Wouldn’t it be nice if the world automatically empathized with, understood, and supported women experiencing medical hair loss? If you’ve ever contemplated such a wish, did you stop to recall your own awareness of medical hair loss prior to losing your hair? If you’re like me, you knew nothing about medical hair loss, had never thought about it happening to you, and hence could not empathize with others experiencing medical hair loss. If you are like me, you now wish that you could walk out into a world where people understand and are sensitive to your feelings about your medical hair loss. Let’s create the world together. You can contribute to our efforts to raise the consciousness of both the public and our medical professionals and tell the world that “IT IS NOT JUST HAIR!!!” How, you ask. Please take one of our brief surveys exploring individual experiences with medical hair loss. 4Women.com has designed two surveys, one for women who have lost some or all of their hair due to Alopecia (Alopecia Hair Loss Survey) and one for women who have experienced medical hair loss in the context of chemotherapy treatments.(Cancer Hair Loss Survey) Just click on the appropriate link. We will integrate the results of our surveys with research we are conducting into an article addressing the emotional side of medical hair loss. The more responses we get to the surveys, the more effectively we will be able to address the broad spectrum of emotional experiences around medical hair loss. By contributing to our efforts to raise awareness about the emotional consequences of medical hair loss, you will help us to help others experiencing medical hair loss, making the world an easier place to live as a woman with medical hair loss.
I receive many emails from women around the world, thanking me for creating a product that has made such a difference to them. The irony is that I want to thank them. I received this email this morning: “Thank you for the link to your blogs. I have just viewed your podcast and was so inspired! I admire you for making the choices that you have and for sharing your talents and passions with women who are facing cancer and/or hair loss. I knew from the beginning that a wig was not for me. I have heard from too many women that it wasn’t comfortable and if they had one, they never wore it. I can’t say that I have always admired my body, but the one part I actually like (most of the time) was my hair and the thought of losing it, even temporarily was hard. It was also hard for my children. Anyhow, I looked at a lot of head coverings and none of them really fit what I had in mind until I came across a flyer for your beaubeaus at my drs. office. They are easy to use, comfortable and look great! Without it, I am sure I would be a lot more anxious to appear in public. And the personal way in which you conduct your business is especially refreshing. Thank you, thank you, thank you. ”
My connection with these special women and girls is a rare life gift - in helping them, I have discovered a true meaning to my own life. “Life is not how you weather the storm - but how you dance in the rain”.
No doubt you’ve heard all the forecasts - record voter turnout. If you haven’t already stood in line and cast your vote, you might be getting worried just how long you’ll have to wait or when the lines are the shortest. Don’t let them stop you. When I went to vote I was told by a poll-worker that I had a minimum hour-and-a-half wait; which turned out to be only 30 minutes. Be sure and check the hours of your voting place and the rules governing those still in line at closing time. To me it felt good to be part of a long line of citizens who want to participate in our democracy. For too many years this country has experienced voter apathy. Early voting numbers would indicate that is not the case in this election. Find your polling locale online atmaps.google.com.
What a gift it was to attend my son’s wedding donning my new hair, having grown new hair after 7 years of baldness due to Alopecia. As I’ve written previously, I am worried I will become attached to my new hair and if/when I lose it again, I will need to go through the entire grieving process again. With this in mind, I’ve been very mindful not to draw attention, mine or anyone else, to the fact that my hair has re-sprouted. I told almost no one in advance of the wedding that my hair had grown back. I thought that for once I would be part of a public event without drawing attention to my head. How wrong I was!! I caught everyone-from my own brother to one of my best friends- eyeing my hair from all angles and seemingly desperate to question me about it. The absolute irony was that they weren’t curious about my hair; everyone wanted to know about my wig. Apparently my new hair wasn’t very convincing. And while no one ever had the courage to comment on or question my wigs when I wore them, they couldn’t stop themselves from commenting on my newest wig, my real hair. I can’t seem to win this appearance battle!
As a mother, one valuable lesson I learned was that the most compassionate and effective way of responding to seemingly unjustified toddler tantrums was to articulate for my son what he might have been feeling, and why he might have felt so - in other words, to recognize and validate his feelings regardless of whether I could truly identify with so much frustration or sadness over seemingly trivial stuff. Despite such an epiphany, I didn’t always succeed in putting that emotional wisdom to use, often because I was just too tired or distracted to listen to my inner wisdom. Well, I’m not a sleep-deprived mother anymore, but I find many analogies in my past and present experience with medical hair loss.
Here I am, having just sprouted new hair after 7 years of baldness, and already I am catching myself mindlessly committing the same emotional faux-pas many a well-meaning friend committed during my most emotionally turbulent times with Alopecia.In spite of not wanting to become attached to my newly grown hair because of the likely hood of its temporary status,I find myself obsessing about my hair style, the color, andmy good and bad hairs days. What’s worse is I even caught myself obsessing out loud to a long-time friend with alopecia. Only later did I remember how deeply it used to bother my recently bald self when friends would insensitively complain to me about their less than hoped for new hairstyle or vent to me about a bad hair day. I am stunned by how quickly I had seemingly lost my sensitivity to the emotions of other women living with medical hair loss and baldness. Not only did I feel so guilty for going on about my new hair with my beautiful bald friend, but I got to wondering what this would mean for me when I almost inevitably lose my hair again. After so years of depression and seclusion, I had finally made peace with my condition, but how quickly we forget. I worry that I will have to re-ride the same emotional roller-coaster when I again lose my hair. And even when we do remember, how often we fail to act and live accordingly. While I am disappointed in myself, I am grateful for the wake-up call.
I share this with all of you to both validate those feelings of added frustration we all experience when those closest to us pretend not to notice our thinning hair, our balding head, or seem entirely insensitive when whining about their own bad hair days to us. Equally important, I want to recognize that even we who have experienced medical hair loss and the associated emotions are not above forgetting all the emotional wisdom we’ve acquired through our condition.
As I am researching the source of emotions that surround hair loss, I have found some online and print resources that are helping me to gain deeper perspective on and understanding of such emotions. For example, if we look back through human history, we may find comfort knowing we’re not the first to obsess over our hair. Check out The Hair Foundation and the UK Hairdresser’s History of Hair . Another fabulous resource I found that both validated my own feelings about hair loss and is a great read for those wanting to support loved ones experiencing hair loss due to cancer treatments is Melanie Haiken’s article titled “Coping with the Psychological Issues of Hair Loss”. Lastly, I am reading Nancy Etcoff’s book, “Survival of the Prettiest,” as part of my research into why hair and other aspects of our appearance are so important to us. Etcoff’s book provides an important contextual understanding of who we are and why looks matter so much to us, that rather than a modern day disease there are biological and socio-evolutionary methods to the madness. And as a parting thought, I found this empowering quote at CrowningGlory.org . “It is time to remember that we are not our hair, we are not our breasts, we are not our children, we are not our parents, we are not our age, we are not our skin, we are not our wealth, we are not our partners, but WE ARE our inner wisdom, love, strength, integrity and compassion.”
Feeling the best you can about yourself while experiencing medical hair loss need not be a luxury. Instead of a wig that cost hundreds or even thousands of dollars for maybe 6 months of use, why not spend wise and purchase a fashionable head scarf? At roughly $50 per scarf, you can save money while you accessorize and revamp your wardrobe with beautiful scarves that you’ll want to wear with or without hair.
We’re all feeling the weight of these most uncertain economic times. As women with medical hair loss, some of us might feel doubly out of control or insecure. While we cannot individually fix our collective economic situation, we need not give up control of our own self-esteem and sense of well-being. And while we will all be minimizing luxury spending, we should not feel conflicted about purchasing those sacred items that allow us to step out into an increasingly insecure world feeling self confident. While wearing a BeauBeau, you can step out feeling beautiful, fashionable and self-confident, knowing that you’ve spent wisely!Not only do BeauBeau scarves provide an elegant accessory for our beautiful bald heads, but in such times when spending wise is a necessity, you’ll be doubly satisfied knowing that your BeauBeau is a timeless accessory. To me, this makes good ’scarf cents’!
Breast Cancer - 3 Generations of Choices!
In 1952, my 54 year old Grandmother woke up from a biopsy of a suspicious breast lump with a super radical mastectomy! This disfiguring surgery involved the removal of all her breast tissue, her lymph nodes, and her chest wall muscles, as well as part of her rib cage. Just a few years later, my 36 year old maternal Aunt underwent the same radical procedure resulting in the same disfiguration. Not only was reconstruction not an option in those days, women diagnosed with cancer had no decision-making power when it came to their responses to cancer in their bodies. Despite these radical procedures, both my Aunt and Grandmother had recurrences and eventually died from breast cancer.
Almost 30 years later (1983), my Mother was diagnosed with breast cancer. By the 1980’s, the recommended treatment for breast cancer had progressed. The diagnostic tools were more sophisticated and biopsies were part of the decision making process. Doctors were no longer performing radical mastectomies. My Mother had a modified radical mastectomy without reconstruction. She is almost 87 years old and in great health!
In 1991, almost 40 years after my grandmother’s surgery, my 29 year old sister followed a suspicious lump that resulted in a cancer diagnosis. With an early diagnosis and no lymph node involvement, she opted for a mastectomy with reconstruction. Eight years later, she had a recurrence in the other breast (once again an early diagnosis), which resulted in a mastectomy with reconstruction.
In 1999, yet another sister was diagnosed with breast cancer! In spite of our strong family history, a lumpectomy was recommended. With 50 years of family history and the fact that women were no longer accepting roles as passive recipients of cancer diagnoses, my sister took charge of her own body and health. She elected to have a bilateral mastectomy. This self-advocacy may have saved her life. The pathology in her non-affected breast showed an early cancer that had not shown up on any diagnostic test. After a successful round of chemotherapy, she is 9 years from her diagnosis and doing great.
Today, women have a host of options available, including being tested in advance of any diagnosis. Due to my family’s extensive breast cancer history, we entered into a study for genetic mutations. Not surprisingly, it was determined that we were BRCA2 carriers (5 out of 7 tested positive). While my grandmother and aunt may not have had a choice in the course of their treatment, I felt empowered by this news to take a bold but necessary step and have healthy breast tissue removed. Both my sister and I had prophylactic mastectomies and our ovaries removed.
I share this history as an example of how we women have gained the right to make our own choices regarding our bodies and our health. We have taken a proactive role in gathering knowledge and deciding for ourselves the course of actions that feels right to us - even a seemingly radical decision to remove healthy breast tissue in order to prevent this disease - an idea not remotely considered in my Grandmother’s era. So while the fight against cancer continues, we can be thankful that we have more options and more decision-making power than past generations of women diagnosed with or at high risk of getting cancer. We’ve come a long way baby!
Now that summer is finally behind us, it is time to fall forward into the autumn trends. For those of us without hair keeping our bald heads warm is first and foremost! Here are some scientific facts about how our body loses heat on a cold day:
Radiactive heat loss, when your body heat simply escapes into the cold air due to lack of insulation (wearing the wrong clothing)
Convective heat transfer, which involves the wind drawing heat off you - particularly where your skin is exposed (neck, cuffs, head)
Conductive heat transfer, or heat loss through direct contact with cold surfaces (think “cold car seat”).
Evaporative cooling, which is what happens when your skin gets soaked with precipitation or sweat.
The number one tip for preventing the chills is to be prepared before it happens.Don’t let your bald noggin get cold because once the chillin’ gets goin’ it’s hard to plug the leak!Wearing the proper winter head scarf can eliminate the effectiveness of all four types of heat loss.
We at 4women.com not only want you to be warm, but stylish at the same time!Why not???That is why we offer our fashionable “headwarmers”.The beaubeau headwarmers are the perfect weight for indoor and outdoor!We appreciate the fact that you will not want to have different scarves for the indoors!Our Jersey Girls are made from a soft rayon jersey in up-to-date fashion colors such as:Mushroom Beige, Pearl Grey, Moulin Rouge, Noir, Café au Lait, Navy Blue, Merlot and our plaid Chill-Me-Knots.Also, new to our collection is our head warmer called “Pampered.” This luscious combination of cotton and cashmere is a must for everyone’s winter headwear wardrobe.Your head will thank you for being so thoughtful and kind.
Remember the word “COLD” :-
Keep your beaubeau - Clean.
Avoid ————– Overheating
Wear the beaubeau — Loose
Keep your beaubeau – Dry
Don’t let the winter get the best of you – Our headwarmers will keep your body heat where it belongs!We’re bald, we’re fashionable and now we’re warm!!!!
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