The Gray Hair Journey // Lauren Stein From Blog, 'How Bourgeois'

Lately i've been thinking about how going gray early is similar to parts of the emotional journey of managing a disability. I reached out to hair care entrepreneur and blogger lauren stein, thinking, she'd never respond, but she's exceptional and she did here is our lively talk, but before we get to it, allow me to introduce you. Lauren stein is proudly a jumble of many things. She'S, a mother, a wife, an artist and a volunteer she's, also a hair care entrepreneur and writer behind the charming and popular blog hal, bourgeois together with her husband, john lauren, created the line by the way your hair looks fabulous when she could not find products in The market that fit her particular needs mainly more natural, affordable, hair care just for silver, white and gray hair. A happy michigander lauren also loves homeschooling with her son and taking walks with their dog josie. We are so excited to have you with us when i first started going um prematurely gray or i really called silver. I was looking for a lot of resources online. I was searching and i was trying to find other women that were going through the same things, and i saw your blog and just the way that you express this journey. I think is so honest, uh and so vulnerable and because you not only told us that it's it's okay to go right, but you also said it's okay to not do it either. If it's not the right time for you, i really enjoy the videos that you're both putting out and you've, had me tearing up and crying several times good tears, happy life, affirming tears and now what you said about the blog being helpful on your gray hair journey. As they call it these days, i'm just i'm so grateful and thankful to hear that my day that i did about your journey about dumb way. So ten years ago i just i i couldn't take the i was having allergic reactions to so many different hair dyes. You know would have a headache for a day and my eyes would be puffy, and i realized that i had to stop because you know allergies can get worse and worse more. I started vlogging about it because i thought well maybe there's other women out there in the same boat and i feel lonely embarrassed like an alien, because i looked so different and oh my gosh, the women who came on and commented they were my lifeline. They they kept me going. It'S a big community, now called the silver sisters. It'S huge, it's huge is. I was nervous that people would say kind of harsh things and i don't want to be thin skinned, but sometimes i was i know it would have made me feel kind of blue, but no everyone was so supportive and so nice and the most surprising thing in The comments women were sharing with me, their different reasons of wanting to go gray. A lot of women had medical issues lupus, or they were cancer survivors where they didn't want to put the chemicals on their scalp right and some of them. You know they were worried about what their husbands would feel, or you know they talked a lot about if they were single. Would anyone like me with gray hair? They were really worried, but they had these big reasons to avoid the dye. My heart felt sad because that's a hard decision to make between your your health or your allergies and what society wants of you. I'Ve been thinking about this through the lens of disability. We'Re not saying that this journey of going grey equates um. What someone with a disability is exactly going through, but there's there are parallels in in this journey of having something that you once had, which was hair, that is more considered youthful uh and that suddenly being um or slowly going away and it's lost. But i think to lauren - and this is where dana we had some. You know interesting discussion more like arguments um, yes, you know, i think a lot of what we're trying to do on the genji is is to build a bridge between this. The experiences which are you know, i think, at the heart of it human yeah and this you know people think of disability as something very foreign they they don't see, especially if they have very little to no experience with it. So in my blog once when i was writing about gray hair, i said something in one of the posts about you know it's just a hair, color and uh. There was another gray hair blogger who wrote something very wonderful woman, but her opinion was it's. It'S not just hair, you can't say it's just a hair color because it comes with all those emotions that you've talked about, biola, which i feel those emotions so much too um. So i oscillate between and it has to do with also the disabilities community. It'S like there are similarities and then there are not, but yes, you're right. I think that emotional component and that invisibility is definitely similar. Did you find that when you did start to um go gray that your husband felt a certain way? I mean what was his reaction to it. Yeah and i love your video where dan comes yes, his first reaction was: oh, my gosh. Will it look? Okay? Will you look older? I think i was about 33 at that time, but then, when i told him you know, i need to do this for me because i'm i i'm i'm tired of having watery red eyes every time i dye my hair every three weeks. You know with the roots and he he i'm lucky. He understood my why. But if my only reason was that i just wanted to have gray hair, i don't i don't know if i could have even kept up with it, because you miss your old youthful looks right, it's it's what ultimately people feel comfortable with, and you know how to What extent they're going to push against those norms um and be okay with it? It'S really up to people, and i know that you really emphasize that which is so important. I very specifically want to always put out that message that no matter who you are and what you decide to do with your hair, it's okay, it's all good! Because don't you guys think that we're told every day how to be? You know how we should look and how we should be in this world, and i just think that's not right. This is why lauren is such an awesome cyber celebrity of coin, because when i, when i reached out to her, she said me shampoo and conditioner - and i have it right here, uh of your line by the way your hair looks fabulous. I know that you've upgraded or changed rather uh the logo. Recently this is our new packaging. This uh conditioner and i love the ingredients tons of awesome oils, um that support the hair and and make it softer. So i'm really enjoying this once the silvers are coming in i mean i feel like i have a whole new different head of hair. My main motivation was, i couldn't find anything out there that worked with my hair, and that was more natural, because i wanted to avoid the synthetic fillers and the parabens and all i thought. Okay, we have to make something for women or men with gray hair. That'S good for them and good for their hair and it doesn't cost like a designer arm and a leg. So is there anything specific um with regard to the people who use your product that you're, hoping that they feel or um are changed by after you? I just want people to not feel sad or badly about losing that sign of youth. You look in the mirror and you don't recognize yourself. I still sometimes it's not so much anymore, but at least for the first five years i found what you said about the invisibility factor that really resonated with me biola. How? How do you feel wait? Oh i'm not supposed to interview you, but can you tell me a little bit more about your feelings on that, because i do wonder about that parallel there on one hand, when you have a visible disability, you um are sometimes scared at, and so you feel very Much on the spot or in the spotlight, but then on the other hand, when you would like to be considered to as like, maybe a romantic partner or even as a potential friend with someone and you're overlooked. You recognize that you're often not included things of everyday life. They may not stop to ask, or even like in the case, for you dan. Maybe you want to talk about this. People may not wait long enough to to hear what you might have to say, and so i i think what do you think? Yes? Well, then you know you don't have to convince it. I i love it. We chose specifically video because we want people to look at us. We want people to hear what we have to say and um and hopefully bridge that that divide that i think, still exists, this stigma around being different and it's it's. It'S amazing our intolerance for difference, because something as simple as you know, the color of your hair set you apart in society as different wow um. I know that we taking up so much every time right now. Oh, i could talk to you for hours. Yeah sam dan learned a lot today because he was like maybe he won't stare at my silver. So, oh i was just gon na say it looks like a look of love. You can see the focus of love someday when you, when you need an idea for a video i'd love to hear about what both of you do for work. Your hobbies, i want to get to know you both because i think you're so kimchi and i want to know more. Oh, i love it.