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The bald spots are growing!!!

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Me and Veronica, on her wedding day, when the only thing I could think about was my hair.

Saturday March 23 was Veronica’s wedding day. She is my friend and housekeeper and I was chosen by her to be an official witness at the ceremony.

The day started with me baking some pecan tartlets for the wedding reception and then I had to wash my hair. Anyone that has read previous entries of this blog and anyone that has heard me complain about my hair problem know that washing my hair has become a nightmare. I don’t like it, it terrifies me, it gets my anxious… I do not enjoy it at all.

So I jumped in the shower and washed my hair. I felt so much of it fell from my head and when I came out of the shower I could see the bald spot on the top of my head looking at me from the mirror. It looked huge!

I got closer to the mirror and turned the lights on and yes, the spot was definitely bigger. I know that my dermatologist told me to avoid the mirror, not to look and the spots and stop paying attention to the hair that falls in the shower. But I can’t, I need to see and I rather see now than find a surprise in the future if the spot keeps growing.

Still, when we left to the wedding my bald spots were the only thing on my mind. I told my husband, Jeff, that I thought the spots were growing. He told me that I needed to calm down, “thanks for your support,” I said ironically, even when I knew that he is right, and that what I need is to calm down and keep doing what I am doing. I know I have to be patient, it is just so hard.

Later that day, after the wedding, we went to play tennis with some friends. Before arriving to the court I was still feeling down, depressed and worried, but the exercise worked its magic and after two hours of tennis I was smiling, happy, and enjoying life again

Terror in the shower!

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As an enthusiast runner for most of my adult life I am used to sweat a lot, and therefore I am also used to take a lot of showers. In the last 14 years I have lived in places with hot, humid, and long summers (Houston and Havana) and during those hot days (after a run or not) I would love to get in the shower and wash my hair or at least get it completely wet to get refreshed.

This has changed in the last month. I still love to take showers as long as my hair is not involved. But washing my hair has become one of the bigger (if not the biggest) trigger of my anxiety.

So, I washed it the Sunday after I discovered the spots and after my trip to the beach (March 10). It went OK. But since then I barely touched my hair. It was Thursday, March 14, when I decided that I needed to wash it again.

I got in the shower I got my hair wet and massaged my head with the shampoo and when I rinsed it I saw hundreds of hair strands ending up in my hands. I just broke down.

But later this is how I try to reason about the subject: if I hadn’t touch my hair in four days (no combing, no styling, no water, no nothing) and then I wash it, wouldn’t that be the perfect opportunity for my hair to shed the natural shed accumulated in four days? I want to believe it is so.

Or maybe it is just the natural shedding amount and I just have lost completely my objectivity.

Or maybe the shedding caused by the Alopecia Aerate hasn’t stopped (I hope this is not the case).

Still, my afternoon was horrible. I called my mom and cried, I called my brother and cried and I cried my eyes out by myself.

December 2012 382 copia

I loved washing my hair!

My brother, the neurologist suggested an antidepressant, Zoloft (which happens not to be readily available in Cuba), and then said that I should have a little bit of clonazepam (a quarter of a pill) to control extreme anxiety states such as this. I will try the clonazepam, and I decided to leave the antidepressant pill for future consideration.

From now on, I will focus on washing my hair three times a week and be brave about it… maybe with the help of a little clonazepam before the shower.