Fact or fiction: do you really go gray from stress?

Maybe you don't worry about it at all, but for many people, getting the first gray hair is a life-changing moment (and not in a good way). There are people for whom this moment is delayed by nature until they are well into their forties, but unfortunately, it can also be that you start seeing the first gray hairs around your thirties, or even earlier. In those cases, there is one standard reaction from the people you tell: that’s due to stress. But is that really true? Can you go gray from stress?

The honest answer is unfortunately: yes. Stress can really cause you to go gray earlier. This has to do with the amount of adrenaline you produce. Besides the fact that adrenaline increases your heart rate and makes you breathe faster, which is already uncomfortable, adrenaline also affects the pigment in the hair follicles. These pigment cells influence the color of your hair, just as pigment affects your skin color. The production of pigment in the hair follicles is impaired by a lot of adrenaline, causing the hair to lose its color. And that is the moment you will start encountering the first gray hairs.

Besides stress, your genes still have a lot of influence on how early you go gray. But stress is of course not good for you anyway, so it remains wise to pay attention to whether you are taking enough time for yourself. If you have a lot of stress from external factors, it is difficult to do something about it, but you can always try to learn to cope better with stress with the help of, for example, a psychologist.