Hair today, gone tomorrow..

Hmm, as I have just commented on Facebook, I am beginning to understand why people say "my hair is fried" when they have subjected it to too much bleaching and colouring. It is having definite haystack tendencies. I guess colouring my hair crazy colours was one of those things that would have come up the top had I been writing a list of "stuff to do before I die" a year or so ago. It has now been orange, pink and turquoise, and red and I had planned to journey back to pink (all over this time, and baby pink) and then a deep blue yet, but I am not sure now that this is a good idea.

To come out of the closet, I am going bald. Not so much that it's obvious yet, but very thin around the crown and if I parted it centrally the parting would be quite wide. My hair has been thinning steadily for the past few years. I used to have luscious thick ash-blonde hair in my youth. I miss it, painfully, as it was the only thing about my appearance that pleased me. Colouring it was not so much on the list of "to do before I die" as "to do whilst I still have any hair to do it to".  Why is it that men can walk around quite happily bald without being judged that much, if at all, whereas for a woman it is disastrous? So much of our self-esteem and sexiness is bound up with having a full head of beautiful hair.  So those of us girls for whom it is thinning, those of us who have alopecia or are getting chemo, it is something that can make us quite miserable. Sure, a bit of surfing can lead you to loads of sites about clever ways to hide your hair loss. Hats, scarves, bandanas, turbans, extensions (if you have enough left to attach them to), clip in attachments (makes it sound like one is a hoover!) and finally wigs.... but how come you don't see men feeling forced to cover up their baldness with a cute floral turban?   So, in case any other women of my age (will be 48 on Friday 18th March 2011) who might read this are experiencing the same problem... this is just to say, you are not alone! If more women talk about it, maybe those going through it won't feel so isolated or scared of being judged.

So perhaps now is the time to get it cut a bit shorter for a while to lose some of the most damaged hair, and to  go for colours that don't require bleaching i.e. something darker than what had become my natural mid mousy brown. The shorter I go the easier it would also make trying out wearing wigs (which could be baby pink or deep blue!). So what do you reckon folks? I need some girly advice...