April 2021

You Don’t Need To Prove Your Hair Loss To Anyone

by Y on April 21, 2021

When I first started to lose my hair I would try and discuss what what was happening, and every time I was meant with a smack in the face, or what felt like a smack in the face. Since I started off this process with a ton of hair, for many years into my hair loss, I still “Looked” like I had a lot of hair, even though my loss was very real, very profound and taking a tremendous toll on me.

I wanted to be SEEN so badly, and I was dismissed. It was really very hurtful, it shut me down – and it made my already bad situation, worse. 

Follow me on Instagram: @whlpnetwork

Please realize, you don’t need to prove your hair loss, you don’t need another person’s validation for what you feel or what you do. 

Nobody, and I do mean NOBODY knows you, like you. Nobody knows what your hair was, and nobody has any reference point to compare it to like you do. 

The same thing is true for if you want to treat your hair loss, or wear wigs. There is no approval needed by anyone. None. You need to do what is best for you.

You cannot live your life waiting and hoping another person gets it. 

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Dealing With Hair Loss: Acceptance, Treatment, Wigs – Only You Decide

by Y on April 16, 2021

Living with hair loss is difficult. So difficult. Conceptually imagining that it was a possibility was a complete improbability for me for many years and I understand it takes so much out of us. There also can be this external pressure to feel like we need to be something or somewhere other than where we are. Which honestly, makes everything much more difficult.

I received this comment on my video, “It’s OK To Not Be OK About Your Hair Loss” and I wanted to share my thoughts on dealing with hair loss, deciding to treat it or not, wearing wigs or not and really just allowing yourself to be true to yourself and not feeling pressure to feel anything other than what you FEEL.

She wrote: I feel the pressure to be positive for everyone else all the time about this hair loss. I don’t see a day coming that I can accept this …but I’m trying. One moment to the next. Thank you for validating our feelings. Only someone else living with this can truly understand.

We need to remove any pressure we are putting on ourselves to be happy or positive for ANYONE else about OUR hair loss. You do not need to be happy about a devastating situation to make someone else more comfortable in their world. I understand the pressure to feel that way, but I want to let you and everyone else know, this doesn’t help us deal with with one of the most devastating afflictions to women.

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It Is OK – To Not Be OK With Your Hair Loss

by Y on April 14, 2021

I wanted you to HEAR me speak The words and not just read them on the screen. 

I wanted you to take them in, I wanted you to feel the meaning and what I am saying. So I have recorded my words to this video and shared some of my love, including my baby HOPE. The male kitten I got from the Spanish Harlem shelter in 2001, and who I name HOPE because I was devastated by my hair loss and needed a reminder that HOPE was always around. I am pretty sure I still haven’t recovered from his passing in 2019, but that is a different story.

For 13 years I have communicated with women online, and I know the pain from hair loss, not just my own – but in hearing your stories. I spent over the first half of my hair loss life (of 22 years) not believing, feeling or thinking that things could get better, but it did and it is important for me to let those know, that need to know – it can better, that it definitely can. 

Often I find that women are so hard on themselves, comparing themselves to other women, which makes the process of working through anything so much more difficult, and especially in dealing with your hair loss – something that is plenty sufficient to deal with on its own.

You only have to do what feels right for you, not for anyone else.

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My 5 Failed Hair Loss Treatments

by Y on April 13, 2021

Some people have asked what are my 5 failed hair loss treatments I made mention of in a previous post. 

Important to note, everyone is different and some of these medications do actually work for other people, for me they were a no go.

There are actually a few more than this, but these are the main ones.

I separate them into two categories, ones I took, but didn’t have a negative impact on my life really, so I didn’t regret it.

And then there are the others I took that I regretted.

The three I didn’t regret and I took within the first two years of my hair loss, approximately 1999-2001:

  1. Nioxin
  2. Rogaine
  3. Finasteride (Propecia)

The two I do regret, and took from approximately 2000-2013:

  1. Ortho Tri-Cyclen
  2. Aldacone 200mg (Brand name of Spironolactone)
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Women & Hair Transplants | Watch – Be Informed

by Y on April 7, 2021

I was prompted to make this video because as I was scrolling my instagram feed, I saw an ad for female hair transplantation. As a whole, in general, women with androgenetic alopecia aka female pattern baldness (diffuse thinning of hair ) are not candidates for hair transplants. 

It is important for women to be able to make informed decisions regarding the treatment of their hair loss.  While there are a lot of sub optimal things that occur online that result in disappointment, frustration, loss of money etc., this is ONE thing that is extra disturbing to see targeted to women with hair loss, because without the proper information, women who are not candidates and choose to undergo this treatment may not only lose money, but they could *potentially* be left with physical scars and in a much worse position than when they began. 

The scar of hair loss to my life is sufficient, I don’t think additional physical ones are needed. 

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Living With Hair Loss: The Choices We Make – Taking Back Your Power | Podcast Ep #12

by Y on April 2, 2021

This episode of The Women’s Hair Loss Project podcast focuses on moving forward through hair loss, and what that looked like for me. I know a lot of women are in a place of feeling they will not be able to accept, they will not be able to live with hair loss – but you can, I know you can. I am living proof of that. 

I share different parts of my story and journey to let you know it took different things along the way to get me to the place I am today. 

Believing YOU CAN emotionally get past hair loss is so important.  Removing the fixed mentality that things have to be a certain way – that fixed mentality kept me stuck in my own prison for over a decade, till the one day things changed. I changed. My mindset changed. I learned I could be okay even though my hair wasn’t going to come back. I accepted my hair loss, I accepted what is, I accept wearing wigs.  I found a new way to live, and I found it when I was open to it. It was there along, but I wasn’t open to it. 

I sat down today to speak to you, to speak to the woman who needs to hear these words from the person who has lived through it, and who knows deeply all the emotions and feelings that hair loss brings with it. 

We don’t always feel like we have any choices, but we do. It’s not always the choices we want, but we do get choices. Those choices empower us, and bring us closer to reclaiming ourselves and our power.

When I stopped feeling like everything was happening to me, out of my control, without any say of my own whatsoever, and began to make the choices I needed to,  and take action over how I dealt with my hair loss – everything changed. 

To the person that needs to hear this today, there is hope.

Sending much love to all!
XOXO
~Y

Follow me on Instagram @whlpnetwork

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