Please help me with my indigo woes (indiwoes?)

[girlinabox]

Hi everyone,

I haven't been on this forum for years so hi

I'm here seeking your help with my hair, which I feel looks just awful right now. My main issue (which is why I'm on this particular sub) is how dark my hair has become through using hendigo mixes.

So when I first started out into my hair colouring journey many moons ago I was just using straight up henna on my normally mid-brown hair. I experimented a bit and realised I much preferred the cooler toned red over the warmer auburn-y colour (as seen in my sig pic which is around 12-15 years old now!) so was purchasing the higher content henna from Henna Boy or Hennacat here in the UK.
BUT...as I got older and started to get more and more greys I got fed up with how orange my grey hairs would look (I didn't realise that just repeating henna on the roots would darken them but lesson learned there I guess!) so I started down the road of hendigo to just get a brown colour overall.

I started off using Light Mountain Henna's mixes, then moved over to a brand in the UK called It's Pure. I was using their chestnut and dark brown shades and mixing them together, and because I'm lazy, I found it easier to just do repeated applications over roots alone - and this is where I am now - hating my hair because I realised how dark it has actually become and you know - it is ageing on me.

So I'm here to ask (beg) for your help with this mess please. WWYD if it were you and you were desperate to remove the indigo and start again? I tried ColourB4 on the weekend and it did nothing (expected). What I would really like is to get rid of the darkness, the stark blackish colour and then start doing just henna applications again (and doing root touch ups regularly to avoid the bright orange roots!). I don't know anyone else who knows anything about henna and indigo and this forum was incredibly helpful to me when I was starting out all those years ago.

I have attached some pics - from the weekend, of my hair in natural light (but on an overcast day), one of what my hair looked like around 10 years ago when it was definitely at it's best, and one from today after ColourB4 in sunlight. Pics here https://imgur.com/a/qBnaifG

Thank you from the bottom of my heart for help/support/commiserations!

P.S. I also have wider issues with my hair right now in terms of excess shedding/thinning/lack of body and texture - possibly caused by a combination of age/hormones and post-Covid, but I'll likely ask for some help regarding that on the main haircare forum in the near future!

[Nightshade]

Have you tried vitamin C? That works better on indigo than Color B4, though I've seen people do Vit C and then Color B4 and it seems to be more effective.

ETA: The article I linked mentions baking soda further down, do NOT use that on your hair! It won't touch the color, but will ruin your hair.

[girlinabox]

Have you tried vitamin C? That works better on indigo than Color B4, though I've seen people do Vit C and then Color B4 and it seems to be more effective.

ETA: The article I linked mentions baking soda further down, do NOT use that on your hair! It won't touch the color, but will ruin your hair.

Thanks for your reply! No, Colourb4 is the only thing I tried. I'd definitely be happy to give Vit C a go, I've just ordered myself a bag so will try it out this weekend. I'll do a search of the sub and see if I can see anyone else's results from using this.

[foreveryours]

Don't know about hair (really), but indigo-dyed fabric is notorious for "leakage". Indigo doesn't bind strongly and comes off on your skin and washes out of clothing very easily. In some parts of the world, people are "naturally" blue. So washing frequently might help but bound henna will never wash out. So that may or may not complicate things a bit for you. Good luck