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player ready...Until recently, the fact that so many of us color our hair was anything but a gray area. As soon as one gray hair showed up, we’d drown it in dye as soon as we could.
But times could be changing. Actresses Andie MacDowell and Sarah Jessica Parker have shown off their natural color for some time now, and there was an uproar recently when Canadian news anchor Lisa LaFlamme was allegedly fired for daring to appear on camera au natural.
I spoke with two women about why dyeing is dead for them.
Nicki Anderson is the former CEO of Naperville Area Chamber of Commerce who now serves as director of Benedictine University’s undergraduate leadership program for women. She’d been coloring her hair for 25 years before COVID-19 gave her a new perspective and a whole new look.
“During lockdown couldn’t my get hair done,” she said. “I was crossing street one day when it was windy and I pulled my hair back into a pony because I was worried about my roots. I started to think why would I be embarrassed to show my natural color. I was pushing 60. What’s the shame in that? Why am I ashamed of something that’s perfectly natural?”
Anderson says she believes the humiliation came about because women believe they’re supposed to look and act a certain way.
“It was a perceived signal that if I was fully gray, I was giving up. To the contrary, there’s power in being gray,” she said.
For men, the opposite is true, she said. They’re considered distinguished or referred to with the positive description of being a silver fox.
“I came across a Facebook page for women all over the world who decided to go gray,” Anderson said. “Aged from 20 to 83. They were so proud and loud, I realized it wasn’t a bad thing.”
Surprisingly, the biggest critics of her new look were other women.
“The biggest pushback I got was from other women who said I would look old or that I have ‘given up,'” she said. “I am not 25. Who am I going to impress? Going gray was being true to myself.”
Anderson said it took 18 months for her hair to grow out completely. She says the pandemic was the defining factor because she sees it as a time when everyone became more introspective.
“Its interesting women feel compelled to color their hair. Why not show it and own it?” she said. “There’s a sense of strength and clear confidence when this happens. Not right or wrong, it’s a process. I hate the term anti-aging. We are all aging every single day and the more we try to fight it, the more exhausting it becomes emotionally and psychologically. We can celebrate it or try to fight it.”
Anderson says she’s enjoying the best time of her life.
“I still run, eat well and take good care of myself. It has nothing to do with giving up but owning up to being 61 and I’m OK with that,” she said. “I like it. I am very proud of it. I can have more fun with clothes to express myself more freely now because who cares? I’m past the people-pleasing stage. Past trying to prove something. Just because I care less about what people think doesn’t mean I care less about people.”
The pandemic was also a deciding factor for 64-year-old Napervillian Donna Malone, the semi-retired owner of a marketing company.
“I have always worked in corporate America and wanted to look as age agnostic as possible. Image is important,” she said. “I was always blonde, but it became brassy looking and the roots start to come in faster. Then my hair started thinning. Putting dye on it was affecting my roots.”
Malone started to dye her hair when she was 21. She’d always been blonde but started adding streaks to enhance her natural color.
“During COVID I stopped having manicures and dying my hair. I noticed my nails and hair were stronger so decided to let it go,” she said. “I had it cut a little shorter because it was easier to grow it out and I liked that too. My hair is healthier and dries faster so I’ll never go back.”
Malone says there is more to looking your best than simply coloring your hair.
“I make sure I keep up with serums and that my skin looks youthful,” she said. “It’s so much easier — it’s liberating. I don’t need to spend money and time on it. I do my own nails.
“I was always careful with clients about saying anything that would age me, like talking about being a grandmother, so they couldn’t place my age. It’s not just about your hair, it’s the whole package — clothes and jewelry. Some people who are 40 look 64. I’m more confident because people compliment me. I don’t feel any trepidation talking to millennials because I’m not the old fogey anymore.”
Denise Provenzano, owner of Zano Salon in Naperville, says the pandemic definitely helped women to see their hair in a different light.
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“With salons closed for an average of 10 weeks at the start of the pandemic, women who had their hair professionally colored were experiencing outgrowth that they probably would have never seen before,” she said.
“Women with lighter color, light brown to blonde, were not as traumatized by seeing gray as those with darker shades, where the gray was becoming very noticeable in contrast and most didn’t realize they had that much gray hair.”
She suggests anyone wanting to stop coloring should cut their hair to speed up the process and perhaps choose a lighter color to ease the look.
“All those processes helped women who decided to go with the gray,” she said. “This doesn’t necessarily mean that as professionals we don’t enhance the gray color, it just doesn’t need as much maintenance.”
Hilary Decent is a freelance journalist who moved to Naperville from England in 2007.