YOUR RADIANT SELF

101 THINGS TO DO WHEN YOUR HAIR FALLS OUT

An early question every patient asks her oncologist when she discovers she has cancer is "Will my hair fall out?" Most likely, yes! We know, not the word you were hoping to hear. But, it does happen, especially from your chemo treatments, and you will be ok.

So, let's explore this hair situation right from the start. Your hair will most likely begin to fall out after your first chemo treatment. As you will often hear throughout this book, chemo is exceptionally good at killing fast growing cells such as cancer. However, it kills all fast growing cells, including your hair follicles, where rapidly dividing cells reside.

Part of what is so dispiriting in the cancer battle is the lack of control. Your hair, one piece of you that you have always been able to "do something with," is now doing its own thing. And, you can't stop it. However, you do have options.

Cutting It

If you have longer hair, you may consider cutting it a bit shorter before you start your chemo. One advantage of this is that you become accustomed to yourself with shorter hair. You ease into the process of losing your hair in this way. Others may prefer to keep it long just as long as they can.

Ultimately, the choice is yours, but, keep in mind that there are many things that you will be losing control of, so controlling that hair of yours by cutting it may help you feel like you have some ability to direct the events around you.

Letting It Fall Out Naturally

How will you know if your hair is falling out? If you are like most women, you will begin to pull on it as soon as you leave your first chemo. How quickly do these drugs take effect after all? Most likely, it won't fall out on day one of chemo or even day two or three. You need to give it a few days. However, it is not uncommon to start to see strands falling out by day five or so. Of course, like everything else on this journey, it can be different for everyone, depending upon your hair, your body, your treatments.

Where to look for the strands of hair? Your comb and hairbrush are obvious, but many women start to realize their hair is coming out when they see some on the pillow in the morning. Good morning, you have lost hair isn't the best way to get your day started, but it is something you may have to get used to.

The first several weeks you will experience strands of hair falling out. As you move into week three, it may come out as several strands at a time or even clumps. When this happened to me, I could hardly keep my hands away from my head. Really, I kept asking myself, is it really coming out? The answer was yes, and each time I reached up, I pulled a little bit more out.

By the end of the third week of treatment, my hair was falling out in great clumps. A question that many women ask when going through chemo is, is there a way to prevent the hair from falling out?

The blogs will tell you of something called a penguin cap that basically freezes your head, in an effort to prevent the hair from falling out. A few concerns are worth mentioning with the cap. 1. Your hair will fall out anyway. 2. The cap is very uncomfortable. 3. The point of chemo is to kill the cancer throughout your body. If by freezing you are preventing the chemo from getting to your head and hair, then you are preventing the chemo from working on any little cancer cells that might be in your brain.

Like most women, at the outset, I was hopeful that this cap might work. I checked around. It was in speaking with my chemo nurses that I realized that a few months without hair was far better than a metastasis to the brain.

My father, an engineer and man of science, who wasn't quite sure how to handle his daughter having breast cancer, did offer up some sage advice assuring me, "Honey, if you are losing your hair, it means your treatment is working." So many times I had to turn to that phrase and remind myself that loss of hair is a visual indication that the chemo is working.

To Shave Or Not To Shave

My cancer treatment started with chemo. So, from the very beginning, I started thinking about getting my hair shaved off. That becomes another opportunity to take control. Many people, from friends to my hairdressers, advised me to shave it off, several suggesting that we turn it into a party, with some girlfriends and a glass of wine in hand.

I finally got to a point where I wanted it off. I wanted this part to be finished, I was so sick of seeing it fall out. Emotionally, I had been preparing to do this, but even though some women choose to do so, I couldn't begin to think about doing it as a party. I wasn't sure how I would react, so I wanted it to be more private.

While I had been thinking about having the remainder of my hair shaved off, the ultimate decision to do it was rather spontaneous.

Life With No Hair

Once you have lost your hair, you have new considerations. You lose much of your body heat through your head. So, without hair, you may get rather chilly. Thus, the scarves, hats, and wigs are not just a fashion statement, but also keep you warm. Another consideration, don't forget sunscreen. That head of yours hasn't seen this much light in a long time. Last thing you need is to get sunburned on top of your head through all of this!

Beyond the practical considerations, what you wear on your head is totally up to you, of course. I was most comfortable with wigs. Well, wigs, or nothing at all. I did try various options. I had scarves, but for the life of me, couldn't get them to stay very well on my head. I had a few hats, knitted for someone going through cancer without hair, but they felt itchy, so I didn't wear them all that often.

There are a variety of styles of hats available for women going through cancer. An important consideration is the material: not only is it comfortable, but will the material truly keep the sun off your head? I bought one, thinking a hot pink hat with sparkles would be fun, and tried it with a halo, little strips of hair that you put on underneath your cap to give the appearance of having a full head of hair. Still, I never wore my pink sparkly baseball cap. It just wasn't me.

My preference was wigs, due in large part to the fact that I felt "normal," whatever that might be, when I had hair on my head. I became very comfortable over time, wearing wigs outside and...