Why am I getting white hairs mixed in with my dark hair?

Answered by Eva Taub

This surprises a lot of women. They’ll look in the mirror one morning and notice that some of the hairs on their chin are still dark, while others have suddenly turned white or gray. Almost everyone asks me the same question: “Does this mean my hormones are getting worse?”

Usually, the answer is no. The reason the hair is growing and the reason it’s white are two completely different things.

The growth of the hair is often being driven by hormones. PCOS, menopause, insulin resistance, thyroid disorders, and other hormonal conditions can all stimulate follicles to produce coarse facial hair.

The color of that hair depends on something entirely different: the tiny pigment-producing cells inside each individual follicle. As we get older, those cells gradually stop making melanin, so some hairs begin growing in white or gray while the neighboring hairs remain dark. That’s why it’s completely normal to have both colors growing side by side.

The most important thing to understand is how this affects treatment. Laser hair removal doesn’t actually “see” the hair itself. It sees the pigment inside the hair. When a hair turns white or gray, that pigment is gone, so the laser has nothing to target. That’s why laser can permanently remove the dark hairs but simply passes over the white ones.

This is also one of the most common reasons women think their laser “stopped working.” In reality, the laser worked exactly as it should. The dark hairs were removed, and the white hairs that were always going to appear with age simply became more noticeable.

That’s where electrolysis becomes important. Unlike laser, electrolysis doesn’t rely on pigment. It treats each individual follicle, whether the hair is black, brown, blonde, red, gray, or completely white.

After treating women for more than forty years, I can tell you that many eventually need both treatments. Laser removes the dark hairs efficiently, while electrolysis finishes the white and gray hairs that laser will never be able to see.

White hair doesn’t mean your treatment failed. It simply means time has changed the color of the hair, not the reason it was growing.