Living in My Naked Skin

by Brenna Bell

I lost all my hair when I was 27. All of it. Gone were the rich brown waves that cascaded down my back, the dark lashes framing my blue eyes, the thick eyebrows I never would tweeze. Arms, legs, and yes - pubic hair. In a few months' time . . . all gone.

It was coming on winter and I lived off the grid on a farm in Southern Oregon. Meaning - there was only heat when I made a fire in the woodstove, which was not all the time. Meaning - my head got very cold! That winter, I had to wear two hats: one to be my hair, and one to be my hat.

Through its loss, I quickly began to realize how many things I took for granted about having hair, like warmth! Why else do animals have fur? While our human hair is but a remnant of our once furry selves, it still provides a very important function in thermoregulation. Practically, keeping myself warm became a serious issue when bereft of my fur.

Then there is the corollary during the summer - hair gives protection from the sun. It only takes one good headburn to appreciate this. Also, ever wonder about why you have eyebrows and eyelashes? One key reason is to keep sweat from falling straight into your eyes. Without eyebrows to direct sweat to the sides of my face, or eyelashes to absorb it, it rolls right in, and it stings.

Much of this is not new to the ranks of balding men in our midst (well, maybe the eyebrows!). These are common experiences of the bald.

What I really learned when my hair fell out is just how much I relied on my hair for my vanity. While not disregarding balding men's own struggles with hair loss, in our culture there is something tangibly different about bald women. Something weird. Something wrong.

To understand the impact of hair loss on my vanity, I must take a step back and explain how vain I was (though, of course, I didn't know it then). For some time - perhaps from the age of 17 to 27 - I learned to experience myself as beautiful. And, importantly, I learned to experience, even expect, the power that came along with beauty.

I felt the social lubricant of physical attractiveness bring ease to my interactions, and the more I realized this, the more I relied on it. Beauty gives one a certain leeway in our society. Beauty and charisma gives one even more leeway. I learned to expect people to admire me. I relied on this, perhaps too much. Perhaps to the extent that I wasn't careful with emotions - others' and my own.

Because others paid more attention to what I looked like than who I was, it became easy for me to do so as well.

Then, all my hair fell out.

And the way that people look at me changed

And the way that I look at me changed.

Dear reader, if your hair is still in your head, if your lashes still frame your eyes, I invite you into a moment of imagination: Imagine yourself one day noticing that more hair than usual came out during that shower. And during the next shower too. And after you run your hands through your hair, you wonder: why is there so much hair in my fingers?

Imagine that all the hair in a particular patch falls out - one smooth section of scalp in a sea of hair. Maybe it's the size of a quarter, or maybe its even bigger and irregularly shaped. Imagine that these patches come, and go, with no rhyme or reason. This, my friends, is Alopecia Areata (pronounced "aloe-peesha airy-ahta") . I've lived with this all my life.

Now, imagine that, one time, the hair loss doesn't stop with a patch, or two, or three. Can you imagine what it feels like to realize that, this time, it's really all going to go? How there are strands of your hair everywhere but your head? Can you imagine the loss of control, the fear? And can you imagine that moment when you decide to take the power back? When you stand with a razor, hand trembling, heart beating and make the first shave into what is left of your hair?

Can you imagine how hard you might cry?

And then, can you imagine it doesn't stop there? That one day you notice your eyebrows are thinning, and lashes are beginning to fall out? Do you have a beard? Imagine it's gone, and no stubble grows again on your smooth face. And when they all go - who do you see in the mirror?

Dear reader, just for a moment, imagine yourself perfectly smooth, hairless, with a body out of your control. How does it feel? This is Alopecia Universalis. I've lived with this for the past 10 years.

When I tell people that being hairless is hard and they seem surprised, I'm pretty sure its because they never imagined what it would be like if it happened to them.

Because it is hard.

First, there was reintroducing myself to old friends, and explaining what the hell is going on with my head. Then there are all the new relationships, the interactions that came after my hair fell out, and all the assumptions that crowd in.

The first assumption is, of course, that I have cancer. Oh, the many conversations with well-meaning people who have or had cancer (or maybe it was their children, parents, friends). They approach shyly, full of concern, wondering if I'm OK.

How could I be upset about that? I see them as a gift and explain, gently, that no -- I have Alopecia and it only affects my hair and thank you very much for your concern and are you/your child/your parent doing alright? I listen to their stories, and send them on their way. I often reflect how lucky I am to only be dealing with the loss of my hair.

There are other assumptions, of course: that I'm making some sort of feminist statement (which I'm not, though I am a feminist!), that I'm a Buddhist monk, that I'm male (well, I only get called "sir" from behind), that I'm just really committed to this bald hairstyle. When people finally (if ever) talk to me about these assumptions and I, again, gently and patiently explain about Alopeica, another assumption is often made: "Well, at least you don't have to shave your legs anymore."

As someone who was proudly hairy and unshaven before my hair loss, this is perhaps the one that stings the most. Perhaps because it is most closely related to why I don't wear a wig: to the best of my ability, I choose to inhabit the body that was given me.

Yes - wigs. There is a way I could avoid all assumptions and enjoy that good ol' beauty privilege. I tried to wear a wig once, for a minute. My parents bought it for me; my mother feels personally responsible for my Alopecia, like she somehow made me wrong. So they bought me a wig, and even got me a "wig cut" to personalize it. I wore it out to dinner with them once. I wore it during my first appearance in court after my hair fell out. Both times I felt absurd, unnatural, like I was hiding the truth of me.

So, I took it off and put it in a drawer. It emerges when I want costuming, when I want to be in femme drag. Just never to try and mask what has been given me, who I am.

Because I'm bald for a reason. Is the reason so I could get over myself and stop being so vain? Perhaps. I'm absolutely certain that I have become a better person by learning how to inhabit my bald body in a good way.

Is the reason so that I can better understand, and be in solidarity with, other people who look "different?" There are so many ways to look different than the norm, and looking different is hard. It means people make assumptions. It means children stare at you and ask awkward questions that their parents want to ask but won't. It means that day in and day out I deal with a lot of baggage that "normal" looking people simply don't have to.

Now, I imagine the people I know reading this and thinking: "All this might be true, but Brenna, you're still beautiful." People always feel the need to tell me this. And they're right. I'm blessed to have a well formed symmetrical rosy-cheeked bright-eyed full-lipped face and, I must add, a very nicely shaped head. It's taken me years, though, to see myself as beautiful. For years before that, I couldn't really look in the mirror, let alone like what I saw there.

Honestly, in some ways, it was not until I went hiking with a good friend who had recently lost her hair and it became warm so she took her hat off and I looked back down the hill at her as she was glowing under the sun, bald head shining with sweat, and thought "damn, Hazel is hot!" that I realized what other people might see when they look at me.

Because bald girls can be beautiful, if seen through the right eyes. I'm learning to have those eyes. And, honestly, I'm learning to not care so much about beauty - my own or others'. I've learned that beauty privilege is a blessing and a curse, and I'm glad that I'm moving beyond it. Yes, I'm different. Being different is what makes me stronger, more compassionate, and, definitely, more memorable.

Being bald is hard. It will never not be. But that's only part of the story.

Ten years in, I'm beginning to truly own and appreciate my journey as a bald girl. Daily, it helps me remember that while I can't always choose what life gives me, I can choose how I respond. And I am choosing to embrace the bald, embrace the difference, and - in doing so - more deeply embrace my life.