Loreal EverPure VoxBox from Influenster

I've been an "Influenster" for a few years now and I absolutely love the company and what they do. Pretty much what Influenster is, is a site that you join to connect with other Influensters, to write and share product reviews. Then suddenly you'll get an email from them telling you to fill out a survey to determine if you're the right pick for their upcoming VoxBox. I've participating in a few, I love them.  A VoxBox is a box of one or many products that you get to try out for FREE in exchange for reviewing the product or products with your HONEST feedback and sharing your experience with others. They also have VirtualVox campaigns where you don't actually receive physical products, but you get to interact with other people about the products in that campaign.

The very exciting email that I received informing me that I scored a spot!

I was so extremely happy when I was accepted to participate in the Loreal EverPure Repair and Defend VoxBox. I had filled out the survey, but I didn't get my hopes up until I got that second email confirming that I claimed a spot for that campaign. I received the EverPure VoxBox before I bleached my hair, so the VoxBox couldn't have arrived at a better time, I was in desperate need of repairing hair products!

The EverPure VoxBox

What's inside the box

First off let's start with this line. This is a product line that claims to protect your hair from fading after coloring it. It also helps to repair damage that takes place while you dye your hair. More often than not you have to use a developer in your hair dye, unless you're using henna or unnatural looking colors, like manic panic, you'll most likely be using a developer. That developer contains chemicals that can damage your hair and so this line repairs damage and protects your color from fading and heat damage hence being called Repair And Defend. 

I was skeptical about the lines claims at first, I'm either overly skeptical or way too trusting, there is no in between. I have used the line called EverCurl by Loreal and I liked it, it wasn't my favorite line, but I did like it alot. The EverPure line is much much better.  I had written a post about my experience with bleaching my hair and I honestly think that some of the products in the line helped repair the damage that was done to my hair.

Loreal EverPure Repair and Defend Shampoo

The EverPure Sulfate-free Color Care System Repair and Defend Shampoo obviously is sulfate free, since I discovered the curly girl method I stopped using shampoo that contains sulfate (I do use Clairol purple shampoo which contains sulfates maybe once a month to keep brassiness at bae) and so I wouldn't have been able to even use this product religiously if it had contained sulfates. The shampoo and conditioner specifies the following...

Deeply strengthens
Protect From Color Aggressors
 Natural Botanicals

When I first put the shampoo in my hair the first thing that I noticed was how well it lathered, which is rare for a good sulfate free shampoo, lathering is the one thing that I miss about shampoos that contain sulfates. The shampoo has an awesome scent, it really is a perfect scent, it's very soothing. I would probably purchase a perfume or body spray that had a similar scent, that's how much I enjoyed the scent of the shampoo. After I washed the shampoo out, my sculpt felt clean and free of build up. Even though it is just a shampoo, it leaves my hair feeling conditioned and soft to the touch. I'm giving this Shampoo an A.

Loreal EverPure Repair and Defend Conditioner 

The EverPure Sulfate-Free Color Care System Repair And Defend Conditioner is AMAZING. It has the same lovely scent that the shampoo has, but added is the scent of peppermint and you can feel the peppermint when you put the conditioner in your hair, your scalp has a cooling feel once the conditioner touches your hair which indicates to me that it really is a repairing line because peppermint helps to stimulate your scalp. Besides the scent and cool feeling the conditioner makes your hair feel like silk, it really is just amazing and has nice slip. I leave it in my hair for about 2-3 minutes before I wash it out. I had wrote in a blog post that I had used this conditioner after I had bleached my hair and before using the product my hair felt so matted that I couldn't get my fingers through it, but when I applied the conditioner, my hair immediately became manageable and smooth to the touch. I am not exaggerating at all. This stuff is the real deal. I've been using the shampoo and conditioner every time that I wash my hair since I got this VoxBox and that's saying something because I own a zillion different hair products. I give the conditioner an A+.

Loreal EverPure Repair Remedy Mask

As for the EverPure Repair Remedy Mask, gosh.. I'd buy this stuff by the gallon! It's an OUTSTANDING hair mask. I'm a big hair mask junkie and I own too many to store. This is honestly my second favorite hair mask ever. It's a fantastic product. The mask smells mostly mentholish and when you apply it to your hair your scalp starts to tingle like the conditioner, but even more so. The consistency of the mask is much thicker than the conditioner, which helps keep your hair coated longer, it has the same good slip that the conditioner has. I like to apply the mask to my hair after I've taken a t-shirt and I've squeezed out a bit of that water that was in my hair after washing the conditioner out. I'll apply the mask and leave it in for at least 5 minutes. Once I wash the mask out of my hair, my hair honestly feels like silk. I wear my hair naturally curly 98% of the time and I noticed that this mask made my curls spiral more than usual and my hair just feels super soft after using the mask. I give this mask an A++.

Everpure Repair and Defend Lotion 

So the EverPure Sulfate-free Color Care System Repair and Defend Lotion was a bit tricky to figure out. The first time that I used it, I loved it, it made my curls spiral like whoa. Then after that I think that it made my curls look a tad frizzy at the ends. BUT THEN I bleached my hair and now the lotion has been working for me. It's helping to construct my fragile curls. The bleach damaged my hair, but it didn't destroy my hair and it's already starting to bounce back. For some reason I think that the hair lotion is helping more with my damaged curls than my healthy curls because it's a repairing lotion and there must be some components in the product that make it work that way? The instructions suggest that you use 2 pumps of the lotion in your hair, but I actually use at least 3, 2 pumps isn't enough for the consistency that I like. The lotion definitely doesn't feel like a leave in conditioner, it feels more like a sculpting product if anything. The product doesn't have the best slip, but for what it does, it doesn't need to. I use the lotion with my favorite leave in conditioner, and my favorite gels. Before I bleached my hair I would have given this lotion a C, but after bleaching my hair I give this lotion a B+.

Before I started using the Loreal EverPure Repair and Defend products. Before I bleached my hair.

After I started using the Loreal EverPure Repair and Defend Products for about 2 weeks. After I bleached my hair.

I received all of the products in the EverPure VoxBox for free to test and share my honest feedback. If you aren't an Influenster already, I strongly suggest that you join! You will not regret it!! You may even thank me :)

Turn back Sarah, turn back before it's too late.

So I am going to break a HUGE curly girl method rule, I am going to bleach my hair....

And of course after I bleach my hair I am going to complain about my damaged hair and curse myself for bleaching it.

After one overall bleaching and another bleaching to touch up some roots that I missed. I had about 5 different colors in my hair before I bleached them all out and almost an inch of root. I had to bleach my roots twice.

Well, that was then and this is now, and I'm kinda only half cursing myself for bleaching it, maybe even one fourth cursing myself, because I did manage to keep my hair from getting completely destroyed. I didn't even have to cut a few inches off after the dye, I'm that good, I have no idea how or why, but I am.

Let's start with the few days prior to bleaching. I had gone without washing my hair a day, which turned into a few days because they say that you shouldn't wash your hair before you dye your hair, the more natural oils in your hair before dying, the better, that is what they say and so I had dirty greasy hair leading up to the dye. I had also done deep conditioning masks before the big dye and I was putting castor oil in my hair for about a month prior as well. I had also ordered a product called Bond Angel which is suppose to act like a wicked expensive product called Olaplex. Olaplex is suppose to protect your hair during bleaching and dying, it's like insurance for your hair. I couldn't afford to try the olaplex out and so I decided to try out a product that was suppose to work similarly. I got the product half off, In exchange for my review of the product which was a huge gamble. The system retails for $55.

Bond Angel

The last time that I had bleached my hair with real bleach was almost 10 yrs ago and I was, and am not super familiar with bleach. At the time of the bleaching in question I was straightening my hair almost daily and I was dying my whole head with 40 volume developers, not just my roots, why? I have no idea. My hair was definitely not in any condition to bleach, but I had no clue and so I bleached my hair a week after I decided to dye my hair a purple red. (Red is the hardest color to get out of your hair) My hair turned orange which is completely normal (which I had no idea about, because I didn't know what I was doing!) So I bleached my hair again to try to remove the orange and my hair was still orange and so I dyed my hair with a blonde color that I purchased at Sally's with more 40 volume developer, little did I know that all I had to do was tone my hair to get rid of the orange and save my hair from melting right off of my head. The remainder of my hair was a slimey ball of cotton candy. I swore I would never bleach my hair ever again. Years later and here we are.

Freaking out the night before, after watching bleach disaster videos on YouTube and having several second thoughts.

The night before I had bleached my hair I made the mistake of drinking some coffee at 8pm. (My caffeine cut off is usually in the early afternoon) So I couldn't get to sleep and I started doing more research about the whole bleach process, I wanted to be prepared. I watched more youtube videos, and read up about it on random blogs. Then I stumbled upon YouTube videos with titles such as "How Bleach Ruined My Hair" or "I had to shave my head after bleaching my hair". Now, there was a time that I would have totally shaved my head because I would love to start over fresh with brand new virgin hair, but I'm not prepared at the moment for that. The more disaster warning videos that I watched, the more frightened I became to bleach my hair. I probably only got 3 hrs of sleep the night prior to bleaching my hair, which was probably not the smartest move.

Before the big bleach, I had mega bags under my eyes, my hair was a billion colors and I had almost an inch of root.

The morning of the bleach I was prepared, and most of all I was ready to wash my grimy hair! First I did a strand test with the bleach because if the bleach was going to melt my hair, this was one way to determine if that would happen. I took a piece of hair and put some bleach in it, I waited 30 minutes and washed it out. I had no issues and so I set my bleaching station up and I was ready to go.

I had a mirror on a table so that I could see the back of my head and a towel for spillage, probably should have used a white towel, oh well.

I had the powder bleach, 20 volume cream developer, bond angel and Wella T18 toner ready for after I bleached.

My strand test, you can see how bleach turns your hair orange.

I mixed up the bleach, I used Clairol basic white, a giant tub of it was on sale for $14.99 at Sally's and I've heard it is one of the best bleaching powders. I poured in the generic 20 volume developer. I didn't measure the developer out like I do with hair dye, I watched tons of videos and no one measured it out, they just poured enough to make a consistency that they were happy with. I then added the bond angel no. 1 that I measured out before hand. The consistency was what I thought was ok, so I started to apply the bleach to my hair. I sectioned my hair into 4 parts and worked from the back of my head to the front. I realized immediately that I didn't add enough developer. The bleach became so thick and chalky, it was terrible. 

The measured out bleach powder and bond angel no 1.

What I thought was a good consistency for the bleach. I was wrong.

Half way through getting the bleach in my hair and already I was thinking about all of the mistakes that I made. First off, I should have measured 2 parts developer to one part bleach. I should have put the mixture into one of my coloring bottles, but because no one in the videos or tutorials measured their developer or put the bleach in a color bottle, I didn't. Using the bowl of bleach and the brush alone is insane, I had no control, but again, that's how everyone does it! I could hardly move my hair to get to parts of my hair that hadn't been bleached yet because the sections of my hair that I put bleach in were just hard and crusted and wouldn't move. It was a disaster.

 So I had finally gotten all of the bleach in my hair and I was looking at my hair and was thinking, there goes an entire year of getting my hair healthy. I thought that my hair was dying right in front of me, I could have cried. Then at one moment I thought that my hair was falling out and I was only 10 minutes into my 40 minute wait to let the bleach stay in my hair before I could wash it out. So I contemplated washing the bleach out, but I didn't. I only had a little bit of an anxiety attack and I occupied my mind until the bleach was ready to wash out to prevent a full blown panic attack.

So I started to wash the bleach out of my hair. After I washed the bleach out it was then time to use the 2nd step to my bond angel kit, no.2. The bond angel no. 2 has the  same consistency of conditioner, but in no way is it conditioner, the no.2 is suppose to finish the "bonding process". I put some of the no. 2 in my hair and my hair honestly felt like matted up dog hair, I couldn't even get the no.2 in my hair at first, not until I added a liberal amount. Then the instructions told me to comb the product through my hair with a wide tooth comb from the bottom of my hair to the root, there was no way. I had to add even more of the product to attempt to get anything through my hair. After I got the product in my hair I had to leave it in for 15-20 minutes and then wash out. So I let it sit and then washed it out, my hair still felt pretty matted, dry and brittle.

You can only shampoo and condition your hair after you use step 1 and 2 of bond angel, so I was anxious to condition my hair. I decided not to shampoo it, I didn't want to make it any dryer than it already was. I used Loreal EverPure Repair and Defend conditioner and I left that in my hair for about 3 minutes and then I used the EverPure Repair And Defend hair mask and left that in for about 5 minutes. To my surprise my hair didn't feel completely destroyed after I conditioned. It no longer felt matted, it felt somewhat smooth now. I could run my hands through my hair, it still felt somewhat damaged but it didn't feel like wet noodles, it didn't feel like elastic and all of my ends weren't completely fried. So I call that success!

Pretty impressed that my hair wasn't completely fried!

When my hair was still damp I put some Kinky Curly Knot Today in my hair along with some Ouidad gel. Then I let my hair air dry. I was going to tone my hair that same day but I noticed that I had missed a few spots towards the back of my head and also my roots didn't lift enough and so I had to apply more bleach to the patchy areas and I had to apply more bleach to my roots. I decided to give my hair a break and bleach those spots the next day and enjoy the very Hollywood bleach blonde hair that I had!

                      

The next day I had my mother who actually went to school for cosmetology help me out with the roots and she did an awesome job, I was so paranoid about getting bleach on my hair that had already been bleached and frying it. Before I bleached again I put tons of castor oil in my hair to make my hair more manageable when it came to sectioning my roots, and I wanted that added protection.

Missed roots

This time around when I was mixing the bleach, I measured out the developer with the little scoop that came with the bleach. I did 2 parts developer to one part bleach and the consistency was perfect. I was even able to pour it into one of my coloring bottles which totally helped control where the bleach was going.

Roots take two

Finally no more roots

Freshly washed and conditioned after the second bleaching

It's gold Jerry! Gold!

I mean, can you even tell that a curly girly JUST bleached her hair? Mystic Devine is heaven in a jar.

 After I washed the bleach out of my hair for the second time and I repeated the bond angel no. 1 and 2 steps again. I conditioned again and I decided to do an Argan oil mask from this company called Mystic Devine. It was one of those masks that they have at the counter when you check out at Sally's. Usually those masks do absolutely nothing for my hair and if anything they make my hair feel like straw, but I decided to try the mask out because I really wanted to do a repairing mask. So I cut open the package and I applied the mask to my hair, I couldn't believe how instantly my hair felt like silk after putting the stuff in my hair! I left the mask on for an hr and when I washed it out my hair didn't even feel like it had just been bleached not just once but twice! I am in love with the stuff, next time there's a Sally's trip Mystic Devine is the first product that I am going to put in the cart, it's biblically good. 

Applying the toner

Toner has been applied to my entire head

After leaving the toner in my hair for about 10 minutes, my hair appears to be purple, that's what gets rid of orange and brassiness

After all of the bleaching my hair was pretty orange and I really wanted to get it toned with the Wella Color Charm T18 toner and I had read that most everyone tones their hair the same day that they bleached their hair and so I decided to tone my damp hair following the Mystic Devine hair mask that I had just done. I was able to get away with using one bottle of the toner, I even had a little extra to spare. I had used the bond angel in the toner as well because it contained more 20 developer. I used a clear developer in the toner instead of the cream. I had no issues applying the toner to my entire head. I left the toner on for about 20-30 minutes, however long the box said to leave it in for. 

Right after washing the toner out

Before toning and after

I dried the front of my hair with my hot air brush just to see what my silver hair would look like semi straight

When I washed the toner out my hair actually felt more damaged than it did when I had bleached it, that's when I could see a lot of fried dead ends. I definitely should have given my hair a break, but I didn't and it is what it is. My hair looked really cool after I toned it, it looked silver. I was just relieved that I was finally done dying it for a little while!

                   

After a few washes my color was a very pretty pale whitish color. I've done countess hair masks to try to repair my hair from the bleaching and it's only been 2 weeks and my hair is already bouncing back. I am really impressed. I'm not sure if it's because of Loreal EverPure Repair and Defend products that I'm using or the bond angel or the hair treatments, but I'm happy that my hair isn't completely fried and I didn't even have to cut a few inches of hair off, which I was totally prepared to do. My curls are starting to come back too! Now it's time to start playing around with some powder pinks!

Finally getting my curls back! Here I'm using Kinky Curly Knot Today, Loreal EverPure Repair and Defend hair lotion, Curl Keeper and Ouidad. I did a lot of a scrunching and only a few finger curls.

So I didn't turn back. Through dangers untold and hardships unnumbered, I had fought my way to have platinum hair. Bleach, you have no power over me!