Here's the thing about wigs: they are just too..."WIGGY"! (think Carnival, Fancy Dress, Raquel Welch and Joan Collins....need I go on?) There are other options, but when you are a bald female, you sometimes want to look like you are still a normal (ie.not sick) person, and I'm afraid the scarves, bandanas, turbans, baseball caps (etc...etc....) just don't cut it! BUT , let's face it, neither do most wigs. However, I have learnt a lot about wig-choosing over the last 11 years and the thrice losing of my crowning glory (mmm, well..), so I am here to give you the benefit of my vast experience, should you need it, although I sincerely hope that you don't!
2001
First, some personal history of hair-loss... The first time I had to do chemo (11 years ago...the dark ages in terms of breast cancer drug development), the side-effects were truly brutal (sickness, vomiting,fatigue..blah, blah, blah) but I didn't lose my hair!
At that time I was still "under" my German/Greek Doc, who was a gynaecologist/mastologist (special interest in breasts!). He realised from my jubilant reaction to weight-loss as one of the side-effects, that I probably would be none too chuffed about going bald, so suggested the "COLD CAP". This is a contraption resembling a boxer's helmet, but, imagine if you will, filled with ice-blocks like you put in a cool-bag on a hot day! Imagine too an ice-cream headache but without the double-choc chip creamy deliciousness! R says he still bears the scars from the Chinese burns I gave him ,squeezing his forearm during these sessions!
Anyway the idea is that it literally freezes your scalp whilst you are hooked up to the chemo IV, so that the drug(s) don't penetrate the hair-follicles!
The great thing is: It works, or it did for me. The downside is, that I, personally would never do it again, because it is extremely painful and you have to wear it for an hour either side of your chemo, which can mean 4-5 hours of varying degrees of agony! It is changed every half-hour for a fresh, ultra-frozen helmet, so just as its melting and the brain-freeze is starting to feel almost bearable, you have to go through it all again... 8 to 10 times, each chemo session!
Just so you know I'm not exaggerating here, go and stick your hand in the freezer, or wrap your head in a bag of frozen peas , if you have one handy! See how long YOU can stand it?? Having said that, this WAS 11 years ago and maybe there's a new, improved version out there now, so don't let me put you off (!!!!!!!!)
As it happens , I managed to do it for my 4 sessions and kept my hair, but it was enough to put me off for life. Of course, I didn't know back then that there would ever be the need to worry about hair-loss again......
2007
FAST forward 6 years.........Unfortunately (understated adverb of the millenium!) I WAS to have to worry again about the Coldcap/No Coldcap dilemma, once I was rediagnosed with spread to my bones, then liver. This, as you can imagine was one of those planet-sized bombshells you hope will never happen, but it did and I just had to suck it up and get on with it (the situation not the planet!). To be honest, at this juncture, hairloss was not really an issue. It is mind-blowingly frightening to be told you are far from putting that 6 year-old cancer scare behind you (as you had so blithely thought after passing the famous 5 year survival point!). No, you have now jumped from Stage 1 to Stage 4 breast-cancer (there is no stage 5!) and you will be fighting for your life from now on!
SOD THE HAIR.......let's just get on with zapping the little buggers! Anyway, as I said above, the Coldcap (SO many C's in all of this!!) never really had a look-in after its first spectacular success/failure! So now I really had to address what to cover my first-time shiny-skulled modesty with......
Once the drugs kicked in I knew something had to be done, so I did what I frequently do in times of trouble, I went shopping! I ended up buying / being given etc. about 5 wigs. How exciting it was to be, ringing the changes in colour and style, having previously sported a boring blonde shoulder-length bob!!! I invested in scarves of every colour-way and fabric, cute hats (bobbled, baubled, striped, spotted etc.) I was just going to make the most of this new-found versatility in the (non) hair department....Such fun!!
You realise , I'm lying, of course......it wasn't exactly what I'd call fun, it didn't even elicit a wry smile, but in some small way it did help to ease the sorrow of saying goodbye to my old friend, who'd hung around my forehead, ears and shoulders for nigh on 50 years!
I named my favourite 3 wigs: Hairther, Hairriet and Hairmione and although they were all pretty "wiggy" in their own way , I grew quite fond of them. At least the kids had a laugh trying them on. Of course , Gemma looked way better than I did in any of them (when this happens with clothes I just give them to her, but she wasn't so keen on the wig-donation idea and my need was greater than hers...nanananana!) and B, my son, well he looked especially fetching in a medium-length , mid-brown wavy number (Hairriet), but he wasn't having any either!!! Ah well, that's kids for you!
2008
Eventually, once those 12 C-sessions were history, sure enough my hair started sprouting again. You still need your "headgear" though for another 6 months , depending on how brave you are, and what colour and texture your "new" hair turns out to be. It came as something of a shock that mine was the same dark brown I'd been born with and not the sun-bleached blonde (hhm, hhm,)I'd been accustomed to seeing atop my "nicely shaped head" for the last 20 years! But it was a change and they say that's as good as a rest.......I actually started to like the new "wash'n'go" me and was flattered that even my kids and their friends were saying it suited me and was "funky"!! (They have lovely friends!!)
Now "funky" I could work with. It was a huge jump from"baldy" And "frumpy", those other two dwarves I'd been keeping company with of late! So in the early summer of 2008, I courageously abandoned the security of the wig/scarf/hat combos and went bare, but not bald-headed for the first time in nearly a year (in public, that is!). Very liberating, especially as the "headgear" can be itchy, sweaty, heavy and just plain uncomfortable at times!
I suppose it's the Law of Sod or Murphy (Fbud's dog's name...told you he'd get a mention!Remember Fbud, aka Bestbud, you'll be hearing about her again) , but those heady summer days of throwing headgear to the wind turned out to be shorter-lived than I had imagined. By July 2008, those pesky, not so little, liver "buggers" had grown back and needed rezapping with a different, but equally hairloss-inducing chemo drug!! As luck (!) would have it, and because I am cautious and realistic by nature, I had not exactly "thrown" the headgear anywhere, so....and how fortuitous and of sound economic practice, not to say "green" is this?..... I was able to recycle all my headgear and even collect a bit more! After all I WAS saving on hair products and regular trips to the salon!!!! I had learnt a lot of tricks along the way, and not ALL 5 or so wigs were still in favour, but I had made good use of them all, you have to give me that!
2009, 2010, 2011
Hair-wise, these were "the golden years", because although I had to have chemo for up to 6 months in each of them, I did NOT lose my hair! It turned out, as time went on, that indeed there do exist chemo treatments that don't necessarily mean you lose all your hair. Since I'd dealt with it twice , back to back, I think Dr. P (my current Consultant Greek/Greek Oncologist for the last 5 years) took pity on me and let me have a go with some regimes that would spare me the added insult of complete hair loss! OR as I was working my way through all the still available breast-cancer drugs, I just got "lucky".
Either way, it did help enormously, especially in recovery from each regime to still have hair and even grow it long and thick enough to have it coloured and cut again! I think for those last 3 treatments, the fact I still looked half-normal, even presentable, meant some people didn't even realise how physically ravaging the other side-effects were!
2012
I guess all good things come to an end, so early this year, when my blood tests and CT scans came back showing not such good things, I had to admit defeat..at least in the hair department, and agree to lose it all for the 3rd time. After all , the list of new breast-cancer drugs is not inexhaustible, but as I've responded so far to each one, I'm hoping I can just keep going back around again. (I'm not sure Dr. P would put it that way!) And if that means hair loss, then so be it!
That brings me to the 2012 choice of headgear...
This time round, I knew what to expect.....You need to prepare yourself mentally for what is inevitable. If one of the main side-effects listed is "HAIR LOSS for most people", believe me it will mean losing all your hair!Buy your wig,scarves,hats BEFORE you wake up with clumps of hair not only on your pillow , but in your eyes, nose and mouth. (That's when you know its time to shave it all off!)
The first thing I did after checking online if the new drug caused complete hairloss (not just "thinning")was to root out all my previous headgear! If I was going to have to do this again, it would be with the same measure of gusto as before! However, Hairriet , Hairmione and Hairther looked well past their sell-by-date. What had seemed like fun the first and second times (re-inventing myself like Madonna every 5 minutes with a different wig) seemed suddenly slightly ridiculous in the face of what I was about to face for the umpteenth time!
I had been wearing my hair shorter and shorter, (perhaps subliminally in case the hair ever got its marching orders again), but I liked it that way. What I needed was a new short lightweight blonde wig that looked as close to my own hair as possible. I managed to find one, amazingly in a wig shop right opposite the hospital. It's not completely devoid of "wigginess", but it'll do very nicely, thank you! So I'm afraid the 3"Hairama"sisters have gone to Hairven and I don't miss them one bit!
I'm off to the hospital on Thursday for cycle 3. No.2 was definitely worse than no.1, so fingers crossed there isn't a pattern developing here! By the way, my new wig doesn't have a name..I've run out of Hair-monikers, so I'm calling it "The Hair", hence the title of this blog.The Hair doesn't get out much at the moment, but I promise you it will when this is all over in a few months!
Bye for now from both of us!
2001
First, some personal history of hair-loss... The first time I had to do chemo (11 years ago...the dark ages in terms of breast cancer drug development), the side-effects were truly brutal (sickness, vomiting,fatigue..blah, blah, blah) but I didn't lose my hair!
At that time I was still "under" my German/Greek Doc, who was a gynaecologist/mastologist (special interest in breasts!). He realised from my jubilant reaction to weight-loss as one of the side-effects, that I probably would be none too chuffed about going bald, so suggested the "COLD CAP". This is a contraption resembling a boxer's helmet, but, imagine if you will, filled with ice-blocks like you put in a cool-bag on a hot day! Imagine too an ice-cream headache but without the double-choc chip creamy deliciousness! R says he still bears the scars from the Chinese burns I gave him ,squeezing his forearm during these sessions!
Anyway the idea is that it literally freezes your scalp whilst you are hooked up to the chemo IV, so that the drug(s) don't penetrate the hair-follicles!
The great thing is: It works, or it did for me. The downside is, that I, personally would never do it again, because it is extremely painful and you have to wear it for an hour either side of your chemo, which can mean 4-5 hours of varying degrees of agony! It is changed every half-hour for a fresh, ultra-frozen helmet, so just as its melting and the brain-freeze is starting to feel almost bearable, you have to go through it all again... 8 to 10 times, each chemo session!
Just so you know I'm not exaggerating here, go and stick your hand in the freezer, or wrap your head in a bag of frozen peas , if you have one handy! See how long YOU can stand it?? Having said that, this WAS 11 years ago and maybe there's a new, improved version out there now, so don't let me put you off (!!!!!!!!)
As it happens , I managed to do it for my 4 sessions and kept my hair, but it was enough to put me off for life. Of course, I didn't know back then that there would ever be the need to worry about hair-loss again......
2007
FAST forward 6 years.........Unfortunately (understated adverb of the millenium!) I WAS to have to worry again about the Coldcap/No Coldcap dilemma, once I was rediagnosed with spread to my bones, then liver. This, as you can imagine was one of those planet-sized bombshells you hope will never happen, but it did and I just had to suck it up and get on with it (the situation not the planet!). To be honest, at this juncture, hairloss was not really an issue. It is mind-blowingly frightening to be told you are far from putting that 6 year-old cancer scare behind you (as you had so blithely thought after passing the famous 5 year survival point!). No, you have now jumped from Stage 1 to Stage 4 breast-cancer (there is no stage 5!) and you will be fighting for your life from now on!
SOD THE HAIR.......let's just get on with zapping the little buggers! Anyway, as I said above, the Coldcap (SO many C's in all of this!!) never really had a look-in after its first spectacular success/failure! So now I really had to address what to cover my first-time shiny-skulled modesty with......
Once the drugs kicked in I knew something had to be done, so I did what I frequently do in times of trouble, I went shopping! I ended up buying / being given etc. about 5 wigs. How exciting it was to be, ringing the changes in colour and style, having previously sported a boring blonde shoulder-length bob!!! I invested in scarves of every colour-way and fabric, cute hats (bobbled, baubled, striped, spotted etc.) I was just going to make the most of this new-found versatility in the (non) hair department....Such fun!!
You realise , I'm lying, of course......it wasn't exactly what I'd call fun, it didn't even elicit a wry smile, but in some small way it did help to ease the sorrow of saying goodbye to my old friend, who'd hung around my forehead, ears and shoulders for nigh on 50 years!
I named my favourite 3 wigs: Hairther, Hairriet and Hairmione and although they were all pretty "wiggy" in their own way , I grew quite fond of them. At least the kids had a laugh trying them on. Of course , Gemma looked way better than I did in any of them (when this happens with clothes I just give them to her, but she wasn't so keen on the wig-donation idea and my need was greater than hers...nanananana!) and B, my son, well he looked especially fetching in a medium-length , mid-brown wavy number (Hairriet), but he wasn't having any either!!! Ah well, that's kids for you!
2008
Eventually, once those 12 C-sessions were history, sure enough my hair started sprouting again. You still need your "headgear" though for another 6 months , depending on how brave you are, and what colour and texture your "new" hair turns out to be. It came as something of a shock that mine was the same dark brown I'd been born with and not the sun-bleached blonde (hhm, hhm,)I'd been accustomed to seeing atop my "nicely shaped head" for the last 20 years! But it was a change and they say that's as good as a rest.......I actually started to like the new "wash'n'go" me and was flattered that even my kids and their friends were saying it suited me and was "funky"!! (They have lovely friends!!)
Now "funky" I could work with. It was a huge jump from"baldy" And "frumpy", those other two dwarves I'd been keeping company with of late! So in the early summer of 2008, I courageously abandoned the security of the wig/scarf/hat combos and went bare, but not bald-headed for the first time in nearly a year (in public, that is!). Very liberating, especially as the "headgear" can be itchy, sweaty, heavy and just plain uncomfortable at times!
B and I , wigless!
I suppose it's the Law of Sod or Murphy (Fbud's dog's name...told you he'd get a mention!Remember Fbud, aka Bestbud, you'll be hearing about her again) , but those heady summer days of throwing headgear to the wind turned out to be shorter-lived than I had imagined. By July 2008, those pesky, not so little, liver "buggers" had grown back and needed rezapping with a different, but equally hairloss-inducing chemo drug!! As luck (!) would have it, and because I am cautious and realistic by nature, I had not exactly "thrown" the headgear anywhere, so....and how fortuitous and of sound economic practice, not to say "green" is this?..... I was able to recycle all my headgear and even collect a bit more! After all I WAS saving on hair products and regular trips to the salon!!!! I had learnt a lot of tricks along the way, and not ALL 5 or so wigs were still in favour, but I had made good use of them all, you have to give me that!
2009, 2010, 2011
Hair-wise, these were "the golden years", because although I had to have chemo for up to 6 months in each of them, I did NOT lose my hair! It turned out, as time went on, that indeed there do exist chemo treatments that don't necessarily mean you lose all your hair. Since I'd dealt with it twice , back to back, I think Dr. P (my current Consultant Greek/Greek Oncologist for the last 5 years) took pity on me and let me have a go with some regimes that would spare me the added insult of complete hair loss! OR as I was working my way through all the still available breast-cancer drugs, I just got "lucky".
Either way, it did help enormously, especially in recovery from each regime to still have hair and even grow it long and thick enough to have it coloured and cut again! I think for those last 3 treatments, the fact I still looked half-normal, even presentable, meant some people didn't even realise how physically ravaging the other side-effects were!
2012
I guess all good things come to an end, so early this year, when my blood tests and CT scans came back showing not such good things, I had to admit defeat..at least in the hair department, and agree to lose it all for the 3rd time. After all , the list of new breast-cancer drugs is not inexhaustible, but as I've responded so far to each one, I'm hoping I can just keep going back around again. (I'm not sure Dr. P would put it that way!) And if that means hair loss, then so be it!
That brings me to the 2012 choice of headgear...
This time round, I knew what to expect.....You need to prepare yourself mentally for what is inevitable. If one of the main side-effects listed is "HAIR LOSS for most people", believe me it will mean losing all your hair!Buy your wig,scarves,hats BEFORE you wake up with clumps of hair not only on your pillow , but in your eyes, nose and mouth. (That's when you know its time to shave it all off!)
The first thing I did after checking online if the new drug caused complete hairloss (not just "thinning")was to root out all my previous headgear! If I was going to have to do this again, it would be with the same measure of gusto as before! However, Hairriet , Hairmione and Hairther looked well past their sell-by-date. What had seemed like fun the first and second times (re-inventing myself like Madonna every 5 minutes with a different wig) seemed suddenly slightly ridiculous in the face of what I was about to face for the umpteenth time!
I had been wearing my hair shorter and shorter, (perhaps subliminally in case the hair ever got its marching orders again), but I liked it that way. What I needed was a new short lightweight blonde wig that looked as close to my own hair as possible. I managed to find one, amazingly in a wig shop right opposite the hospital. It's not completely devoid of "wigginess", but it'll do very nicely, thank you! So I'm afraid the 3"Hairama"sisters have gone to Hairven and I don't miss them one bit!
I'm off to the hospital on Thursday for cycle 3. No.2 was definitely worse than no.1, so fingers crossed there isn't a pattern developing here! By the way, my new wig doesn't have a name..I've run out of Hair-monikers, so I'm calling it "The Hair", hence the title of this blog.The Hair doesn't get out much at the moment, but I promise you it will when this is all over in a few months!
Bye for now from both of us!
"Julie Andrews" and The Hair!
This is a brilliant blog! you are amazing and you are very beautiful with all your differing amounts of hair xxx
ReplyDeleteI have loved reading this. It is so entertaining for such a sad subject. Reminded me of when I worked at your mother's hair salon in Crosby. I agree with Gemma about your beauty.You are also very self aware, especially about you when you were 17.
ReplyDeleteJoyce x