What’s That in Your Foot?

Before I talk about my hair woes, I wanted to put a picture up I created of me and Eric. I am a HUGE True Blood fan, and I’m really mad that HBO has been keeping me in suspense since I missed the last three episodes of the second season! It feels like its taking forever for them to just get through that first season of reruns. Anyway, Eric is one of my favorite characters from the show and I am posting this picture for my own absolute enjoyment. LOL

OK, Over the last month my hair loss has seemed to go into remission again. I say that with hesitation because it typically takes about six months to know for sure a person with alopecia is in remission. After keeping the swamp cooler off for three months, my circled patches started to grow back in and my hair started to fill out. Its coming in quite nicely again, with very little permanent loss. After shaving it off about three months ago, I had it in my mind to never try and grow my hair out again. It will never look or feel the same as it used to and it would be necessary for me to get some sort of hair system to make my hair look semi normal. I’m not into hair systems or toppers, and I only wanted to get a wig for days that I felt like mixing it up a bit. So why am I growing it back this time around? Well, about a month ago my scalp started hurting very bad. As I’d bic it, it felt like the razor was dulling with each stroke against the scalp. By the time I’d be done shaving it, my head felt like it was on fire and I’d end up nicking my scalp pretty bad. I don’t need any new interesting designs on my beautiful bald head due to razor scars! So I laid off the razor for awhile. As November came and went, it perplexed me as to why my razor would dull so bad and my head hurt like a million needles were being pierced through it.

One of the lovely side affects for some individuals living with Alopecia Areata (in its many forms) is the possibility of growing what looks like translucent hairs. To the ‘lucky’ people that have to deal with this strange phenomenon it is almost surreal to view. Guess who has these hairs growing in? Yup, yours truly. It isn’t a pleasant experience for me to feel them coming through my scalp, nor is it any comfort to feel them on my head. You see, they are like hard plastic strands of see-through hair. Ever hear of see-through hair? They shimmer when light is cast on them…they feel like freshly laid astro turf! There is nothing soft or pleasing, feeling hair you can’t even see. And these rogue hairs are dangerous too! I’d like to share an unbelievably true story that takes place in my bedroom just a few short weeks ago:

Picture this…it’s nightfall and all is well in our house. I settle into bed and Dom comes in the room and is walking around barefoot. All of the sudden, he starts to limp. “Ouch!” He exclaims as he makes his way over to the light so that he may better view the “thing” that has pierced his foot. He looks but doesn’t see anything. Then he says to me “Can you look to see what’s stuck in the bottom of my foot? I think there’s glass in there!” He limps over to me and puts his foot up on my lap. I look and look, and at first I didn’t see anything. I moved his foot closer to the light and I said “Yes! You do have something in your foot.” It was glass like in appearance but thin. I reached to pull it out, and I realized that it was one of those damn rogue translucent hairs! Oh-My-God! It went half way into his foot. I pulled it out and said “Its one of my HAIRS!” He said “No!” and I gave it to him so he could see for himself. My translucent hair is like shards of glass piercing my lover’s foot. How bizarre is that? Now imagine if my hair can do that to the tough underside of a man’s foot, what is it doing to my scalp?

At that point I realized why the blade was dulling on my razor so quickly too. You try shaving something that feels like thick hard plastic strands and see how far you get! The thickness of these hairs is also not the same as my regular hair…its thicker! I’ll be laying off the razor for a while until I don’t have any more pain, but I’m going to have to find either a very sharp industrial blade, or let it grow. I don’t even know how well an electric shaver would work at this point. I love being completely bald, but I can’t risk at this point damaging the skin on my scalp either.

The other issue I have with my hair now is that with these translucent hairs coming in, it looks like I have less hair than I really do. I can’t use conventional hair dyes because they trigger my autoimmune response and they don’t grab the white hair (another lovely part of alopecia) very well. I’ll have to try a henna dye in a dark brown. I’m unsure whether the white hair and the translucent hair would hold color with henna though. I know it would work for my gray hair (I have plenty of those!). I guess all I can do is try huh?

Bald Beauty of the Day

Bald Fetishism

I wanted to address a topic that is rather heated in the lives of women who live as Alopecians; the bizarre world of bald fetishists. I have gone to a number of bald fetish sites to see what the fascination is with a bald woman and try to make sense of this odd sexual proclivity. Women shave their heads for a variety of reasons, but as I am discovering, it is about power for a woman. And for every “powerful clean shaven woman” there is an awestruck willing man erect and waiting to be subdued. I wanted to look objectively at this group of participants, because I believe women are just as much apart of the bald fetish world as men are. I wanted to understand exactly what the big “turn on” was and why this particular fetish makes men go nuts and blow their load.

The picture on the left shows two women involved in fantasy roles, one as a dominate and the other as a submissive. For the sake of staying on the conservative side, I am not showing the rest of the picture. The woman being shaved not only has a clothes pin on her tongue, but she is topless with clothes pins pinched to her breasts as well, and from the waist down she is wearing a plaid Catholic school uniform skirt, white knee high socks and shoes. For me, it’s hard to see what the great appeal in this is, or even how it can be a turn on. And then it dawned on me; how long has sex in general been looked at as bad, wrong, sinful, immoral, disgusting, perverted and base? What were you told growing up about sex? How about sex before marriage? Could fetishism just be some deep psychological rebellion against what their parents expressed as acceptable and “right?”  Or is it the acting out of parental hangups about sex, beauty, love and life? As I view this first picture on the left I see a few things at work. I see a woman with a clothes pin pinched on her pieced tongue. Is there something she isn’t supposed to talk about? Her head is being shaved; was vanity and beautiful hair ever an contentious issue in this persons life? This is supposed to be exciting? A turn on? Well, when you were young, did you ever have sex in the house while your parents were home? Did you find it exciting to do something you weren’t supposed to do? Was it a turn on to almost get caught?

Since a bald woman isn’t a regular part of what is “acceptable” in the mainstream media or society, I think this adds to the appeal with fetishists. But what is a fetishist anyway? I believe that a fetishist of any kind needs that object or body part to get off sexually. The list of fetishes are extensive! Smelly feet, defecation, animals, hands, hair color, latex rubber outfits, S&M, size and shape of a woman or man, piercings, tattoos, fantasy incest, angry clown sex, objects…you name it and it has probably already been an active part of someone’s sexual life.

It can be a totally selfish and self serving sexual behavior that cares nothing for the other person. But for every self-serving fetishist, there is an equally self-serving partner…so I think they are kind of made for each other, don’t you? There are women that shave their heads because it’s a turn on to them and they know there is an audience for their brand of sexuality. Does that make it wrong? As objectionable and disgusting, immoral and base as you may feel it is, it’s how these people choose to live their lives and express themselves sexually.

I wonder what will happen if more women decide to make it acceptable to be bald in public and in society. Will it be as much of a turn on to the fetishist? I must clarify something though…I don’t believe if a man feels a bald woman is beautiful, it automatically makes him a bald fetishist. There is beauty to the female form, and when her hair is gone it allows the face, bone structure, eyes, nose, lips and smile to be seen clearly. Hair is no longer a distraction. Some men are actually surprised that they find a bald woman attractive. I would hate for them to feel shame in some way because they find bald women beautiful or sexy.

I have spoken to many women who are bald not by choice but because they are Alopecians. These are women who have lost their hair and now feel preyed upon by bald fetishists. They feel objectified by a fetishist’s advances, and rightly so! These are women who are NOT a part of the bald fetish fringe group and do not wish to be exploited or used to fulfill some strange sexual fantasy of a man who can’t seem to get it up without the assistance of looking at a bald woman. This of course adds to the excitement for the bald fetishist because “they’re advances and compliments aren’t welcome” by the Alopecian woman and this in turn adds to the appeal.

I have had a very good experience being an Alopecian woman, and while there have been some fetishists that have contacted me online, for the most part they have been far and few between. I don’t feel every man that thinks I’m sexy or beautiful is under suspicion of being a fetishist. I accept the compliment and allow my beauty to be acknowledged.

If you are a bald fetishist (male or female or both), leave a comment and let me know what the appeal is for you.

If you are an Alopecian what are your feelings about bald fetishists?

If you are neither but have a ready opinion…tell me what you think!

Bald Beauty of the Day