How Long After Dying Hair Can I Swim (And Why)?

Exact Answer: One Week

Hair dyeing is also known as hair coloring. It changes the original hair color partly or wholly to an artificial color that looks good on the hair. It is mainly done for cosmetic purposes. But the primary purpose for which it is done is to cover up someone’s gray or white hair.

Coloring or highlighting one’s hair makes the person look good. So it is trendy for beauty purposes. Hair dyeing can be done by yourself at home or with the help of a hairdresser professionally. It is found that hair dyeing at home in the United States in 2010 was close to two billion dollars, but the same became nearly three billion dollars after a decade. This shows how popular the concept of hair dyeing is.

How Long After Dying Hair Can I Swim

How Long After Dying Hair Can I Swim?

Some people also color their hair, which can be tricky because they are lightened and more porous. This means that the color would not respond to the dyes the same way virgin hair would. The chemicals present in the coloring process could ultimately decline your overall hair quality. There are several tutorial videos available on the internet for you to dye your hair from the comfort of your home. There should a process that you should follow for applying dye to your hairs. You should know that dyeing hair will not strengthen the hair somehow; instead, it will weaken.

When we start coloring our hair, our hair is much darker than our standard hair color. This is due to the melanin pigments responsible for the dark color of the wholly broken hair. This is caused because of oxidation. The oxidizing agent is hydrogen peroxide. A mixture of hydrogen peroxide and ammonia is performed for the creation of an alkaline solution. This alkaline solution helps in speeding up the reaction.

Dying Hair
Events After Dying HairTime After Dying Hair
Taking a bathAfter five hours
Time to swim after dyingAfter one week

The dye needs some time to dry, so a shower should be taken after five hours of dying. In contrast, it is not advised to swim for a minimum of one week after dying the hair.

Why Does It Take That long After Dying Hair To Swim?

The coloring process will break into the hair shaft, and it destroys the pigment molecules giving you light hair at the end of the process. The dark pigment gets destroyed, and during this process, the chemical has to break down the organic fatty acids on your shafts. This is the reason why most hair professionals recommend people to wait for a few days or weeks before they decide to dye after their hairs have gone white so that their hairs can get enough pigments to retain the darkness of the color for a long time after dying.

During this process, your hairdresser should recommend you cut off some amount of hair. However, on the other hand, if your hair does not feel too damaged, you could use a deep conditioner to restore some amount of moisture so that you can prepare yourself for dyeing. You have to stay cautious about using these kinds of things because you should know what you are allergic to. If you are allergic to some of the components present in the chemical of the color, then there is no need to continue to do the dying process.

Swim

It takes that long to swim because swimming can lead the chemicals present in the dye to come out, and then there will be no significance left of dying the hair. If enough time is not given, then the hair will not become shiny. This will make the hair weaker and porous leading to the break-off of hair.

Conclusion

Overall, it can be concluded that we all like to dye our hair to look glamorous. But dying itself has many side effects. It causes damage to the hair and makes it dry and frizzy. If you feel like your hair is being damaged after dying, you should consider deep conditioning before taking other steps.

On average, it is advised to swim after one week of dying hair. It is advised to let your hairdresser cut the split ends a few inches. But if you do not feel that your hair is too dry or damaged after the coloring procedure, you can put some hair oil or conditioner to revive the moisture content in your hair.

References

  1. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1858345/
  2. https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0048969708002398

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AboutNidhi

Hi! I'm Nidhi.

Here at the EHL, it's all about delicious, easy recipes for casual entertaining. So come and join me at the beach, relax and enjoy the food.

22 Comments

  1. The science behind hair dyeing and its effects is intricate, but important to know to make informed decisions about our hair.

  2. I appreciate the warning about the side effects of hair dyeing, this is essential information for anyone considering coloring their hair.

  3. Waiting a week to swim can be inconvenient, but the reasons behind it make sense. Better safe than sorry!

  4. Waiting a week to swim after dyeing hair sounds like a hassle, but I suppose it’s worth it to maintain healthy hair.

  5. This article presents a compelling case for the importance of waiting to swim after dyeing hair. It’s a necessary precaution for hair health.

  6. I have been dyeing my hair for years and always wondered why you can’t swim right after. This explained it perfectly!

  7. The impact of hair dyeing on hair quality is significant. I appreciate the detailed explanation about the chemical processes involved.

  8. So, after dyeing hair, it’s not just about the chlorine in the pool affecting the color, but also the chemicals in the dye itself. Interesting.

  9. This is very informative, I had no idea about the chemical processes involved in dyeing hair and the impact it has on swimming!

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