Here I Am

So… here I am.

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Today, I shaved my head. 6 months, 1 round of Chemo, 1 round of Radiation, and 1/4 cycles into round 2 of Chemo finally robbed me of my hair. Which was, surprisingly traumatic.

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I’ve never been a big hair person. I’ve threatened to shave my head for YEARS only to rebuffed by friends and family. So when we met with my Oncologist for the first time and we discussed the potential chemo, I actually sort of considered the hair loss to be a silver lining.

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Before my first round of chemo, I shaved my head pro-actively. We had a big party actually. A bunch of my friends got together and we had food, and gifts, and had a celebration of defiance. It was empowering.

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Of course, then I didn’t lose my hair after all. But after a month off of treatment, I’ve started Round 2 of 2 of Chemo. At the initial pre-treatment assessment we talked about the side-effects being a little bit different this time around. And while there were things she neglected to mention (like the body-wrenching bone pain), she did let me know that my hair would fall out this time, definitively. We were talking about how unhappy I was with the color and texture of the hair that grew back post-buzz cut. And she sort of chuckled and said, “Well, in a couple weeks that will be pretty much wiped clean.”

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I didn’t realize how literal that would end up being. Yesterday was 2 weeks to the day from Treatment #1 and on Monday the first few strands started to come out. Tuesday, more, thicker. By Wednesday I was starting to look a bit bizarre. I started wearing scarves and hats. By the end of the day Thursday- I looked like a neglected, possessed kewpie-doll.

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I had no idea how traumatic the process of losing my hair was going to be. I knew it would be hard. But I’ve never been a hair person. Never been that caught up with my appearance. I just— I didn’t think it would matter that much.

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But there is something so real, so vivid, so painful about watching fistfulls of hair come away from your head. To watch a small bald spot become a large bald patch. To leave behind a trail of hair as you walk through the house. I didn’t realize. Fortunately, I have a dear friend who is also my hairdresser. And another who let us borrow her house.

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Lisa buzzed out the rest of my hair, and Stacey sat and watched and distracted me. There was calming music, aromatherapy incense and lots of love. There were tears on the initial reveal, it was hard to let people see what was there. Or what wasn’t as the case may be. I didn’t even show Kris- and we live in the same house. They are the only 2 people who saw that… hair-losing-phase in person.

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When I got home, I took my razor and finished the job, leaving my head smooth and soft. And surprisingly- it actually looks pretty good.

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I think there are a few reasons why this has been so hard to deal with. One is that the hair loss is such an universal and obvious sign that I’m sick, that I have Cancer. It’s this sight that tells the world- This girl has Cancer. And that’s hard. My size has actually made me a little lucky in that respect. I have (up to this point) looked incredibly healthy. Strong. People tell me that all the time. And that’s helped in a way- to keep me from sort of… sinking into all of this the way I otherwise could have.

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But to be fair, and to be honest, there is more to it than that. I spent 20 years hating the way I looked. Feeling Ugly, unlovable, unattractive, unwantable. And there were a lot of issues that went into that assessment- but in the last 2 years I did so much work to change all of that. Not to change my looks- but to change my FEELINGS. To finally realize that I was beautiful just the way I was. And the truth is, this whole Cancer process has put a little bit of a dent in all of that. My body is changing, constantly, sometimes drastically. I face this sort of- readjustment period every time I look in a mirror- learning my new shape, my new condition, my new look. Over and over.

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And for whatever reason- seeing myself in a patchwork of hair and skin— seeing this so-obvious sign of illness, was finally, once and for all— too much. For the first time in more than 2 years, I felt ugly again.

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So today, I came home from Stacey’s and finished my head shaving at home, carefully running the palm of my hand back and forth, following with the razor when I ran in to small pockets of rough hair. And less than 20 minutes later, baby smooth… soft… pale.

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And you can still see a difference. Patches of darker scalp where I still had hair- follicles left behind giving shadow to my otherwise empty head. But I can handle that. So, I showered off the loose hair, showered off the trauma and meloncholy of the last few days and dressed. I chose a necklace (one of my own making of course- why miss a marketing opportunity right?), and sat in front of the computer, photoboothing until I had 4 shots that I didn’t just… not hate, but that I actually liked.

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For the first time all week, I can look myself in the eye again. And here I am. Bald. But still beautiful. Not that I wasn’t still beautiful yesterday or the day before. Not that I wasn’t beautiful the whole time. I was. But I don’t necessarily think it’s the “look” of my shaved head that made things better. Like my first pre-chemo buzz… I think it was the act of making the choice. Of not waiting for Chemo, for Cancer to steal one. more. thing. from me, from my life.

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Of course as a bonus- I look pretty bitching as a baldie. And Cancer hasn’t changed everything. I’m still fat. I’m still fabulous. It’s just that now, I’m not burdened with the ordeal of having to make my hair behave for a few months.

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So here’s to being beautiful. Even as a psycho-possessed-kewpie-doll.

Even bald.

Still me.

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Beautiful.