Guide to Bleaching & Coloring Your Jet Black Hair. Part 1: The Salon Disaster

Before I start, there’s two things you’ll need to know about me & my hair:

1. I have virgin hair. That means I have NEVER bleached, colored or even chemically straightened/permed it before. (Even though I REALLY wanted to for so long.)
2. This year, I have bleached my hair twice. Once in a salon & the other time using Manic Panic’s Flash Lightning Bleaching Kit.

Here's a picture of my hair. 

The picture was actually from last year so it's actually slightly longer now ;)

So here’s the thing.. I thought that bleaching my hair in a saloon would be the ‘safe’ thing to do. Plus, I have zero experience with coloring and bleaching my hair, best leave it to the professionals right? WRONG. I went to quite a ‘reputable’ salon in Subang, out of respect (and some legal reasons too) I won’t blatantly mention the name of the saloon here. But the saloon used a bleaching mixture marked with Chinese characters and was told not to worry. Pfft!

Here’s a friendly tip, ALWAYS demand to know what they are putting on your precious locks. ALWAYS. Even if you have to yank the damn thing out of their hands, DO IT. I learnt this the hard way. 

Anyways, long story short, in just 40 minutes they almost fried my hair! They even had the nerve to ask me if I wanted to bleach it again on that very same day to get my hair to turn strawberry blonde! (I need it to go MUCH lighter than the dark brown it was at the time. I was aiming for purple hair.) At that point, my hair already felt like straw. It was stiff and looked so fragile to the touch. Like hell I’ll let them do another round!

Thank god I did a little research before I went to bleach my hair.

Here’s another tip: Let your hair rest! The best is to let it rest for two weeks to a month between bleaching sessions. Loads of professionals recommend this method. It may be a slow process, but it is the safest. What’s the point of doing this if you fry your hair beyond repair in the right? 

The reason why saloons would rather bleach your hair 3 or 4 times in a row on the same day or just a few days apart is because it saves THEIR time & energy. Plus, it’s a sure fire way to make sure that you shell out RM 100 per bleaching session IN THEIR SALLON.

On another note, (This applies to a select few. To those who have been ranting that bleaching don’t give them the results they want right away. Siapa makan cili, rasa lah pedasnya).

What do you expect?? To go from jet black hair to platinum blonde in just one session? Come on people.. Get real. I can’t say this enough (call it tough love) but no matter how good a bleaching kit is, don’t expect miracles. Put a little logic in your beauty regimes! Even if you buy the best, most expensive skin lightening products, you don’t expect it to transform your sawo matang skin to albino-like in one use right? It takes time. So Chillax.

Okay, enough ranting..

After more research, (Another tip: RESEARCH. Google is your best friend! Find out the best brands. How to get them and any hair care regimes that might be useful afterwards.) I finally found a product that sounds promising. I first found Manic Panic’s Flash Lightning Bleaching Kit but after reading the 50th review on it (Yes, there’s THAT many reviews on it online), I decided to get their Semi permanent hair dye too!

So after a whole month of tender loving care (I went ahead and bought repairing ampoules for my hair and made sure I used my hair serum daily. It was the most work I have ever done for my hair!) my hair went back to all it’s former glory. *Hoyeah!*

NEXT CHAPTER: THE BLEACHING SESSION

Till next time my lovely readers.
XOXO,
Reina Lum