oh if only I had hair...

When I cut my hair short it was all a preemptive strike against the shock and emotional stress of loosing long locks of hair on my pillow or in the shower. I had a very short buzz cut when I went into the hospital for my second treatment. Since my cycles were three weeks apart that's exactly the time when my hair was scheduled to start to fall out. Sure enough when I was sitting in my hospital bed I started to play with my super short hair. Some part of me was still clinging to the thought that perhaps clippering my hair was a bad idea - i.e. that it would never fall out and that this would have been a big waste. But there I was, playing with my little stubble and having little tufts of hair come out. By the time I made it home from the hospital I had some random bald spots. I suppose I should have taken pictures, but trust me, it wasn't very pretty. So, the next morning I took at razor to my head and shaved it all off. The great news was that my eyelashes and eyebrows didn't seem to be affected. Sure, they would fall out, but there was no real noticeable increase in the number of lashes that would come off when I washed my mascara off. That is of course until around the time that my 5th treatment started. Then they seemed to want to head for the hills and fall out with no indication that there would be reinforcements. I now have one long eyelash on my left eye (not that they were ever anything but puny) and about 5 on my right. Then I have a bunch of little sprouts that are about a milimeter long. But I have no idea if they'll fall out again or if these will be in it for the long haul. Last week I even bought false eyelashes just to wear for some big meetings at work without feeling self conscious. Since my last treatment my hair new hair started to come in a little bit, but the tips are very blond. Of course about a week ago (remember that was about 3 weeks after my last treatment) even the new blond hair was falling out. It has dark brown roots, so it's anyone's guess what the actual color will be once it's filled in. Total length at this point is about 1/4 inch. I am guessing that it will grow about the same amount over the next month and then settle into the 1/2 in per month that's a normal rate of growth.

However, hope springs eternal and since chemo ended almost four weeks ago I am optimistic that my hair and lashes will start growing at some noticeable clip faster than that. Unfortunately no scientific medical information seems to be available. Doctors either don't want to give you an average time-line because they don't want to disappoint you or the general medical community just doesn't care. I kind of get that - the more important clinical work is on refining the chemo drugs so I'll survive, not in studying if/when I'll have luxurious lashes and eyebrows again. Yeah - I'm thinking of the t-shirt "chemo ate my eyebrows". Until then I'll be wearing false lashes, pink wigs, and colorful scarves.