To pluck or not? 

Finding that ghastly lone grey strand lurking in a head of hair can be a horrifying experience, and it can happen much younger than you might expect, with nearly a third of the women in the world turning grey before they reach the age of 35. Whilst the natural reaction is to grab your tweezers pluck it, but before you engage is there any truth in the urban myth that this will result in seven more taking its place? 

I remember finding my first grey hair. I was about 38 and getting a blow dry when it caught the eye of my hairdresser who very unsubtly pointed it out to me. How could he not? Maybe if the rest of my hair wasn’t so jet black, it wouldn’t have been so glaringly obvious! This glinting silver strand shone out like a beacon on a dark night. So I did what I imagine most people do. I went home, pulled it out and examined it closely. The first thing that I noticed was that it wasn’t actually grey at all. It was almost white and slightly translucent, full of the absence of colour. More appeared after that but not in the same place, debunking for me at least the theory of the seven sisters! 

If you really want to remove a grey hair, some hairdressers would recommend cutting it out rather than plucking. Plucking grey hairs can destroy the hair follicle, so it is better to leave the hair alone because you can cause sore and painful ingrown hairs when you pluck I don’t believe that if you pluck a grey hair more hairs will grow back in its place,through experience and because science teaches us that until their own follicles’ pigment cells die, surrounding hairs will not turn grey. However, if you do pluck grey hairs, they will grow back and will be coarse. 

Grey hair can occur as a result of ageing and stress but it's also very much to do with your genes. Pulling the odd grey strand out could cause thinning of the hair so it really isn’t the best thing to do. Talk to your hairdresser as they will be able to advise on the perfect colour, cut and product to use for grey hair. Everyone is different – so there isn’t a one size fits all approach. Grey hair is more vulnerable to sun damage from the lack of melanin so try to use a hair product that contains an SPF.