Hair

Prologue

I wrote this essay while on vacation last June, in between the end of chemotherapy and the beginning of radiation therapy for breast cancer.  I was still bald at the time I wrote it.  It is the story of my hair, and an attempt to put into words the feelings surrounding the experience of losing my hair due to cancer treatment.  I hope that by sharing, it will help others facing a similar situation.

Hair

Every morning when I was a young girl, my mother brushed my reddish blond hair and tied it with ribbons that hung on a nail by our basement door.  I remember once, on picture day, the school photographer called me Goldilocks because he liked my hair.  When I was eight years old, I got a "Dorothy Hamill" haircut, like the famous Olympic ice skater.  She had just won a gold medal and her short bobbed hair style was very popular that year.  A few years later, Mom gave me a home perm.  We called it my Bette Midler look.  

All through my teens, twenties and thirties, I had a love-hate relationship with my strawberry blond hair.  It was thick and wavy, and was always complimented by hair stylists, but cursed by me for having a mind of it's own. Sometimes, in frustration, I wished I had someone else's hair, or on a really bad hair day, I even wondered what it would be like if I shaved it off.  When my children were small, I decided to have my hair cut short.  I hated it and cried in front of the mirror, wondering what had possessed me to do that.  And there were other bad haircuts over the years. Sometimes hair clips, headbands, or bandannas were called into play until it grew back out.  Thankfully, by the time I reached my forties, I finally embraced all of my hair's qualities, good and bad.  I came to peace with it.  I let it grow, let it wave, let it do it's own thing.  But I realize now that I had always taken my hair for granted.

Whether short or long, permed or natural, my hair was always a big part of my identity and my daily life.  I remember all the years of hair dryers, curling irons, gel, mousse, straighteners, perms and hair cuts. How much time and energy and money did I spend over decades on my hair?

Then, at age 46, I was diagnosed with breast cancer.  And when my doctor told me that he recommended chemotherapy and that I would lose my hair, I felt my heart break.  And yes, I cried.  I cried and I mourned the loss of my hair.  I called my sister one day shortly after my diagnosis.  "I don't want to lose my hair," I said to her as I cried big buckets of fat tears.  At the time, it was somehow even scarier than losing my breast.

Before

On my 47th birthday, as I prepared to begin chemo and the inevitable loss of my hair, I decided to have my hair cut in a very short pixie style.  I had been wearing it long, below my shoulders, and decided it would be easier to lose it all if I cut it short first.  It would put me more in control of the situation. While waiting for the hair dresser to call my name, I looked up and saw two of my best friends walking into the salon with smiles on their faces.  I hugged them, so surprised and happy that I wouldn't have to face it alone.  Suddenly, it was fun.  They took pictures before, during and after the haircut.  We giggled as the stylist put my hair into a big ponytail and then cut it off.  It felt like a celebration or a victory, instead of a defeat.  It put me in control of the situation.  That afternoon, when my three children came home from school, they felt like they had a new mom.  My teenage son said I looked like Jamie Lee Curtis in the movie we had watched together a few weeks earlier,  "Freaky Friday".  They liked it.  And I liked it too.  I knew that it would be OK to lose it now.  Although, I must admit that a little voice inside me said, "Maybe I'll be lucky and it won't happen to me.  My hair is so healthy and thick.  How could it all fall out?"  "But if it does, I'll be OK," I thought to myself.

During

After

My health insurance paid for a wig, so I went to a boutique for cancer patients at a local hospital.  They led me back to a room full of wigs and hats.  I selected a few wigs to try on and they sat me down in a chair in front of a mirror, just like in a beauty salon.  The first wig I tried on was horrible.  It didn't look like me at all.  "NO!" I said emphatically.  The second wig was the same color as my hair, and was in a very similar style to my new hair cut.  The stylist put it on my head and declared, "You look cute!  It looks like your hair!"  "Yes," I said, as I reached up to touch it.  "It will do."  She packed it up on a Styrofoam wig stand, wrapped it in purple paper, and put it in a purple bag, along with some hats and scarves I had also selected.  As I walked out to my car, I thought to myself that it was such a pretty package to carry home.   It could almost be a treat or a gift to myself, like I was heading home after a day of shopping.  "Yes, it will be OK.  I am ready."

And then the day came, somewhere in between my first and second round of chemo.  I felt it first, before it fell out.  I didn't know that it would physically hurt.  The roots of my hair seemed to scream out in protest, "Help, you're poisoning us!"  A few days later, it started falling out, just wisps at first, but within days it was coming out everywhere.  I tried keeping it under a hat, but it was coming faster than I could handle.  Red and blond, I saw those golden locks that I'd loved and hated my whole life, coming out in bigger and bigger clumps.  After a week of shedding, I'd had enough.  I was ready.  "Time to take control," I said.  "It's time," I told my husband.

He didn't mess around.  He didn't make a fuss.  He got a bar stool from the basement and put it in our bathroom, closed the door and got out the electric clippers we used so many times over the years to give our boys their buzz cuts.  I stripped down to my underwear and a camisole and sat on the bar stool, strangely calm.  The clippers felt good on my head, like my hair was happy to be set free from the poison.  I didn't look in the mirror as he was shaving it.  I felt the short hairs falling on my shoulders, saw them landing in my lap and on the floor around me.  When it was over, the Leonard Cohen song, "Hallelujah" as sung by K.D. Lang, came on my I pod's random play.  "She put me in her kitchen chair, broke my throne, and cut my hair....Hallelujah."  I looked in the mirror and put my hand to my head.  I didn't cry.  While I certainly didn't feel beautiful, I told myself, "It's not that bad. It's OK.  No looking back."

After that, I went through months of wearing hats, scarves, and wigs, perched on my shiny, bald head.  I didn't want people to see me with no hair.  It was hard to look in the mirror.  I tried to find myself in the reflection of the "cancer girl" who looked back at me.  "Who am I without my hair?"  I thought.  But there were no tears.  There were days where I felt down about it, but mostly, the hard part was before.  Just the thought of losing it, not the actual reality is what made me cry.

Some of My Hats

Chemo is behind me now, five weeks today.  The last two days, while taking a shower, I reached up to feel my fuzzy head.  Soft now, not spiky.  It's coming back in, so light colored I can't tell if it's blond, or white.  Like a baby, I feel I am being reborn, discovering the world anew, finding the new post-cancer me.  Trying to fill in the missing pieces.  And growing back my hair.

Epilogue

It is now January 23, 2016, over a year since I got that pre-chemo hair cut.  Here's the rest of the story.

The New Me

My hair seemed to grow slowly, at least to me.  I continued to cover my head most of the summer because I wasn't comfortable with how it looked.  It was hot, so I seldom wore my wig, favoring lightweight caps instead.  Finally, by mid-August, when I finished radiation, I felt like it was long enough to begin venturing out in public uncovered.  Even though it still wasn't the way I wanted it to look, I was tired of hiding.  I wanted to just be me again.  My husband and children encouraged me.  They told me I looked good.   I don't know why, but it seemed like a big deal going out that way for the first time when my eleven year old daughter and I went to the grocery store.  But again, the reality wasn't as bad as I thought it would be.  I learned that putting on a big smile made everything better.  It made me look better and helped my attitude as well.

One of the hardest things I've ever done was to show up for coffee with my friends on the first day of school.  It was the first time most of them had seen me without a head covering.  Now, let me just say that I have a wonderful group of friends that meets at a local coffee shop every Wednesday morning during the school year, and they had all been extremely supportive and encouraging throughout my treatment.  I had posted pictures of myself on Facebook showing the progress of my hair and had been totally open with people about my hair loss.  However, it had only been a few days since I'd first gone out in public bare headed and I was still not quite used to it yet.  Nevertheless, I was determined to "be myself."  It was like I had to do it to prove to myself that I was OK with being me.  I knew that if I could hold my head proudly for all the world to see, it would somehow make me feel stronger inside too.  "Fake it till you make it," I told myself.  And you know what?  It worked.  I started thinking of it as my "bad ass" hairdo.  I did feel strong, and I was not ashamed.  I actually felt kind of chic sporting my nearly bald head and that was how I began to feel better about it, and about the whole experience.

First Post-Chemo Haircut

In retrospect, the whole hair loss thing really wasn't as bad as I thought it would be.  I'm glad it's over now, but all in all, it made me feel stronger and more confident. Yesterday, I had my "new hair" cut for the first time.  I grew it out as long as I could stand it, and when it got too fuzzy and unmanageable, I decided spur of the moment to get it cut.  I sent a text to one of the friends who met me at the salon last year, and she came along to snap some photos.  It was emotional and triumphant.  It now looks like that first pre-chemo cut.  My old hair color is nearly back to normal.  I finally feel like I look like myself again!  Now, the question is....to keep it short, or grow it long again.  And that's a much better question to ponder than, "What hat should I wear today?"