"Will I lose my hair?" is apparently the most common first question people ask when told they need chemotherapy.
It wasn't mine. I automatically assumed that I would and in the grand scheme of gigantic things to get my head around post-diagnosis, frankly the loss of my locks did not figure highly.
Unlike many women I am very used to having short hair. I find hair across my face and eyes deeply irritating, and have rarely had the patience to grow it long. Cropped hair feels like my 'home ground'. My gut instinct is that losing my hair won't feel like the massive challenge to my identity that I fully appreciate it is for some people. Having been open about my diagnosis from the start, I do not expect to feel confronted by the unavoidably public sign of my current health status that being bald will bring. In many ways it will save on me having to explain.
But, none of that is to deny that this is another very significant part of my cancer journey.
I didn't expect to find this a difficult step at all and had anticipated that cutting it would simply feel like a welcome return to 'me', something that I could do without breaking stride.
Thanks to the weird year that was 2020, I had not had my hair cut for 16 months. My lockdown locks were longer than I can remember having my hair since I was about 18. Even though I had worn it tied back every single day I had, to my surprise, really enjoyed having longer hair. It felt somehow softer and feminine - like a slightly different more 'grown up' version of me.
But, sitting quietly with my feelings as I waited for the chop, I could clearly recognise that my encroaching sense of loss was not really about my hair at all. It was about so much more.
Cutting my hair off represented the peeling off of yet another layer of the onion - leaving exposed another vulnerable layer. Another step deeper into the unknown forest, another step closer to my treatment and another step further away from my old life familiar. The dropping away of so much more than hair...
For a short while after it was cut, I resisted it, I wanted to change it. I pulled and tugged at it, futilely trying to turn what was into something other. Trying to somehow turn back time. Sitting in denial.
But, deep breaths, space to surrender and a gentler gaze and I started to find a soft acceptance of this next stage of my new reality.
Only this time I did not feel the same aching sense of loss. Nothing like it. Perhaps because last time my reaction was wrapped up in tricky anticipation of starting chemotherapy - going over the edge into the great unknown. Perhaps because this time around, I have already taken the first steps of my treatment journey. And although not a breeze, round one of chemotherapy has gone far better than I was fearing. Round two may not be as easy, I know that, but I also know that all I can do is take a day at a time and soften into whatever is coming my way. Show up, breathe, trust.
I have always wanted to try a buzz cut but have never had the nerve to do it...so there is the offer. I don't expect to have it long - none of us can stop stroking it and it is likely to fall out a pace now - but for now, I have to say, I am loving it.
