Women's Hair Loss Project

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. 

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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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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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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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I have…

22 Years of Hair Loss

5 Unsuccessful Treatments

8 Years Feeling Alone ( Started The Women’s Hair Loss Project in 2007)

13 Years Spent Feeling Helpless/ Powerless 

12 Years of PRP

9 Years of Wearings Wigs

9 Years of a Shaved Back Hair Cut

And a partridge in a pear tree…..

I wish I had the exact formula to provide everyone, that one recipe to get you to feeling better, moving forward – closer to acceptance, but the one thing I do know as well as knowing my hair is not coming back, is that everyone is so different. We all process very differently, we all need to do and try things differently, and sometimes one of those things is actually doing nothing. 

I mean that in a passive and active sense. Passively doing nothing, as in we cannot AT THIS TIME make a move, and ACTIVELY doing nothing, meaning we decided, we aren’t going to do anything for our hair loss and that works just fine. 

There are zero hard and fast rules when it comes to dealing with, living and treating hair loss. 

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Over the years, I’ve often been asked “How did you get over your hair loss?” But I didn’t get “over” my hair loss, rather, I learned to accept it and I learned to live with it.

Hair loss was traumatic for me, it impacted every part of my life, countless decisions were framed around it, including many times choosing to not treat myself medically because I was afraid ANY medication would make my hair loss worse, so at times I had compromised my health for hair loss.

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I wear wigs because of my hair loss, if I shave my head, it’s because of my hair loss – those are present day realities. I treat my hair loss with PRP. Saying I’m “over” my hair loss would not be an accurate statement.

What I CAN say is I have quite successfully learned to live with hair loss, accept it, no longer feel a prisoner to it, no longer compromise my health for it (physically or mentally) and that’s a solid win in my book. I couldn’t have hoped for more, truly. Quite honestly, that’s as close to getting over it that I will be, and I am really content in that, because I can actually accept my reality, no longer be owned by it, I can live my life – I can feel free from hair loss, and also at the same time, not be “over it.”

I’m proud and have much gratitude for having reached this place I have in my hair loss life, there was a time I never thought it was possible.

Let me know your thoughts below, would love to hear from you!

Sending much love to all!
XOXO
~Y

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