That is the question.
Well in my case, NOT TO BLEACH.
I have had horrible experiences in the past using bleach that left me with a dry, broken, pitiful mess. But recently I’ve been getting sooooo bored with my hair color. I’ve come across some gentler methods of lightening ones hair with simple peroxide and baking soda. Note, I said less damaging, not un-damaging.
Peroxide is used as a bleaching agent for hair and works by breaking down the melanin in the hair shaft. Because this is in essence damaging the hair, continuous or prolonged use can lead to excessive dryness or extreme damage just like a regular bleach would, so please be careful. Make sure your hair is in tip top shape before trying any home dye jobs or just go to a professional.
Also never use 100% peroxide on hair. Always use 3% to avoid unnecessarily over damaging your hair.
The photos below show what I’m looking to do but not as extreme.
This ones my favorite. 😀
Photo Courtesy of bourgiegreen
I’ve found numerous videos on YouTube showing how to do it but I’m scared lol.
The other thing that I’m afraid of is damaging the relaxed ends of my hair even more! But I think I can save them if I do a protein treatment right after… Hmm.. 
.forever.as.i.am. 
Have you looked into some of the new natural hair color dyes that are out there? I know that Shea Moisture just started to have a line of them. They are starting to gain popularity.
I’ve seen them a bit but I still haven’t been able to find the in target in my city
ohhh welp that was my suggestion to look into those. I saw that some women on the curlynikkiforums found some success out of using them
Haven’t been able to find them in the target stores in my city *** sorry lol.
And yea I just watched some videos with girls using it. It’s kinda expensive, 14.99 and many people say they needed two
Oh I didn’t know that! Welp it’s up to you. But the color that you want looks like it would be cute!
Thx 🙂
I am terrified of bleach. I also had a bad experience, and ended up having to cut all of my hair off many years ago. I want to have blond highlights next summer. So I have to find a really great hair dresser that can safely bleach natural hair.
mannn you’re preaching to the crowd sister! I basically destroyed my hair back in highschool with bleach! My hair was so thin and broken off 😦 Since then I havent touched the stuff. But since peroxide is def not going to be as strong as 40vol bleach I thought Id give it a try. There’s a natural who put a bit of peroxide and olive oil in a spray bottle and over a couple of nights lightened her hair from black to an auburn/reddish color by lightly misting her hair every night before she went to bed. I was thinking of trying out this method since it doesn’t seem to dry out the hair at all.
Hi there! Wow, I bleached my hair several times as a teenager. That ruined how thick my hair was. But it was fun nonetheless. I have never even heard of that method, but it sounds really creative and could be less damaging on the hair. Peroxide and olive oil in a spray bottle. That’s a great idea! 🙂
I’ve got hair in this way! I’m dark blond and my hair’s end is blond. Why don’t you try with dark red ends? I think blond is not ok for you!
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I know I wasn’t going to make it pure blonde, I was going to try and get a nice auburn or henna red 😀