used to. It wasn’t really my identity yet.

By the way, in the last picture, you may notice my skin looking a bit clearer than previous pictures. Through trial and error, I think I have figured out that dairy really clogs my skin, and eating a lot of fruits and vegetables makes my skin shine. In the last picture, I was craving (and therefore eating) a lot less dairy and more fruits and vegetables.

But the reason I mention this is because my intuition tells me that my skin has also become clearer because of not dyeing my hair. I have no scientific proof of this. It is just my intuition. But that is part of my silver hair story, too, so I thought I would mention it.

And I still love eating cheese sometimes, even if it does clog my skin. There’s more to life than having clear skin every day.

This next month is the month I started to love my silver hair transition.

May 2020

I remember starting to really own my silver hair in May. It felt more like me instead of a strange visitor.

June 2020

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I started feeling scared about getting older when I turned 28. Before then, I was totally cool with getting old. And then I turned 28, and I suddenly understood mortality. I have had recurring fears about getting older ever since then.

Letting my hair go silver has actually helped me with these fears. It’s because the silver process has been so beautiful and magical to me, it helps me understand that while my life certainly changes as I age, these changes bring so many good things to me.

July 2020

This month, I started noticing more silver streaks down the side of my hair. I was really glad I decided not to chemically transition my hair. It has stayed healthy through the transition process, and I love the brown and silver streak effect.

August 2020

The more silver my hair gets, the more confident and daring I feel. I think my silver hair transition took over this month and is now in completely in charge of my hair.

September 2020

I definitely embraced the silver life this month.

October 2020

It’s cool to see how different silver looks in different lighting.

November 2020

This month I realized that soon, I will have more silver than brown hair. It’s really exciting.

December 2020

Okay, here’s the grand finale. There’s a lot of pictures for this month. My silver hair transition is now a clear lifestyle.

That last one was me today. I can’t wait to see what happens next year!

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You can read more about the early months of my silver hair transition here and here.