Paint in your hair.

[etali]

My niece just came home with paint in her hair and it won't wash out. I've got no idea how it ended up there, but it's clumped her hair and nothing seems to be working. We've tried washing it with normal shampoo, vinegar, alcohol based cleaners, the only thing we haven't tried is proper paint stripper because we don't know if that's safe.

If she can't get it out one option is to cut her hair (it's mostly towards the ends so shouldn't be too bad) but that would break her heart

Does anyone have any suggestions please?

[britjojo]

Oil! Butter would work in a pinch but what you need is cooking oil, nothing fancy, not olive oil, but oil.

This is what we would use to get dried on paint off our skin when we decorated, because I cannot use turps-I have kind of sensitive skin. Really pour a ton into the painted bits and then you need to massage it, to break the paint up. If you can get a fine toothed comb to work on it, that too will help.

[etali]

Thanks! I'll give them a ring and let them know, then tell you how she got on in the morning

If it doesn't work, she's getting her hair cut on Monday before school on Tuesday, poor thing.

[britjojo]

At least you have the bank holiday weekend to work on it. It would be worse if you didn't have that extra time.

Good luck, I really hope you can work it out.

[etali]

Thanks

She tried the oil idea you suggested and it has helped a bit - it's broken up the clumping anyway.

There's still paint stuck to parts of her hair that just won't shift, but we might try a little paint thinner on a cloth, carefully rubbed through her hair to get rid of that bit. It just doesn't seem right exposing young skin to that kind of chemically junk.

At least we won't need to drench it now, so thanks for the suggestion!

[britjojo]

Just be really careful and wash it out as soon as humanly possible. The problem with this is that the thinner may damage the hair, start to disolve it, leaving it sticky and tending to tangle at best. You also then run the risk of discolouration when swimming in chlorine swimming pools and all that. Good luck anyway!

[etali]

She likes the sound of the risks you described - she's got swimming for PE and really really hates it - she's more a tennis / dance girl.

It only took a tiny bit to clean it off though, so I don't think she's getting out of it

Back at school today, with long hair still intact.

Thanks again.

[britjojo]

Glad to hear it. My school aged hair was down to bum level, and isn't much shorter now. I would have been mortified at the risk of losing it.