New Hair, New Era, New Me

Why do people dye their hair?

By Jazmin Quintero-Gaviño

Sophmore Evelyn Peña has been dyeing their hair since the summer of 2021. They have even had a hair fail.

“I’ve had a hair fail where my hair dye was uneven since I rushed the whole process but thankfully not to the point where I had big chunks fall out” said Peña.

During their freshman year, they bleached their hair almost every month doing multiple colors throughout the year.

“The first time I dyed my hair I felt more interested in dyed my whole head I felt grounded with my self. Since then I’ve dyed my hair about seven different colors such as pink, salmon, orange, dark blue, teal, purple” said Peña.

At first Peña gained inspiration to dye their hair from her sibling and cousin.

“I dyed the two front strands blue since my sibling and my cousin decided to do so and I just wanted to see how I felt with dyed hair while playing it safe my hair is” said Peña.

Peña realized their hair became unhealthy, due to the constant bleaching Freshman year

“My hair is currently unhealthy from bleaching my hair almost every month during my freshman year. Once when I bleached my hair and realized how damaged it was when I looked like one of those old troll dolls that’s when I knew my hair needed a break” said Peña.

Peña explains the types of hair products they use to maintain and nourish their hair.

“To maintain my damaged hair, I do hair mask to deep condition my dry hair. One product I really liked was the k18 repair hair mask which was for breakage and used shampoo and conditioner that is meant for dyed hair with repairing ingredients” said Peña.

For Peña, dyeing their hair is a form of self expression.

“ Dyeing my hair is big part of my identity because it’s a form of self expression to the kind of person I am and my style” said Peña.

Social Studies teacher Terra Caldwell has been dyeing her hair purple for about six or seven years now but she has also encountered some weird and concerning people and experiences.

“An elderly white woman walked up behind me and grabbed my hair and rolled it around in her fingers to feel the texture. She told me she liked ny hair color and I told her not to touch people’s hair without permission. It was the weirdest feeling, to have someone I didn’t know just grab my hair like that. It was a total violation of my space and my self and it gave me the creeps” said Caldwell.

When Caldwell was a kid, she would watch an anime called Robotech which had characters with colorful hair that inspired her to dye her hair in her adult life.

“The real reason why I dyed my hair is because of an anime called Robotech. Robotech is really old and when I was 10, I noticed that they all had different color hair and I thought, ‘WOW!’ You can have different color hair And so I always wanted to have different color hair” said Caldwell.

Although the character in Robotech that inspired Caldwell to dye her has green hair she decided to dye it purple because it looks better on her then green does because of her skin’s complexion.

“The specific character that inspired me had green hair, however green looks really bad on me. Green also washes off to be yellowish and I don’t look good as a blonde but when purple washes away it looks pink, and I look good in pink so I picked purple because it looks the best when it fades” said Caldwell.

Although Caldwell really likes her natural hair color, she does not see herself going back any time soon.

“I really like my original color and I really like purple, so it’s really going depend if my hairdresser moves, retires, or quits, but I don’t see myself going back to my original hair color anytime soon” said Caldwell.

Senior Taylor Neely has been dyeing her hair since the 6th grade. It has become a look she has been liking and exploring since middle school. Exploring so many colors has made her friends not notice when she dyes her hair and when she doesnt dye it.

“I went from dark brown to almost a golden blonde and a friend in my 6th period physics class last year, took over a week to notice it and I thought he was just playing dumb. I found he really was just oblivaious and the second time I dyed it back he really didn’t notice” said Neely.

Neelys dyed her hair around 11 times. She went to a private school in Nevada that was very strict on the dress codes and hair dyeing. When summer came around she thought it would be fun to do it since she could go against the rules without getting in trouble.

“My school was strict on dress codes and hair dyeing so I wanted to go against that during the summers” said Neely.

When neely started dyeing her hair she thought it would come out bad but was pleasantly surprised when it didn’t.

“The first time I dyed my hair I bleached the ends of it and my hair was all ombré but it came out pretty good and I really liked it. I did have help and I though it would come out horrible but it really didn’t” said Neely.

Through the years, Neely has found herself using the dyeing of her hair as a coping mechanism.

“This may sound cliche, but after the first several times I started realizing that I was dyeing my hair when I was very upset with my parents. It makes me feel accomplished that I can do it by myself” said Neely.

Hair dyeing can be something relatively inexpensive which is why she continues to dye it.

“It’s a really simple thing to do and it doesn’t cost a lot of money because I don’t go to the hair salons but it’s kind of like a way where I can do something I wanna do since my parents don’t really care what I do with my hair. Like they don’t want my hair to fall out obviously, but when it comes down to it they are fine with whatever choice I make” said Neely.