I have been listening to alot of Whitney Houston lately, mainly because I feel like I wanted to sing on top of my lungs and Whitney Houston songs are quite fun to sing along to don't you think? haha

I came across the song "Greatest Love of All" and I am sure all of you must have heard of it. It is a classic. When I was young I used to sing it on Karaoke (yes, we asians love our karaoke!) Before you get any ideas, no I can't sing to save my life but it feels good to burst out in song once in a while :) I remember at the tender age of 8 I used to sing it alot but at the time the words didn't mean anything to me until today.

After having my breakthrough, I feel that every line of the song is about me. I could relate to it. My life hasn't been great. I had a tough childhood and this isn't only because I had to deal with alopecia. As I mentioned before, I never saw it as a problem because I had bigger problems to deal with. Having alopecia was merely a minor obstacle in my life. So back to the song- after 'coming out' the lesson that I learned from it was that in order for me to deal with alopecia is to learn to love myself. This is by far the biggest challenge I have ever encountered. How can I love myself? I have so much flaws. I am not perfect but then who is? I remember during my teenage years, to make myself feel better I used to think the reason why God did not give me hair was because if I had hair I would be perfect! lol That made me feel better and it made me carry on with my life much much easier. Obviously it did not last cos recently I felt so depressed about it. I hated looking at myself in the mirror. I felt ugly and I thought I looked like a freak. The only time I let myself look at myself is when I put make-up on and I try to do it as quickly as possible to avoid having to sit in front of the mirror for a long time.

But now, I love looking at myself (vain alert!!!) lol. And this is all because I have sincerely accepted myself. For those of you out there, listen to the song. I am sure you can relate to it too, especially when you have accepted yourself.

"Because the greatest love of all is happening to me. I found the greatest love of all inside of me.The greatest love of all is easy to achieve. Learning to love yourself is the greatest love of all"

Those words have so much meaning now.

So to end this note I wish you all the best in going on this fantastic journey in learning to accept and love yourself. And once you get there I can assure you it is a wonderful feeling!

For those of you who are just experiencing alopecia, well AW is the right place for you. You are lucky that there are people here to support you. We are all lucky to have found each other through AW! We are all a family now and we can help each other get through this difficult time. We can find the strength that we need in each other.

Let us carry on with our lives with our heads held high! Don't give in to alopecia and do not let it stop you from living your life!

Good luck to all of you!