Ah, the joys of getting older. You gain wisdom from experience and don't suffer FOMO quite so much. You also sprout hair from places it wasn't before and slowly notice a silvery tinge to your roots.
The good news is that going grey is not an indication of poor health. It's a natural process that happens to healthy folk and starts in the 20s. It involves a loss of pigment within each hair shaft, leaving the strand without colour, which makes it appear white or grey.
Hair will gradually grow out grey, rather than 'turn grey', so it's not going to happen very suddenly. Going grey is hereditary, so ask our folks when they first noticed it and it's likely you'll follow suit. Caucasians tend to grey earlier than other races. Oh, and plucking a grey won't make more grow back.
The decision to let nature takes its course or intervene with a dye bottle is a personal one. If you choose to slowly silver you'll certainly save a lot of coin and time at the salon -- the average person's hair gowns over half a centimetre a month -- meaning you'll be booking to have your roots touched up fairly regularly.
Depending on your hair colour you can have your hairdresser blend blonde to caramel highlights and lowlights through the lengths, as grey shows less against lighter shades, so that regrowth is not so obvious up against block colour. Or, you can DIY your roots at home.
Ensure you pick a home packet that boasts 100 percent grey coverage as stands without pigment are more stubborn to colour. For the reason you'll need to go for a permanent colour as semi-permanent is partly transparent. You'll need an old towel for your shoulders, a sectioning comb and crab-claw clip. A second mirror to check your handiwork at the back also helps.
Clairol Nice & Easy Root Touch Up, $12.99, is specifically designed to cover greys. The smaller dose of product and precision paint-on brush makes it pretty much fool proof.
Although we know that greys don't just crop up instant it can sometimes feel that way. You go to bed with a head full of luscious brown hair and wake up with a streak of grey right down your part. For times like this you need an instant root concealer. Either in spray of powder form, the pigmented product grips to hair and camouflages silver hues until you're ready to shampoo. Ranging from light browns through to reds and black, they are surprisingly resilient so don't stress about sweat or a few drops of rain.
L'Oreal Paris Magic Retouch, $15.99, sprays on and dries in one minute. It's budge proof and water resistant until you wash your hair.
John Frieda Root Blur Instant Root Concealer, $19.99, is a brush on powder and has two shades in the one palette, making it perfect for a custom blend.
If you've nothing on hand and a few grey strands to hide, try eye shadow.
"I've had situations on set where I've needed to conceal a models grey roots and I've used eye shadow or brow shadow," makeup artist Natalia Sprem told The Huffington Post Australia.
"Brow powder works really well as it's formulated to grip to hair, but regular eyes hadow is excellent, too. Select a shade from taupe to black depending on your hair colour and use a shadow brush to paint it onto the visibly obvious greys where the hair is parted. Fix it in place with a little light-hold hairspray. It's surprisingly effective."
Inspired by eye makeup products, you'll also find hair mascaras available. These are in varying shades of brown and black and are painted onto the roots much like traditional mascara is to lashes.
If all of that sounds too hard -- and let's face it, grey root management is at the higher end of the beauty maintenance scale -- just embrace the silver look at Zosia Mamet, Kelly Osbourne, Kylie Jenner and Lady Gaga for inspo. They've opted for grey hair from time to time. On purpose.
