this is the story I sent to Women Behaving Baldly. While writing it and be transported back to that day was difficult but I decided to share it here that maybe by chance you might find it inspiring or relate able.

The day that I shaved my head is still a fresh memory, even though its been 19 months (September 3, 2010). It wasn’t a day I planned to shave my head, in fact I woke that morning with the resound thought that I most definitely was not going to shave my head.

That day my mom was making a 3 1/2hr trip into town to see me. We had an appointment to get me a wig. It was her gift to me, to help in my heartbreak of losing my hair completely for the second time in my life. This day came about after her 35 year old daughter called (me) her in tears. Frightened, and not wanting this to happen again. I was beyond terrified, I even thought about not wanting to continue on if it meant that I would have to be bald. I was going to be bald!!!! I honestly thought that there was no worse thing in life at that moment.

I had been religiously seeing my doctor every 6 weeks for the last 10 years, receiving the painful injections and lotions to create hair. But the loss was faster than the growth. I had been hiding myself under bandanas and couldn’t face the mirror. I still have the memory of getting for work one morning and finding a new spot right in front. I started crying and couldn’t stop for the entire day. It was after that and calling my mom in desperation that my mom made the decision to make the appointment with a wig salon, which specialized in hair prosthetics and make the 3 ½ hour trip in. She came in with her boyfriend and both of them decided that if it were to help me, they were going to shave their heads to show support. I didn’t allow them to do that tho.

We went to the salon and I was fitted for a new human hair wig. I was told that depending on the fit, I may have to wait a week or so til the correct one to come in. But as it happened he had 1 last brunette medium length human hair wig in stock that fit me. That was the first day that other than my doctor that anyone saw the state in which my head and hair had become. My mom cried for me and I shedded more tears. It was emotionally draining for both of us. I told her I wasn’t ready to shave the last of my hair off and the gentleman that owned the salon said it wasn’t needed for the fit of the wig. I was determined not to let go of the last of my hair. And again I had to tell my mom that it wasn’t necessary for her to shave her own head.

Wearing my new wig and looking at myself in the mirror, I started to cry again for it was the first time in years that I saw that much hair on my head. I looked like the me of olden days. What I looked like when I had a full head of hair. I walked out of that salon that afternoon, feeling more confident then I had in ages but a little weary of the idea of having a wig on. Was anyone going to be able to tell? We went for lunch, did some shopping and basically spent the afternoon around town. Eventually tho my mom and her boyfriend had to make that long trip back to their home and they dropped me off at my place.

It wasn’t till that night when I took off my wig and looked into the mirror that I made the decision to shave. I don’t even remember actually thinking about shaving or not to, at that point. I just remember looking in the mirror and saying to myself “what are you doing to yourself?” I live on a horse boarding stable, where I take care of the horses at night, basically making sure they have enough water in their stalls till morning and giving them a little bit of hay. I decided right then that when I went to the barn that I was going to take the clippers I use on my own horse and right there in the bathroom in the barn I was going to shave my head. There was something comforting having those horses around me, making their munching noises and hearing them move about in their stalls. I walked into the bathroom and using a couple of tiny elastics I use on horses, I tied my own hair into pigtails. There was no one there in the barn, just me and the horses and my dog. I remember turning on the clippers and listening to the motor and just staring at them for a moment. Then I touched the clippers to my head. One swept and one pigtail was off. I stared at the hair in my hands for a minute or two before sweeping the clippers over the other side and taking off the other pigtail. Staring at both pigtails in my hands, I felt numb and in shock. I couldn’t believe what little hair I had left, the hair that I was so desperate to hold on to at all costs. I cleaned up my head with the clippers and kept running my hands over my head, with a combination of shock, numbness and awe. I walked around the barn and around the horses rubbing my head. I knew they didn’t care. They weren’t going to judge or make a comment about my new look. I knew deep down that I needed to have done this step with the animals around me. I gave both my dog and horse a hug and as always my horse hugged me back by wrapping his neck around me. It didn’t matter to him that I just shaved my head.

When I got back to the house and took a shower, I looked in the mirror yet again. And it was in that moment that truly felt what I have been doing to myself for way too long. It was in that moment, that night, looking at my newly shaven head, that I felt 10,000 lbs lighter. I felt this huge weight taken off my shoulders. All of a sudden, all the stress and tears, of what I was trying so desperately to hang on to was gone. It wasn’t a sense of euphoria that I felt, just a great sense of relief. That the burden I was carrying was no longer. And I haven’t looked back.