Yep, I’m 21 and I’ve begun to notice gray hairs. Is this common for someone of my age? What could the causes of this be? I will tell you that I’ve been under EXTREME stress lately, with many personal problems (work, etc…) and family problems (like my brothers divorce, my sisters divorce, etc…). Could stress be causing gray hairs to appear? Is it a sign for a type of depression?
If this is common, please just ignore me, I just thought I’d ask. It isn’t like I have a head full of em, just a few here and there. I noticed them first about a year ago, maybe one or two here and there, and tonight I noticed around ten at one time. Anyhow…
This is a tough topic to research since there’s so much holistic cosmetic BS all over the internet.
My WAG is that premature graying is genetically mediated (any family members gray early?) Sure stress could contribute, but I doubt it’s the majot player.
As far as why hair grays, it’s a failure of the pigment synthesizing cells (melanocytes) to keep up production.
It would be foolish indeed to deny that stress has anything to do with it. Emotions can cause all sorts of physical effects. Can anyone deny that embarassment can cause the face to get red?
However, I can’t think of any way to find out for sure. A controlled experiment would be immoral. How could anyone ever think of intentionally stressing a group (in a double blind experiment, no less), with the proper experimental controls, to see if more-than-usual gray hair resulted?
And there are so many variables that it is hard to imagine anyone paying for a sophisticated enough sampling procedure so as to get a significant statistical answer.
How about other family members? Any of them get gray early on?
One of the prettiest heads of hair I ever saw on a man was a guy about 45 years old with the most beautiful silver gray locks. Women swooned and men turned around to stare.
Gray hairs are nature’s way of letting you live longer. You wake up one morning, find a bunch of gray hairs, go OH MY :eek: and the sudden rush of blood pumping through your arteries cleans them all out. Adds at least 10 years to your life.
That’s my theory and I’m sticking to it.
On a more serious note, stress can not only cause your hair to turn gray, but it can actually cause it all to fall out. I know someone that this happened to, and even worse, she was female (bald guys are a lot more socially acceptable than bald gals). I don’t know about premature graying, but if it all falls out there’s a bunch of tests they do to make sure something really bad isn’t causing it. The impression I got was that if they can’t find anything really bad, they chalk it up to stress.
This isn’t a very GQ-ey answer, but I know a brother and sister who are 17 and 19 have had grey hairs (well, white hairs really) since about a year ago. IIRC, their mother had premature grey hair as well, although I don’t know whether she went grey as a teenager.
My mother’s best friend started greying in her teens and was completely grey by her mid-20’s. It’s my understanding that most of her family went grey very young.
It may be no co-incidence that her family are what you might call “highly strung”. Their father was bad enough that my mother attributes his wife’s early death to being driven to her grave by the husband; this combined with their tense (almost hysterical) personalities may have contributed to their early greying, although I’m sure there is a genetic component as well.
I’m in my mid 20’s, and over the past year or so I’ve been getting gray hairs left and right (and up, too). My stress has picked up a bit in that time (wedding in July, moving soon, etc), but it hasn’t been what I would call unbearable.
My father, however, started to go gray when he was 22. Same with his brother. I’d chalk it up to genetics.
I’d say genetics. I started turning gray at about 17, but my life was usually not all that stressful. Even when things were pretty bad for me (out of work and my marriage breaking up), there was no increase in the amount of gray hairs.
25 here and I’ve got one or two grey hairs. They dont really bother me to be honest. My mate at work noticed it a week or so ago slagged me about it but really it didnt bother me at all. I’ve got more important things to think about.
Perhaps diet or health can cause this condition, and maybe one can have their hair analzyed to find out if they are lacking something, like perhaps protein. See:
I’m 17 and I have a patch of white hair. I (well, a friend, actually) first noticed it when I was in eigth grade, and it has been getting very slowly bigger ever since. A couple of other guys in my class also have a small spot of white hair, and I recall seeing a youngish-looking professional tennis player who does too. It seems kind of rare to me, but not unheard of and almost certainly nothing to be concerned about.
Definitely a genetic factor in there.
I started getting gray in my early 20s also, as did my father. My mother says when she and my dad started dating, his parents were both totally gray, in their 40s.
I’m 37 now, and if I let it go, it’s at least half gray all over my head.
Lady Clairol #118 is my best friend.
Most baseball fans know it happened to Roger Maris during his pursuit of the single-season home run record in 1961. His hair fell out in clumps due to the stress.
Noticed my first grey hairs at 22. I was in the military then and had short hair, so I prolly got them at 21. I’m 26 now, and I still have them. Doesn’t bother me one bit, but then again they’re still hard to notice.
I guess (from what I’m reading here) that you have nothing to worry about, since many of us have been greying at the same pace…
