In this episode I discuss some personal stories and reflect on how I came to accept and learn to live with hair loss, the path that helped to get me to where I am today. Hair loss is ever-evolving and my own journey has been just that. I have 25 years of hair loss, since the age of 21, and I got a 2nd type of hair loss (inflammatory alopecia ) in 2022. I shaved my head May 2023 and I have worn wigs since 2012.
My hair loss journey has not been easy, and finding out the lighting does strike twice definitely impacted me, but one thing that has never changed over the years, is my desire to never want to live a hostage to hair loss ever again, and staying in front of that, whatever that means and whatever that takes.
So many women and men are struggling day in and out to just get through the day and process this entire thing, the devastation, and I understand. In this episode I share my thoughts on all this and I hope it helps in some way, to at least know the ability to get through this exists, the ability to reclaim your life exists. That is real, and you can do it.
People say you’re beautiful without hair, or it’s just hair, who you are isn’t tied to your hair, you are still you without it, the people that love you love you for you with or without hair and these are all TRUTHS.
But I think the part here that’s missed, it’s not about someone else being FINE that we are bald or thinning. Thats nice and all, but, the part that is missed is that the person who is losing themselves does often change when they can no longer feel like themselves, see themselves, their lives are reduced often plagued in struggle and suffering because they can’t feel right in this new version of themselves which by the way extends beyond a mirror. You can rip all the mirrors out of my house but I know what hair feels like and that has an affect on how I can feel.
So yes, the world can love someone bald and say you are all the things you were before and hair doesn’t matter, but that’s one tiny portion of this equation, the bigger part is the person dealing with this often can’t stay afloat to feel as good as they did before, which means often their mental health suffers, their relationships suffer.
So hair matters, to those it matters to, and no one can say what anyone should or shouldn’t feel in this regard.
“Well, least you look good bald” “Well, you’re lucky you have that jawline.” “You don’t even need the wig.”
While it’s nice, it’s never changed how I had to navigate this process myself, which was unique to me because our journeys in this are unique to us, there can be similarities and strength in community, but this journey is our own and you get to feel all the feels.
The Rest Is Still Unwritten… Natasha Bedingfield. I never forget those words, that song. but really those words, because it’s so true, we get to decide, we get a vote in this, even amongst all the heartache, the loss…we get choices.
Many times we feel helpless, powerless, I know I have MANY times for different reasons, and it would take time to figure out my way, different ways, adjusting ALONG the way to learning to successfully live with hair loss without feeling like I was its prisoner, its hostage. I was held captive for over a decade and once I got a taste of freedom I just never wanted to return to the way I lived before. That’s a terrifying thought. I have 25 years of hair loss. Female pattern baldness began at 21, and I got an inflammatory alopecia in 2022, at the age of 44. Lightening really does strike twice, yet I buy lotto tickets and never show up a winner there, but I’m a 2x winner of hair loss.
Hair loss has continued to surprise me over the years, in new and unexpected ways. In acceptance I’ve had the highest highs, but not without some lows. Maybe the lows exist to allow us to appreciate the higher moments. Sometimes people write and say “Please tell me it gets better” It does. It really does. I never thought I could live the life I have, WITH hair loss, after finding a way to make it work at 34, which began after I started wearing wigs, and learning I could have some control in how I got to portray myself to myself and to the world, I could make this work, it wouldn’t be perfect, but doable.
Hair loss is so complex I think sometimes people are surprised to hear me admit “I’m not OVER my hair loss” I think it’s much cooler and hip to say you are, but the reality is I move mountains to make hair loss work in my life, I didn’t simply shave my head (which I did May 2023 due to this 2nd hair loss) and call it a day, snap two fingers to the side, brush off my shoulder and say well good ridden, yea no, but I accepted change, accepted I had to accept. You don’t have to be OVER something to find peace, and acceptance, and move through new phases of this journey to find new depths of self love that builds even more resilience, but sometimes you can get torn down before coming back stronger.
For 14 years I flew from Los Angeles to Florida every 4-5 months for PRP treatments, that began in 2009. It wasn’t a cure, it was just part of the process that made it work. I began wearing wigs in 2012, so of course it wasn’t a cure, but it helped me to feel better in all of this. I stopped those treatments after my last treatment Jan 2023 because against this second hair loss it was not effective. That ended up being third non responsive failed treatment, with 2 fails in 2022, I just could no longer justify the effort and cost, and I felt lower afterwards because the trips were tiring, and now no longer providing anything.
In this video I share how I wash my lace top, lace front wigs and provide some wig care, general wig knowledge, thoughts and insights along with some wig buying considerations in my wig wash day vlog.
There are several ways to wash a wig, and it does come down to finding what works best for you, I am very careful in how I wash my wigs and do have a specific way I have learned to wash them that I think lends itself to being safer, causing less potential damage to the wig.
This type of washing method is specific to how I learned to wash my Lace top / lace front / closed wefted wigs, and it is different than how I previously washed the type of wigs I wore which where fully hand tied, closed front wigs – those I washed on a mannequin head to help prevent inversions.
I don’t think hair loss is given the respect it deserves as the life altering devastating disorder it is. I have 25 years of hair loss, not one type but two, and I successfully lived with my hair loss for over a decade. Getting a second hair loss devastated me in ways I just could never anticipate and the pain of the loss continues to be reactivated in new ways. I share this story because I want women to know their feelings are valid, ALL OF THEM. Hair loss effects everyone differently, and we are allowed to feel our feels and need to give ourselves some grace within this difficult process.
Hair loss is hard, traumatic, beyond excruciating at times…. I’ll never say otherwise. I am one of the most resistant people to change and completely inflexible. Those that know me are rapidly nodding their head up and down, because they know. I have got to got to be in the top top top 5 % of people who simply do not like change in any way shape or form, my entire mental stability relies on control and order…. Enter Hair Loss.
Why do I share this? Certainly not to wave the “hey look at how weird I am flag” and slap the badge over my forehead for all the word to see I got issues that exceed hair loss, but it’s to say if someone like me, so resistant could find the ability to let go within this, find acceptance, accept change, accept the progressive nature of my hair loss, accept the unacceptable, Accept wearing wigs, accept that NOW I do have to shave my head for hair loss to be able to live with it without it taking over my life….. it is accessible for so many women. ??I’m not new to this, I have 25 years of loss, and the first 13 I lived in darkness, resistance to change, nothing will matter unless ALL my hair comes back. Well that’s like saying I can never live my life and be happy unless I’m 5’10. It cannot happen.
This was the hand I was dealt, it took losing over a decade of my life to find the ability to begin to work with this, not against it. My wish to other women is they don’t lose the time like I did, know hope exists, know the strength to change exists even if you are in that top percentile of resistance to change. We can. I’m living proof.
I received a DM today from a woman extremely distraught from a wig purchase she made online, seeing them through instagram and the wig did not work out. She was unable to return it and was also offered no resources to possibly be able to resell it. I guarantee you the company she purchased this wig from knows of multiple places to possibly sell this online because it is an Instagram brand, and I know of several places that you can resell a piece online and I have never even done so. Why not offer SUPPORT, suggestions, help?
If you are are choosing to sell wigs to women with hair loss this MUST be treated with the respect it deserves, women’s are looking to this to help get their life back, this isn’t a cookie purchase. Have care FIRST for the client over the desire to just sell a piece and not offer any post after care support, even if only in resources.
When I saw this article, I was shocked, in just the hair loss aspect alone, my life was forever changed, in the most negative way by making the decision to take the pill.
I started to lose my hair at 21, the pill kicked in my genetic predisposition for female pattern baldness, something I did not know was even a possibility. It would take me over a decade to find a way to live with hair loss, and I lost my entire 20s, it’s a blur of sadness, depression, and losing myself, watching myself erode in the mirror, and then blaming myself for having caused this TO MYSELF, because I made the decision to take the pill.
That is the past and my present, and my story is my truth, and not misinformation, women sharing the ways their lives have been affected helps 1 ) to heal themselves by discussing it and 2 ) helps others maybe not have to go through the same thing, or saves a loved one in the future.
Just because we didn’t go to medical school does not mean our stories are not valid, it does not mean it’s misinformation, and also keep in mind just because it hasn’t happened to you does not mean it cannot happen and does happen to other women.
It is up to us to share our stories, educate ourselves, this is our body and our life. For anyone truly interested in getting more educated about the Birth Control Pill, I high recommend The documentary The Business of Birth Control.
Your hair loss journey is your own, your wig journey or hair loss treatment journey, is your own and cannot be compared to others. Striving to find peace for ourselves is all we can do, and with hair loss that is no small feat, and wrought with challenges.
To learn to adapt AGAIN, in dealing with a second type of hair loss, which then changed how I did Everything.. needing to shave my head, adjusting to a yet another very different reflection, wearing a different type of wig (lace fronts) as I no longer have a hairline to blend close fronts , and then existing in a wig struggle of not feeling like I can get everything I feel I need, as I want, working on it, but mostly trying to make peace with it all really, because that is all that is in my control. ??It’s hair loss, it will never be perfect, and I’ve never believed there ever was a perfect wig, not now and not before, I don’t own a perfect wig, I never have, it’s definitely harder now though.
I continue on my journey to make it all fit, because there is no alternative, but some days you get frustrated and want to cry, but the plumber is coming so he ruins your cry game, so instead you post to instagram to share your thoughts and message.
Mostly to let you know after 25 years of hair loss, 12 years of wearing wigs, getting slapped up side the face on year 23 with a second hair loss… I understand. I get it. I also know the power and ability and capability in getting through.
Growing up you hear, how a “bad hair day” just RUINS the day… a bad hair day? How bout irreversible progressive loss with no end in sight. You hear how a woman is revamped by a new cut and color, brought to life again….. all those things are things, but somehow all this is missed and lost when it comes to understanding the person actually losing a fundamental part of themselves, a body part, their frame, their image.
It’s not just hair, it never was “just hair,” not to me, and not to millions of other women and men experiencing hair loss.
I write to share and spread awareness, look around on tv, movies, “he’s got great hair” “she’s got great hair.” If these weren’t things that mattered why mention them? They matter. I liken my hair to a body part and losing it I lost a body part and a huge part of myself, and I had to learn to rebuild myself up from that, but it is sad how often people minimize this devastating loss.
I’ve heard women tell me their hair loss was worse than cancer, worse than back / spine surgery…worse than XYZ, some really difficult things, and yet hair loss is still looked at as meh, it’s not Meh, it’s a part of who we are and for many contributes to our ability to function in this world and our mental well being.
I want to first write that I am not a fan of hair transplants for women, I personally
think that most women with androgenetic alopecia are NOT candidates for
this procedure. Having said that, I get emailed all the time from women looking
for a good hair transplant surgeon.
If you are deadset on having a consultation, please visit the International Alliance
of Hair Restoration Surgeons. The IAHRS (http://www.iahrs.org)
is an organization that selectively screens skilled and ethical hair transplant
surgeons. Read
my thoughts about hair transplants here.
