I Dyed My Hair Black and It Nearly Killed Me

A trip to the salon can be fun and exciting, but one woman's attempt to change up her hairstyle nearly cost her life.

Laura Velaye looked unrecognizable after her hair transformation, for all the wrong reasons. The young woman's head ballooned after she had an allergic reaction to hair dye, leaving her mentally scarred for life.

Velaye, then 18, was admitted to the hospital six days after the black dye touched her roots, making her first and last hair coloring experience one to remember. Within a day of getting a dye job, she began to experience symptoms including itching and a high temperature.

"It's weird because the hairdresser did a patch test, and nothing happened. She used ammonia-free hair dye and usually people don't react to that," she told Newsweek.

Velaye had been visiting family in France at the time and had decided she wanted to return home to Nottingham, England, with a new hairdo. The day after her appointment, she was feeling under the weather on the flight home from France.

"Everyone else was cold on the flight, but I was sweating. And that was just the start of it. The following morning, I woke up to a pillow soaked in pus; it was disgusting," she said.

Her scalp had blisters all over it, which prompted the woman to go to a walk-in medical center. She was told to take antihistamines to reduce the symptoms.

"My condition didn't get any better; in fact, it got much worse. I had spots on my neck and my face was swollen," Velaye said. "I went to the doctors again and I was told there was nothing I could do for me."

At this point, Velaye looked unrecognizable, as her head was no longer in its usual shape.

She said: "I kept taking antihistamine tablets and hoped it would pass. On the sixth day, I went to hang out with a friend, and I didn't feel well at all. My throat and tongue started swelling, and I was struggling to breathe. My friend had to call an ambulance."

Velaye, an account director, spent 10 days in the hospital, where doctors told her she could have died.

"It was terrifying and even scarier knowing I had been to the doctors twice and nobody helped me," Velaye said.

Dr. Ryan Peterson, a board-certified expert in anesthesiology and pain medicine, spoke to Newsweek about the case.

"I'm suspecting that the woman had an anaphylactic reaction to the dye," he said. "An anaphylactic reaction is a severe allergic reaction to an allergen, which includes substances that may be in everyday products like hair dye.

"The body presumes that the component in hair dye is harmful, and it gets the immune and nervous systems all riled up, leading to the manifestation of extreme itchiness and swelling in the affected area, to the point that even the airways become so edematous [swollen] that it's difficult to breathe, increasing the risk of death."

Peterson, medical director at NuView Treatment Center in California, shared tips for ensuring an allergic reaction doesn't happen:

• Be aware of allergies.
• Check the product components on the label.
• Do a patch test at least 48 hours before the procedure.

Peterson told Newsweek: "People should always do a skin test first by dabbing a small amount of a product in their inner forearm or ear and observing for any redness, itching, burning, pain and swelling, which are signs of irritation, within 24-48 hours.

"If any of those symptoms happen, wash off the product right away, and it may highly likely indicate an allergic reaction to the product. Take note of this and speak with a trusted healthcare provider in your area."

Velaye, now 25, recently shared her terrifying experience on her TikTok page (@lauraa_aura) and racked up half a million views in just a few days. The slide show posted on October 21 includes a series of photos.

The first image shows Velaye smiling. Text overlayed on it reads: "At 18, I dyed my hair black, and it nearly killed me."

The next image looks like a completely different person, with Velaye's head completely swollen. She said that after four days, she couldn't even open her eyes.

The clip has racked up 25,000 likes and plenty of comments. Many users suspect the woman has a paraphenylenediamine allergy, as she has also revealed she had a reaction to a black henna tattoo she got last year during a vacation to Greece.

Two hours after getting the henna done, her hand started to hurt, making her second-guess her decision. She was having scorching pains and her hand was covered in blisters the next day.

On her return to England, she was advised to take antihistamine, but eventually, she was referred to a burn unit, where they popped the blisters.

"I had to see a nurse every couple of days for three weeks until it eventually dried up," Velaye told Newsweek. "The scabs started to fall off, which then led to my fingers being scarred, but thankfully, they've recently disappeared."

Dr. Ross Perry, the medical director of Cosmedics skin clinics based in the U.K., agreed that Velaye could be allergic to paraphenylenediamine.

Perry said: "Black henna tattoos are extremely popular on holidays, festivals, days out, and parties; however, they can cause a number of skin reactions, and this is due to the fact that despite being called 'henna,' the main ingredient used is called paraphenylenediamine, also known as PPD, which although popular for its use in hair dyes, isn't good for skin and in actual fact is banned by the EU."

"Hair dyes containing PPD are safe to use for the majority of us, provided the instructions are followed. However, you can be more at risk if you have also had a henna tattoo containing PPD, which can cause an allergic reaction due to the high level of the PPD ingredient in not just the henna tattoo but also the hair dye," Perry said.

Velaye also shared the aftermath of her henna tattoo reaction on TikTok. She told Newsweek: "I would advise against henna; it is not worth it. It could have turned out so much worse."

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