There was a time in my life when I had quite the head of hair. As a child, my mother would curl my thick, black tresses and with the natural wave pattern, the hair that I had always received compliments.
The curls and thick hair were a way of life for me!
As I hit that awkward age, and my mother tired of fixing my hair—most likely due to the fact that she had four other heads to watch over, my thick hair was cut into a pixie. This was the most awkward stage of my life. And I hated both my mother for cutting my hair and I hated my hair for misbehaving.
Quite possibly the most awkward hair moment in my life. I’ve never forgiven my mother for that! But everyone goes through that awkward stage!
A couple of months later and the hair is STILL at an awkward stage. And yes. I twirled a baton! With the St. Patrick School Marching Band!
Then as I entered the teen years my hair grew out. Still thick but very unmanageable and so I wore it pulled back most of the time—especially in the humid summers.
Back in the day–with a full head of hair, no wrinkles and I didn’t need glasses 100 percent of the time. Where did my chin disappear to? A rainy afternoon on the NYC Subway system!
Then I came to terms with the head of hair that I had and accepted the waves and the thickness.
And I grew to appreciate the hair that I had.
With Oona at Chesapeake. You can see in the front that I’m starting to lose a bit of hair!
And throughout all this, I pulled my hair out when I was stressed, and even worse—I picked at my scalp and I won’t even go into those details.
But—I was lucky that my hair was thick. At the time.
At Sydney’s Taronga Zoo with a Zookeeper. I ended up having a blast with this guy later on a bar crawl! But look at that little “spot” in the front of my head!
At Trenton’s Waterfront Park–lots of baseball time spent there and lots of hats to cover the start of a loss through my own doing!
And when I met my present husband, the effects of the damage I had done by pulling and picking began to show. I now had a “spot” on the back of my head to match the one by my front part. And normal shedding became abnormal. And where new growth occurs—it didn’t with me because I damaged my scalp.
This picture always makes me think. I was adept at the comb-over because the hair was really shedding and falling. I was stressed because I lost my home through divorce and was living in a crappy apartment. Jake was away at college but I still had Roman and Oona to keep me sane and happy. Little did I know that a Frenchman would enter my life shortly!
At this time, I started using Toppik, which was a life-saver. I can’t pinpoint the exact moment when Bonaparte realized my hair loss began to be a big thing but, him, being the very honest and critical Frenchman, would point out where I needed to cover the loss.
My sigh of relief was that I could depend on him to go through this with me.
Suffice it to say, the loss became greater—hair stopped growing and eventually I began to wear toppers and then wigs.
The last “nice” photo of me in my bio hair. Adam, the hairstylist extraordinaire knew how to blow my hair out and cover the loss and he was an expert at applying my Toppik!
Anyway, in a random moment last Sunday while we were enjoying the weekend’s end with aperitifs, he mentioned that he loved the way I look when I’m wearing wigs.
Surprised by that comment, I must’ve given him the cross-eyed, side eye because he went on to further elaborate.
He caught me competely off guard!
He said that when I started wearing wigs, he was a bit concerned because those first ones were a bit “wiggy” looking. They weren’t good wigs (He was right. My first foray into wigs was a trial and error thing). He thought some of the wigs were a bit too shiny.
And he went on to tell me that with the research I did, and learning to customize wigs, I did such a great job that he prefers me in wigs these days and………………………………. here’s the best part! He said sometimes he has to remind himself that I’m wearing a wig because they look natural.
Here I am wearing Chloe in Chocolate Cherry–the wig my husband gifted me with for my birthday!
That’s a nice testament coming from my Frenchman. The French can be appear to be very critical—but it’s more because they are just being honest. And honesty is the best policy.
My Frenchman. I’m damned lucky to have such a supportive man!
You have no idea how great my husband made me feel during that part of our conversation simply because he supports what I do. He never thought I was odd because of my hair loss or the way I dealt with it because he’s part of my team.
It’s difficult when you begin to switch over to the world of wigs for the first time. It’s that time when we wig wearers all make mistakes. It’s that time when we are at our biggest learning curve in how to handle the hair we wear.
The wigs I wear now are looking much better than the ones I wore when I began my journey!
Through research and instinct, we learn what works for us. And when we have a husband, or significant other, family member or friends who support us—we’ve gotten the best gift we can which is support.
Because with support we gain confidence and courage and I’m thankful that my husband has given me that support to be confident and courageous in my journey from my bio hair to my fake hair!
I created a slide show for you that I ended up putting on my YouTube channel. Have a peek at my various hair looks and let me know what you think!
Enjoy the rest of the weekend and take it easy as we begin to enter into the holiday season!
