How It Feels To Go … BALD … As A Woman
By Gloria Faye Brown Bates/aka Granny Gee
Her scalp tingled; a tingle unlike any sensation she’d ever felt before. In fact, the tingle… hurt. It hurt… bad.
She reached up to touch her hair. Oh, my God… touching her hair hurt so bad. It seemed she could feel each individual hair … where it grew from her scalp. Pain… more pain.
Not only more pain, physically. More pain… mentally. No woman ever wants to lose all her hair. Her hair was long, curly… beautiful. She had just had it cut… short in anticipation of … losing all her hair.
She didn’t know what was going to happen. She’d never lost her hair. Would it all just… fall off her head at one time? Would it come out in… clumps?
She did know that she had never felt such pain in her scalp as she did now. She was very ill… she’d just been diagnosed with cancer… non-Hodgkins lymphoma. She’d also, went through major surgery.
Even with all the medicines, pain in her body… the pain was very noticeable in her scalp. ‘Every hair … hurt’.
The oncologist had explained to her that the chemotherapy drugs would cause this to happen. It would happen soon after she began chemo… sure enough, it did.
She almost opted to keep her beautiful hair. The oncologist told her about how women who were very vain… opted to keep their hair; not take the chemo medicines. They were… dead, now. She was very proud of her hair, wanted to keep it… but, not at the expense of dying. She loved to live.
She was afraid her husband would think she was … ugly. He had purchased the most beautiful wig for her. Curls just like her own curls. Real hair… no one would know the difference; but… she would. The wig was made in such a way that it was very light-weight; easy to care for.
That day… while in the shower… she began shampooing her hair. Oh, how her scalp ‘tingled’… hurt so bad. As she began to rinse it… she began to notice her hair was coming out. It wasn’t all at once… just gradually. It was as if her scalp was … just letting go of it. A little here… a little there.
The evening came… she began to panic. How could she go to bed… without the wig? How? She didn’t want her husband to see her… bald. She was … bald. Only a curl on top of her head, remained.
Tears began to fall. Grief for the loss of her hair made her sob. She laid down with the weight of mental, physical pain. She felt panicky. How could she live without her hair? How could she possibly live without the medicines her body needed to kill the cancer?
Her husband came home later that evening. He came in smiling, glad to see her. She had no idea if he would still love her without… her hair. He knew something was wrong when he saw her face. He went to her, sat down beside her… asked her to tell him what had happened.
She began to speak, cry as she told him that her hair came out that very day. She didn’t have hair anymore… only one curl was left on top of her head. He began to smile… speak to her in a calming voice.
Baby Girl, he said… this is only temporary. Your hair will grow back. I love you very, very much. I love you with… without hair. We’ll get past this… go through one thing at a time. Everything is going to be alright. As he spoke to her… she listened with her heart. She began to feel a peace inside… knowing that everything really was going… to be alright.
That night, she took her wig off, to go to bed. Her husband looked at her, told her he loved his Baby Girl who was now, his… Gerber Baby.
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NOTES BY AUTHOR: Gloria Faye Brown Bates/aka Granny Gee
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This is a true story… I lost all my beautiful hair… and in a three year span of time… I lost it once more for the second time.
I opted to take chemo treatments to save my life… I had been vain over my beautiful hair in the past… I didn’t want to die like women before me… who wouldn’t ‘let go’ of their hair to live.
Skip loved me, cared for me… never cared that my hair was gone. He wanted me to live. I never forgot how special he treated me; how well he cared for me, worked… too. He is why I am here.
You never hear women tell how it feels to lose their hair… this one will tell you. How else can someone know… if everyone stays silent?
I’m so … grateful for everything. No matter how bad things get… everything is going to be… alright.
Oh…. I found out the truth about a lot of myths when I was diagnosed with cancer…
One myth is that the cancer itself… caused one’s hair to come out. It is not… true. The chemo drugs that help one to win the battle with cancer… causes one to lose their hair. In my case…. I lose all my beautiful hair…. and in the trade-off to live… one drug damaged my heart.
Another myth is something I’ve always heard… I know you have, too. It’s ‘when they cut her open… the cancer spread so fast … it killed her’. This is not true…. it was most likely in the stage where it was too late to save someone.
I’ll name one more myth, here. All cancer patients have to be …. skin and bones… look like death. That’s so far from the truth… most people don’t show anything to let others know they have cancer. A lot of cancer patients look like … you.
Oh, here’s one more…. all cancer patients get cancer because they smoke… that’s not so, either. People are getting lung cancer now… who have never smoked a day in their life. In my case… no one knows what causes non-Hodgkins lymphoma.
Oh… I grew all my beautiful hair back!
Gloria Faye Brown Bates/aka Granny Gee
Colors of My Life 