- As a professional colorist, I can assure you that it’s not written in stone that you must wait 14 days to dye your hair after bleaching.
- You should only wait 14 days to color your hair if it’s seriously damaged and dry after bleaching. You can profit from those 14 days to nourish and repair your hair before applying the dye. Coloring is also a chemical process because a developer and ammonia are used.
- However, you could apply the dye if your hair is not too damaged or dry. I’ll tell you why.
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I was surprised by a new client today.
Not because she visited me with a gift.
No.
She surprised me because the first thing she did was shout, “Alejandra, I want to change the color of my hair! (I should point out that she has dark brown hair). But I’m discouraged by the idea that I have to wait 14 days to dye my hair after bleaching.”
Excuse me, where did my client get that idea?
When I asked her, she told me that she had heard it from her best friend, who in turn had heard it from her cousin, who had heard it from a neighbor who saw it on a YouTube tutorial.
My goodness, I wish people were cautious regarding hair processes when they’re not trained in coloring, colorimetry, neutralization, and so on.
If people were more cautious, they wouldn’t damage their hair to the point where it starts to fall out in clumps.
In this case, in fact, she was being overly cautious.
For the sake of clarity, let’s start with some tips:
- If your hair isn’t damaged and dry after bleaching, you can dye it immediately.
- If, on the other hand, your hair is damaged after bleaching, you should wait 14 days to dye your hair.
Let’s go step by step.
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In most cases, you shouldn’t wait 14 days to color your hair after bleaching
Of course, I mean when the bleaching session is performed by trained people in coloring.
For example, finding a colorist who refuses to color a client’s hair after bleaching is difficult.
Why?
- First, the hair after bleaching is more porous, and it’s easy for it to absorb the dye pigments. They travel to the hair’s innermost layer, and the color lasts longer.
- Second, the professional must have assessed the health of her client’s hair. If she bleached it, she knew it would withstand both the bleaching and coloring process. She may have even recommended including some extra treatment like Olaplex to protect the hair even more and to be able to color it immediately after bleaching. Imagine how many satisfied clients there would be around the globe if colorists sent clients home with bright orange or yellow hair.
A professional colorist will always apply a dye or tone immediately after bleaching the hair. That way, the dye would complete the job requested by the client.
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When you apply the dye after bleaching, you’re filling your hair with color again. Since your hair is more sensitive and dehydrated after bleaching, it’ll absorb any products you apply to it.
When should you wait 14 days to color your hair after bleaching?
I’ll be particular.
- If your hair is seriously damaged after bleaching it, you should wait 14 days to color it. If your hair is dry, frizzy, and breaks easily when you detangle it or when it’s wet, the dye will damage it even more.
- If you bleached your hair but haven’t decided on the new color, you should also wait to dye it. Sometimes, people bleach their hair because they want to reach a platinum blonde, and along the way, they fall in love with a fantasy color or a more golden blonde. Therefore, you don’t need to apply the dye until you decide.
- You can also wait 14 days to dye your hair after bleaching if you reach a blonde level you like and decide whether to apply a dye or a toner.
If you don’t want to apply dye because your hair is too damaged after bleaching, what you should do is wait 14 days to dye it. In the meantime, start a repair routine. You can apply natural oil masks, such as an argan oil mask, for bleached hair.
If you still haven’t decided what color dye to apply to your bleached hair or don’t know whether to use a toner or a dye, you can use a semi-permanent dye, which fades gradually with washes.
A semi-permanent hair dye is ideal for experimenting with hair color because it doesn’t contain ammonia and isn’t applied with a developer. Therefore, you can play with colors until the final one is applied.
Conclusions
After rinsing out the bleaching mixture, you can dye your hair immediately because your hair will more easily absorb the dye pigments, which will be fixed in the inner layer for longer-lasting color.
However, if your hair is seriously damaged after bleaching, you should wait 14 days before coloring it and take advantage of those days to start an intensive repair routine.
