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" Gray is tricky: Wear it well, and you could be unforgettable. But play it wrong, and you risk looking like a (great-) grandma. Despite the challenges, lots of women do go natural \u2014 and love it. Would you consider being one of them? Here&amp;#039;s what you need to know to decide. Causes of color loss As you age, your hair&amp;#039;s melanocytes \u2014 cells that produce pigment \u2014 lose steam and make less melanin. That&amp;#039;s when your hair seems to &amp;quot;turn gray,&amp;quot; but it&amp;#039;s actually just losing its original color, not acquiring a new one, explains Roger I. Ceilley, M.D., a clinical professor of dermatology at the University of Iowa in Des Moines. It makes no difference whether you end up with a head of gray, silver, or white, he says. Like chestnut, light brown, or dark brown, it&amp;#039;s just a shade variation, and you treat it the same as the others. Once the change begins, the rate at which your strands lose color varies. But whether you&amp;#039;re graying fast or slow, there&amp;#039;s nothing a doctor can do about it \u2014 even if you started young. &amp;quot;Premature graying is all about genetics,&amp;quot; says Manjula Jegasothy, M.D., director of the Miami Skin Institute. &amp;quot;Though we haven&amp;#039;t isolated the gene that&amp;#039;s responsible, you can definitely blame it on your parents.&amp;quot; Will there be an anti-graying breakthrough soon? Don&amp;#039;t count on it. While thinning hair in women is a hot research topic, graying is not. &amp;quot;It&amp;#039;s an interesting subject,&amp;quot; says Dr. Jegasothy diplomatically, &amp;quot;but not a medically important one.&amp;quot;  Should You Go for the Silver? Maybe you&amp;#039;re alarmed because your first white strands have started to multiply. Or maybe you&amp;#039;ve covered up for so many years that you no longer know just how much white you&amp;#039;ve got. Wherever you are on the spectrum, you have a choice: Conceal with color or let it go gray. If you decide on the chemical route, the plus side is obvious; the downside is the cost, in time and money. So maybe gray is your answer \u2014 unless you fall into one of these categories. Your skin is yellow- or olive-toned. &amp;quot;Gray is a cool shade, so it doesn&amp;#039;t always complement warm skin tones,&amp;quot; says Robert Gallagher, owner of the Long Hair Care Group in New York City.  Your locks are thinning or superfine. Unless you cut your hair very short, a light color (whether blond or gray) can make it look even sparser than it is.  Your hair is very frizzy. Flyaways are more noticeable with gray (or blond) hair. So if you have trouble with frizz control, consider coloring to get a sleeker look.   Taking the plunge? Here&amp;#039;s the best advice from top colorists. If you have: uneven gray patches Consider: pretty salt-and-pepper Your name doesn&amp;#039;t have to be George Clooney for you to look incredible with a sprinkling of silver. The key is to even out your color and make your gray appear well blended, which can be difficult since it tends to grow in random clusters. Your goal: to turn these patches into chic streaks. The secret: strategic highlights. &amp;quot;When you lighten the right strands, you end up with ribbons of gorgeous highlights instead of a patchy mess,&amp;quot; advises Todd Fox, a colorist at New York City&amp;#039;s Fr\u00E9d\u00E9ric Fekkai Salon. (Caveat: This is hard to do on your own. If a salon treatment isn&amp;#039;t in the budget, opt for allover color or allover gray \u2014 see below.) If you have: dyed hair Consider: allover gray If you&amp;#039;ve been coloring for as long as you can remember, one of the major benefits of stopping is that there&amp;#039;ll be no more wrestling with roots. But news flash: There is no easy path to allover gray, and many women who go cold turkey on color fall victim to the two-tone look. Fox has a better plan: Make a more gradual change. &amp;quot;If you&amp;#039;ve been using permanent color, switch to semipermanent, which is more translucent,&amp;quot; he says. Use a lighter shade with each touch-up and never put color on the ends. &amp;quot;If you cover only the new growth, the ends will fade until eventually you have the color you want.&amp;quot; If you&amp;#039;re mostly gray, consider blond highlights. They&amp;#039;re easier to do and will blend with your gray to give you a pretty white-blond color (think Barbara Walters).  If you have: a head of gray already Consider: giving it more TLC Hair that&amp;#039;s losing its color is susceptible to a whole new host of problems (like frizz, wiriness, and yellowing) that you may never have experienced before. &amp;quot;Your best response is to condition regularly,&amp;quot; says Gallagher. He recommends using a moisturizing shampoo and conditioner every time you wash. &amp;quot;When hair is healthy, it&amp;#039;s more elastic and thus less likely to break and split,&amp;quot; he adds. His styling tip for gray-heads: Set your hair with rollers to give it a smooth, controlled look, and use shine spray or serum to restore luster. Counteract yellowing, if any, with a purple shampoo or conditioner (try L&amp;#039;Or\u00E9al Nature&amp;#039;s Therapy Color Confidence Blonde Brightening Shampoo) and a monthly rinse with lemon water (the juice of one lemon for every two cups water) to help eliminate smoke- and pollution-induced discoloration.  Got your first gray? What to do next Don&amp;#039;t pluck! While there&amp;#039;s no truth to the old wives&amp;#039; tale (that pulling one hair will cause three to sprout), removing those bad boys will not help in the end. Louis Viel of the Miano Viel Salon in New York City explains: &amp;quot;The follicle doesn&amp;#039;t die when you pluck, so that hair will start growing again, and it will still be gray. But until it&amp;#039;s long enough to blend with the rest of your hair, it will just stick out.&amp;quot; Instead, conceal minor graying with easy-to-apply, temporary color (try the GHRI-tested Fanci-Full Touch-Up Stick).      "^^<http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#string>
<http://www.goodhousekeeping.com/beauty/hair/tips/a16987/amazing-gray-hair/>