Project: Mitigating the Lightening That I'm Seeing Over A Few Months

My natural color has always been a true golden brown: a lot of yellow and some red. It's always been a medium shade. Lately, probably due to a new conditioner, it's been getting lighter and more brassy, especially on the ends. It's moving toward a dark blondeburn on the last couple inches. It's a lovely color on some people but I just want my darker hair back.

I looked up gloss recipes here and elsewhere: henndigo or some other natural dye/conditioner combination, various mixtures of color and conditioner. I settled on doing this but with brown: https://thebiggersthebetter.com/2013...g-conditioner/ I didn't want to do henndigo because henna straightens the hair and once the indigo fades, it's reddish. At least this would fade evenly.

I was at Walmart looking at non-ammonia color which I put in my cart. Wandered over to the clearance and saw some color refresher tubes. Checked the ingredients: same idea. They were $2.50 a pop so I figured why not? Maybe still a bit more expensive overall, but convenient. The tubes fit in the short shelf of the shower caddy. I bought pairs of warm brown and cool brown since all my coloring seems to be right in the middle. I have blue-green eyes, a fairly neutral hue of brown hair without being ashy, a peach undertone to my skin. OK, so I pull a little bit warm but I can wear cool colors and makeup, too. So I figured the two mixed would be right for me. I bought every tube they had.

I just did it. It's still wet but looks different already. I think it covered my silvers a little. When I put the fallen hairs on the shower wall as one does haha, I saw that an old one that I had missed last wash was lighter than the newly fallen one. And more golden. So yeah, it's a different brown. I'll see how it looks in the morning.

I learned some stuff:

-Use an old washcloth in a dark color. My mint green one is ruined. Well, it was stained and faded a bit anyway.
-Even if you wash your hands, it will stain your palms. But it came off by shower end and they look normal now.
-If it stains the fiberglass tub, one of those "magic" eraser type sponges will get it off. I use those to clean it anyway. I get them online for cheap.
-The instructions say "no need for further condtioning." Yeah, no. I did do a regular conditioner after that. It still feels a bit rough but it will settle.
-I don't think I need haircolor with peroxide. I always avoided ammonia but I would use semi-permanent that did have peroxide developer. This doesn't have either.