I remember when I was 10 years old I found my first grey hair, a wiry strand sprouting wildly from the top of my head. I actually found it kind of cool and something that made me unique, and I would occasionally find the greys throughout my teenage years and just pluck them out. No big deal.

Fast forward almost three decades from that first grey sighting, and the grey hairs aren’t “occasional” anymore at all. I have quite a bit of grey, and my hair is really dark, so it’s fairly noticeable.

And at 38 years old, I’m trying to decide how much I care that I’m going grey, and if it’s worth the time and money to do something about it.

I’m all for women deciding for themselves what they want to do with their own bodies. I wear makeup almost every day, because I’m self conscious about the imperfections of my skin and just feel better about myself when I have it on. Last summer, I did 6 alternating treatments of chemical peels and IPL facials (extremely painful) to reduce the sun damage on my skin. My face does look remarkably better than it did, but it’s definitely not flawless. So my daily makeup routine continues.

But for some reason, I’m just not as self-conscious about my grey hair as I am my skin. I go back and forth between a half-hearted “I really should get my hair colored” and “Eh, whatever.”

And to be honest, it’s mostly about the time and money. Both time and money are extremely limited in this season of my life, and there are always a long list of priorities ahead of spending several hours in a salon chair and lots and lots of dollars on a professional coloring. Also, my hair has always grown REALLY fast (a blessing, I guess?) so I think I would just have to do it so often to maintain it looking really good- and that’s overwhelming.

And yes, I could do it at home, and have many times in the past, but eh, it’s so messy and also time consuming (not to mention I’m terrible at picking out the right color). So I just don’t anymore.

Aside from that time it takes to sit in a salon, I’m weird in that I really don’t find having my hair done relaxing at all. I’ve realized since I had kids, I do not like people touching my head or my hair. This is probably because this is all that toddlers do- get in your face and put their sticky fingers in your eyes, mouth and hair. Bleh. Whenever I do get my hair cut, I never let them blow dry it because it just makes me antsy and uncomfortable.

And I don’t think (maybe incorrectly) that my grey hair looks that bad on me. It does concern me some that maybe it makes me look older than I am, but not enough to actually do something about it today.

Do you think I’m crazy? Should I just make the time and spend the money to cover up the grey? What are your thoughts and solutions about going grey (especially before 40)?