- If the bleach won’t lift your hair another level, then you might not have bleached it correctly or your hair might be resistant to the process. If that’s the case, then you’ll need to bleach your hair again, the right way.
- Also, if you’ve been dyeing your hair a long time, the accumulation of dye in it might make it so the bleach cannot open your hair cuticles to get rid of the pigment. In that case, you’ll need to get rid of the pigments with a clarifying shampoo or do a bleach bath.
When a session of bleach won’t lift your hair enough to lighten it as much as you wanted, then something went wrong.
It could be that a lack of experience or knowledge is what dealt you a bad hand.
What do I mean by that?
Well, maybe you didn’t use the bleach mix’s ingredients in the right proportions, or that you didn’t leave the bleach in your hair for long enough.
But, there’s another fact you need to consider, too: your hair’s color history.
If your hair has 5 different colors, each of them forms a hard film in your hair fiber, which can make it so the peroxide isn’t able to open your hair cuticle and your hair won’t lift.
To fix that, you need to turn to other ways of getting rid of those layers of color, which could be by using a clarifying shampoo or doing a bleach bath.
And if your hair is black and you want to lighten it, you’ll probably need to do a more aggressive bleach since black pigments, like red ones, are the hardest ones to get rid of.
Do you want to know what to do to make the bleach lift your hair level properly?
If so, stick with me, because I’ll tell you:
- The most common mistakes that stop the bleach from lifting your hair
- How to make bleach mix lift your hair
Tabla de Contenidos
The most common mistakes that stop the bleach from lifting your hair
In order for the bleach to work, you need three key ingredients:
- Powder lightener
- 30 volume peroxide
- Patience
Why is patience so important?
Because every process takes time, and bleaching your hair isn’t an exception to that rule.
That’s why, once you’ve used the bleach mix on your hair, you’ll need to wait the full amount of time for it to work.
You need to leave the bleach mix in your hair for at least 20 minutes for it to work, but don’t leave it in for more than 30 minutes.
Did you leave it in your hair for the full amount of time, and your hair still didn’t lift?
If so, then you probably didn’t use the right volume peroxide, which in this case, should be 30.
- If you use a 20 volume peroxide and have dark hair, it won’t lift your hair enough.
- If you use a 10 volume peroxide, it won’t be strong enough to bleach your hair.
And you should also always check the developer’s expiration date and remember that if you had saved it from previous use, it loses its effectiveness 6 months after opening.
So, if you open a container of developer, try to use it all immediately, so you are sure it will lift your hair without causing any extra damage.
If you left the bleach in your hair for long enough, you use a 30 volume developer, and it wasn’t expired, then it’s time to consider your hair’s color history.
Because if you’ve been dyeing it for a long time, then each dye will have formed a layer in your hair fiber so hard that the bleach can’t pass through it to get rid of the pigments. In that case, you’ll need to get rid of the color to make the bleach work.
Don’t worry because I’ll tell you exactly how to do that soon.
Lastly, is your hair really dark? Was it the first time you’ve done any chemical processing to it?
Although it doesn’t happen very often, very dark virgin hair can be tough to bleach. That is because the hair fiber is much thicker and stronger, so 30 volume peroxide won’t be strong enough to open the cuticles.
If you still want to bleach your hair, you’ll need to use a stronger bleach and leave it in for 20 minutes.
Now we’ve seen all of the reasons why the bleach may not have lifted your hair. So, it’s time to find the solution to each of the problems.
Do you want to know what to do in your case?
If so, keep reading.
How to make the bleach finally lift your hair
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Did you mess up how long you needed to leave the bleach in your hair or the volume of the peroxide?
If so, you can bleach your hair again.
If you didn’t leave the bleach mix in your hair long enough or you used the wrong volume of peroxide, you should bleach your hair again.
But this time, you should leave it in your hair the right amount of time and use the right proportions of each product, meaning the peroxide and lightening powder.
You can also add a few drops of coconut oil to the bleach mix to protect your hair even more.
This time, use the right volume of peroxide, which should be 30.
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Is there too much dye accumulated in your hair?
In this case, I don’t recommend bleaching again.
The best thing to do in this case is get rid of the color, and to do that, you can use a clarifying shampoo, which is a product that gets rid of the artificial color in your hair without causing excessive damage. Since it doesn’t contain peroxide, you can do it several times in a row.
You can also opt for a bleach bath, which you should slightly lift your hair, lightening it with each wash. All you need to do is mix a 30 volume peroxide with shampoo, using a 1 to 1 proportion, then use it on your hair, leaving it in 10-15 minutes.
You’ll see that your hair will lose a little bit of color each time you use it, but you shouldn’t use it every day because that could cause irreversible damage to your hair. After all, a bleach bath is as aggressive for your hair as normal bleaching.
Use it once a week and hydrate your hair between washes.
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Is your hair very dark and never been bleached before?
You should bleach it again, but this time using a 40 volume peroxide with an extra-strong lightening powder.
But remember that this is a much more aggressive version of the bleach, so you shouldn’t leave it in your hair for more than 20 minutes.
And always, in any of these cases, it’s important to deeply moisturize your hair, whether you’ve bleached it again or gotten rid of pigments using a clarifying shampoo or bleach bath.
Conclusions
It’s important to understand what went wrong the first time you bleached your hair to lift it correctly the second time around. Getting rid of either natural or artificial pigments in your hair requires a chemical process, which you should always be careful about doing to avoid causing irreparable damage to your hair. And now you tell me: Why do you think the bleach didn’t lift your hair?