It’s Just Hair…

Before I got cancer, I always took my hair for granted.
It sounds a little odd, but I never really cared much about styling it.  Some days, I’d just toss it into a ponytail before leaving the house, if even that.

But when I was diagnosed with my first cancer in 2003, I suddenly wished that I had cared a bit more.
Suddenly, the thought of not having my hair terrified me.  Though I knew that it was inevitable, a part of me wished that maybe I could just get the chemotherapy and keep my beautiful hair.

Unfortunately, that isn’t how it works…

Now don’t get me wrong – there are some chemotherapies that don’t make you lose your hair.
But it wasn’t the treatment I was getting.

I remember finding those first few clumps of hair on my pillow as I woke up one morning.  I cried and cried.
My parents had scheduled family pictures for later on in the year, but when my hair started to fall out, they made a phone call to try and get in earlier.  The photographer got us in one morning before school – talk about professional!

A few days after the family pictures, my siblings stood around me while my dad shaved my head ‘shiny bald’ (as I like to call it).  I cried some more while my dad attempted to crack a few jokes to make me feel better.  Once it was done, my family reminded me that I was still beautiful and that it was “just hair…”

The second time around, losing my hair didn’t affect me as much as the first.  I had ordered a second wig and LOVED it!  (I hated my first wig)

I wore that second wig to my senior Prom and received so many compliments on it!  I felt like a normal teenager, not enduring those poisonous treatments.  I felt like me again.

But in February 2007, on a celebratory trip to Belize to signify the end of chemo, it flew off while I was riding a jet ski on the Caribbean Sea.

No, really, it’s true!

I even had a shirt made that said – “I lost my hair in the Caribbean Sea!”

There was a joke among my friends in Belize that a fisherman would pull it out of the water someday and it would scare the pants right off of him!  (To my knowledge, it’s still on the sea floor)

This time around, #3, was more difficult than I thought it would be.

After losing my hair twice, I thought that this time around would come and go – that I’d think nothing of it.

Because – let’s face it – it’s just hair, right?

But this time was very difficult.  And I think it was so difficult because I realized how hard I had worked for it.

There are 9 years between my second and third cancer.  That is 9 years of hair growth – it was long and dark and beautiful!  I had begun to style it a lot and very much enjoyed doing that.  I desperately wanted hair for my maternity pictures and for those first pictures taken after baby is born … but I wouldn’t get to have that.

This disease was robbing me of that simple pleasure.

When it started to come out, it came out quickly – like the two times before.  I had two sessions of treatment under my belt when it started coming out and I remember bargaining with God, simply asking him to let it remain until after my baby shower.  It did 🙂

When I arrived home, I told my husband that it was coming out fast and asked him if he would shave my head for me.  As you can see through the photos I have included, this was quite an emotional experience.

But one that I wouldn’t have traded for anything.

Hair is “just hair” – I’ve had to remind myself of that lots of times over the last 12 years.

People may look at you a little differently when you’re out in public as a shiny bald beauty, but that’s okay.

Remember that losing our hair is part of the sacrifice that we make in order to get better.
There is no need to feel embarrassed or ashamed or any less beautiful because of it.

So go out and sport that beautiful bald look!

You’ve only got one life and no time to dwell on temporary hair loss.