Supreme Bad Hair Day (and How To Fix a DIY Hair Dye that Goes Wrong)

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The other week I coloured my hair. It was 4 days before Cybermummy and I made the really stupid decision to abandon my normal, perfectly acceptable colour and go for a darker shade - just four days before a really big event where I was going to be meeting hundreds of people. I mean, what was I thinking?!

And of course, it went wrong. It went way too dark. It had that bluey, black hue that is all the rage with Goths, but that's not such a great look on a middle-aged mum. Plus it made my skin look a funny colour. And I only had 4 days to put it right.

The next day, on the school run, I had a couple of people say "Oh you've dyed your hair, it looks nice," (they were lying), one person who say "Did you know someone has attacked your hair?!" (hurtful but more honest) and most tellingly, the majority of my actual friends who said absolutely nothing at all (which was the final nail in the coffin).

So on returning home, I fired up the laptop, and consulted the oracle (aka Google). I typed "hair dye too dark" and was presented with a vast array of options, the first of which were quite condescending - "you shouldn't dye your own hair, you should always have it coloured by a professional". Yep thanks for that.

Then, by chance, I stumbled across a site where someone had posted a question almost identical to mine, after which someone had posted a reply. There then followed a hundred or so comments from people saying thanks for the tip, it had saved their hair. Nothing ventured, nothing gained, I thought and I gave it a go - and it worked!

So for anyone else who suffers a hair-dye that goes wrong (it works for too dark or for grey/green highlights apparently), here's what you need to do:

* Mix 1 part conditioner with 3 parts lemon juice
* Saturate hair with mix and leave to work its magic (the first time I left it for 30 mins, the 2nd time for 1 hour, just to be sure!)
* Dry hair with a hairdryer (with mixture still in) until it's crispy
* Wash with shampoo & rinse (you will probably see dye coming out as you rinse)
* Dry and style as normal and marvel at how your hair has been restored!

I had exactly the same type of hair disaster about 6 years ago, the result being I had to go to the hairdressers, have all my hair bleached and then dyed mid brown, which is obviously not a great thing to do to your hair. This time I had neither the time nor the finances to fund such a rescue mission. And the biggest bonus - apart from the disappearance of the blue black tinge - was the fact my hair was so silky soft, having been bathed in conditioner. Yay!

I honestly can't tell you how relieved I was. And it certainly spared my blushes at Cybermummy and prevented anyone from thinking I was Siouxie Sioux! So this blog post is a chance for me to pay it forward and pass on this DIY fix. And my opportunity to publicly thank God for Google and lemons!