Photo: "passamanerie", Flickr
It’s got to be one of the hardest things about cancer — hair loss! And I know my friend is hating the idea of being bald, just like most of us do, but still, she is handling it with such grace. Her technique: she cut her very long hair very short in anticipation of the big fallout. I like her approach, which is so totally different than mine.
I kept my very long hair around until the very last moment. I think I wanted so badly to not lose it, that I fought back by making not one single preparation. Silly me. The docs and nurses and every other breast cancer survivor I’d met told me it would happen, plus pretty much exactly when it would happen (about day 11-16 after the first chemo treatment), and still, I crossed my fingers tight and hoped like mad that I’d be the exception. And on the day of my second chemo dose (day 14), I wore a hat on my head to hold each hair in its place — it was starting to fall out in clumps, wash away in the shower, and it was pulling so hard on my head it hurt — when I should have accepted the inevitable and surrendered. I did surrender that night — cut off three ponytails, and handed the clippers to my husband and 4-year-old, who shaved while I cried — but only because I could no longer hold onto the hair I so desperately did not want to lose.
My friend has accepted the inevitable, and I love that about her!
How did you handle your hair loss?
