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Fact Buster
Q: Can stress turn your hair grey overnight?
A: No, but some diseases can turn you grey over a short time.
Published 09/07/2008
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Legend has it that as Marie Antoinette awaited her fatal appointment with the guillotine, her hair turned white overnight.
The myth that extreme stress can turn your hair grey or white overnight has been around for a long time. But there's not a single shred of scientific research to back it up.
Hair colour is determined by the amount of melanin pigments produced by stem cells called melanocytes. There are two types of melanin pigment: eumelanin (dark brown or black) and phaeomelanin (yellow blonde to red).
At the end of the active phase of hair growth, the building blocks of hair in the follicle – kerotincytes and melanocytes – die. As you age, fewer melanocytes are replaced. New hairs growing from these follicles are depigmented and appear grey or white.
Dermatologist Dr Jack Green says that even if stress made your hair grow grey or white from the follicle, there's no way all the hairs on your head could change colour overnight, short of using a bottle of hair dye.
"We don't subscribe to the point of view that if you're under stress, that you're going to go grey," says Green.
However, there are some medical conditions – such as alopecia areata – that on very rare occasions can leave you with only depigmented hair (grey or white).
Alopecia areata is an auto-immune disease that attacks the hair follicle and leads to hair loss. It's a relatively common condition, affecting about one per cent of the population, and the hair loss can occur very quickly.
Green says in a very rare subtype of this condition all pigmented hairs fall out, leaving the person with only depigmented hair.
"The appearance is striking and rapid because overnight someone can go from having a regular appearance to only having white hairs, but this isn't stress – this is an auto-immune condition, and there is a disease behind this."
The hair loss from alopecia areata is often reversible, but sometimes when the hair grows back the pigmented hairs will grow back depigmented.
There are also other conditions, such as vitiligo (an auto-immune condition that attacks pigment cells and can make your skin and hair go white), or rare genetic disorders, including piebaldism and Waardenburg syndrome, that can cause a single streak of white hair – but none of them occur overnight.
So how do we explain it when, even without these diseases, some people do seem to go grey very quickly?
When it comes to grey hair it's all about genetics, and at this stage there's no research to support the view that stress plays any part in the process.
It seems there are only two things we can do – learn to love our silver highlights, or reach for the hair dye.
Dr Jack Green is a dermatologist at St Vincent's Hospital in Melbourne with an interest in hair disorders. He was interviewed by Claudine Ryan.
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Comments (27)
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sjh :
31 Oct 2008 9:36:57am
I had numerous discs that were herniated in my lower back. It got worse over time and I got used to the pain but nonetheless it did get worse. The condition caused my leg to give out while I was going upstairs and I fell backwards down the stairs. The pain was awful. My orthopedic dr. did an mri and as soon as he saw it made the determination that surgery must be done immediately. In the course of one week I went from not having 1 gray hair, to having a complete white head. I had the surgery and the pain is still there (normal) and my hair has gotten even whiter. Oh well.........I guess it can happen can't it.
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Kristien Ghys :
29 Jul 2008 10:03:50pm
I'm also a bit frustrated by those people who are convinced it is impossible that hair turns white overnight. Personally, I have not yet met a person to whom it happened except for myself. When I was 28, I had an emotional shock on a Saturday night, almost cried my eyes out that night in bed. The next morning I got up with half of my dark blond eyebrow turned white as well as the eyelashes in the corner of my eye below. How do you explain that then, I wonder ?
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julain finch :
27 Sep 2008 4:57:15am
This happend to me too when I was 17 on the back of my head, qoite a big patch and a little above my right ear. Im now 31 and have never considerd it until now. Can anybody explain to me what happend. P.S. im not saying I don't like it because I do, I think its cool.
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Jeanette :
12 Oct 2008 7:15:17am
I'm 25, and grew a patch of white hair (condensed) on my crown after my boyfriend of 3.5 years broke up with me. I was also crying my eyes out for a full month. The white hairs were ALL the same length, so I KNOW they all started growing at the same time. Don't give me that BS about white hair being only caused by genetics. I have more white hairs than my parents combined. And my grandparents did not have gray hair until they were 65. I think scientists get pigeon-holed by what can be "proven". If your research is SH*T, you can't prove anything. Scientists should consider improving the research as opposed to stubbornly refuting what so many people report as white hair from stress. Your methodology is the problem, not the evidence. Also, I've had 6 inches of white hair sandwiched by 3 inches of black hair on both ends. So white hair CAN turn black again. To scientists: some of you need to open your eyes.
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Jeanette :
12 Oct 2008 7:26:23am
One more thing - let's use some common sense here. If stress can impair your immune system (my doctors insist that I fall ill often because of stress and not an inherent disease), and your immune system regulates normal bodily functions (pigmentation being one of them), then a high level of stress can impair pigmentation production.
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jeannette :
17 Jul 2008 11:01:02am
dr green may be sceptical but this happened to my grandfather. he had ginger hair, thick & healthy, & was taken to hospital with a bleeding ulcer. he was in so much pain his hair turned a brilliant white overnight. it was so remarked upon he was known for the rest of his life as "snowy". he never went bald but always had thick & luxurious snow-white hair.
the incident is well known to the whole family, & photos back it up. -
Mim :
15 Jul 2008 5:22:25pm
'But there's not a single shred of scientific research to back it up'
Does that mean things only happen if there's scientific research proving it? Is there no room for future research?
My guess is that this is not very easy to study. Perhaps a double blind trial of putting people through intense shock, stress, torture or some such and ... On second thought, even if there were people willing to participate, it probably wouldn't pass the ethics committee.
I can't see someone who's just had their hair turned white from major trauma going to a dermatologist - but that's just my take.
Interesting article otherwise. -
Roy :
15 Jul 2008 2:19:20pm
Believe me, I can testify that it does happen... My boss nearly killed a young apprentice by turning off the wrong mains when cutting out pwer by hand, and he literally (not figuratively) went white OVERNIGHT, it was really amazing to witness - the poor guy was sick with worry!
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don :
15 Jul 2008 10:04:31am
I had black hair, then, in my early 40's got sued by a council for $100,000. It really stressed me out (like, totally) and at that time, my hair started going grey. (Still is) Coincidence? Who knows.
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Dude :
14 Jul 2008 8:13:46pm
To those who pooh-pooh research as "for sale", well, it's true that some research can be dodgy but there is also alot of good research happening.
And to johnNO, if you or your friends and family never had or died from polio, measels, smallpox etc., or died from drinking unpasteurised milk et cetera et cetera ad naseaum, you can thank research that you so flippantly dismissed. And contrary to your assertion, people have NOT been eating highly refined food for centuries or taking methamphetamines et cetera. And many of those who do today do NOT live very long or healthy lives. I agree we can't explain everything yet, but I think your scepticism is unfounded. -
Dolly :
14 Jul 2008 10:22:35am
Thirty years ago my six year old son suddenly fell into a coma, and my hair which had a few grey's in it turned nearly white in a week, lots of people commented, including my hairdresser who knew nothing of my son's illness.
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Terry :
14 Jul 2008 9:51:28am
"But there's not a single shred of scientific research to back it up."
Scientific research is for sale. If you've got the money, you can get whatever scientific research outcome you desire.
Scientific research was once within the public domain and all research went through a rigorous peer review process. Now though, if a research company wants to stay in business, they must produce the outcomes the customer wants.
If a drug company developed a drug that stopped you turning white over night, the scientific evidence of this hair colour change phenomenon would appear overnight. -
kephan :
14 Jul 2008 7:50:09am
I don't know how, but it can happen. It happened to an ex boyfriend of mine. I saw him a few days after he discovered I cheated on him. He had white hairs he never had before. Not the whole head, but enough to make me feel very bad
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helen :
13 Jul 2008 8:58:57am
...and anyway, I prefer to think of it as getting blonder...and some days it is very blonde, indeed! lol
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johnNO :
11 Jul 2008 9:58:27pm
Well? The so-called experts can take this fact away and think about it!
My Grandmother, heard a screech of car brakes, a scream, then rushed out and saw her beloved son John laying dead in the road after being struck by a negligent Taxi Driver.
When she awoke the next morning, her hair had turned white/grey, such was the terrible effect of the shock she suffered.
I am getting a bit sick and tired of these "experts" Schmexperts popping up almost on a daily basis, and lecturing the world on their so-called studies. They ought to get on with something useful in their lives, instead of daily telling us all what not to eat, what not to do, despite the fact that over many centuries, people have been eating and doing these very things...and STILL lived their full three score and ten years and more!!!-
george :
12 Jul 2008 12:17:52pm
Impossible. Hair is dead. It cannot respond to stress. Short of all the dark hair falling out overnight, such an awful tagedy could not cause this to happen.
My grandmother's hair greyed very quickly after her husband and son-in-law died within 24 hours of each other and then she had a heart attack and nearly died. But that was because she stopped dyeing her hair.
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Emmjay :
11 Jul 2008 2:10:37pm
No way is my silver/white hair attributed to stress. Not much.
But I greatly suspect that my late father is in fact living in the bathroom mirror. Each day he torments me just after my morning shower. -
Nell :
10 Jul 2008 9:48:13pm
My father had a pulmonary embolism. He was in a great deal of pain. In the 24 hours before his death his hair which was dark brown (no grey) turned nearly white.
It was such a radical change that was shocked when i saw him. -
Fred :
10 Jul 2008 9:23:39pm
I worked with a man in Malaysia in the 60s, he received notice that his father had died but he was unable to get back to Australia quickly, within a few days his hair had turned from quite dark to complete grey.
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Jan Kowarzik :
10 Jul 2008 7:13:06pm
I think I recall reading in Solzenitzyn's The Gulag Archipelago that he observed some prisoners going grey overnight. Maybe just because we don't know why something happens does not mean it doesn't happen.
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Rob Ryan :
10 Jul 2008 4:52:08pm
My father's hair turned grey in two years during the war fighting bandits in Mogadishu where he nearly got killed.
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Linda M :
10 Jul 2008 4:22:42pm
I remember talking to some of the survivors of the concentration camps in the 1960's and one comment that I heard over and over again was "that her hair turned white overnight" soon after a person was incarcerated.
If this was not due to "stress", could the explanation be that all these good citizens had been using a hair dye before they were taken from their homes?-
FredeX :
10 Jul 2008 9:20:27pm
Good one! Thinking outside the square.
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Stephen :
11 Jul 2008 9:12:07am
After a virus attacke dmy thyroid I began to develop BK's and grey hair within a few weeks. After recovering the grey has stayed but has slowed not progressed. Perhaps we need to look at the throid function in relation to the loss of skin pigment.All of my family both sides went grey early I did not and it was during this stressful disease that It accelerated.
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jarkmaxon :
14 Jul 2008 8:15:54am
During a high stress period of my life, a patch of hair grew out white over a period of time. It looked as though whiteout had been brushed over a 50 cent sized part of my head. Once the stress was dealt with, and after about a year, the hair returned to its previous colouration.
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