"How do you do it?" the woman next to me asked, sounding both wishful and incredulous. We sat at a table in a conference room at a local hospital, waiting for the commencement of a monthly alopecia support group meeting. I blinked at her, unable to comprehend her question, and asked for clarification. "How do you just walk around bald all the time?" she elaborated, adding, "I would be absolutely terrified, if it were me." I was somewhat puzzled by her statement. I just do, I thought. At this point in my life, my hairless is so ingrained in my identity and my daily routines that I don't think much of it at all. To say that my relationship with myself has always been so smooth, however, would be a miserable understatement. I started losing …show more content…
On top of the massive changes experienced in the move to a new state, I was now experiencing a sort of culture shock to sixth grade. Suddenly it wasn't cool to be smart, passionate, or opinionated, the very things that had always defined me. I felt as though all the things that made me me weren't "cool" anymore, and it was like the floor had been ripped out from underneath my feet. At the same time, there was an added pressure to be pretty, and the word "pretty" became more important than any other. The "pretty" girls were short and sweet, with bubbly personalities and a neat, round handwriting style. Pretty girls had smooth, white skin. Pretty girls had long, straight hair. I wanted more than anything to be that girl, but I could never fit the bill: undeniably black and horribly tall with a bizarre sense of humor, fundamental aspects of my person made my wishes impossible regardless of how hard I tried. The dead-end results of my futile efforts murdered my self-esteem and left me feeling unsettled in my own skin. Conscious of my progressing hair loss and increasingly resigned to the fact that it might never grow back, my parents give in to my pleas for a wig. I was so excited then, but now I recognize that the wig was a double-edged sword in a way. On the one hand, it offered me the security of …show more content…
When the very last strands of hair were thrown away, I took stock of my new body in front of my bathroom mirror. I flexed my muscles and danced a little and realized, "I don't have to live like this anymore." So I didn't. I walked into school the following day without a wig, and I never looked back. Post-hair loss, I'm feeling more comfortable in my own skin than ever. Upon leaving middle school began to embrace the talents and interests I had suppressed in pursuit of normalcy. It hasn't been easy-- I still have bad days where I -- but I have come to realize that I have to okay with being "weird" if I want to be anything other than miserable with myself and my life. I am bald and I am black and I am six feet tall. These are qualities I will never be able to change, so I might as well love them. My focus now is on becoming a better person, teaching myself to unthink negative talk about myself and others, and ultimately becoming more open and more encouraging. As I sit in a conference room at a local hospital, surrounded by several middle-aged women who were in the same dark place I had been several years
The author also referred to the hair of Zeena and Mattie quite often. Zeena had only “thin strands of hair”, and she wore a “hard perpendicular bonnet” above her head. The sight imprinted in the reader’s mind is not a pleasant one. Zeena appears to be stern and rigid. On the contrary when Mattie’s hair was described, it is more appealing. Ethan remembers her “smoothed hair and a ribbon at her neck”. A ribbon is more appealing to the reader than a “hard, perpendicular bonnet.” Mattie’s hair was also described as looking like a “drift of mist on the moon”. Unlike Zeena’s uninviting hairstyle, Mattie’s hair had a soft and silky quality to it. Mattie seemed to walk about the house with a halo of light surrounding her, almost like an angel. The conflicting hairstyles of the two women represented an overall difference in personalities. Mattie was a feminine young girl, while Zeena was an old hag who made no attempt to better her appearance.
Walker speaks highly of her influencer that encourage her to make the change in working with the hair that she
By the time Sarah was in her late thirties, she was dealing with hair loss because of a combination of stress and damaging hair care products. After experimenting with various methods, she developed a formula of her own that caused her hair to grow again quickly. She often said that after praying about her hair, she was given the formula in a dream. When friends and family members noticed how Sarah's hair grew back, they began to ask her to duplicate her product for them. She began to prepare her formula at home, selling it to friends and family and also selling it door to door.
somebody’s chemo wig? Is there a cancer kid who thrives because of your braids?” (line 16). On
“Beauty might bring happiness, but happiness always brings beauty” (the daily quotes) If you have ever been unhappy about your appearances remember, it is a very familiar problem every human faces. Cosmetology was created to help those that are in need of their desired look. To express every moment was second of who they are or will become to be. Even though, we have abundant stylist today throughout the country. This career may not be the most satisfying, fun, or even a high-ranking in income, but the satisfaction of each smile is more than enough. However, challenging cosmetology is one of the most creative of all art.
is a contrast to the hairless scalp that we see in the film. The film
“As I write this I am still amazed that one day back in 1990 when I stood in my bathroom glancing in the mirror at my hair, that plucking out just one hair, that seemed so out of place, would lead me into 10 years of slavery” (Strickland 2011). This is how Lori opens up her blog about her story of suffering from Trichotillomania. Lori discusses how it began with the o...
In the documentary “Good Hair”, Chris Rock covers a lot about different hair types and what women would do to their hair just to feel beautiful. He first decided to do this questionnaire because one day his daughter asked “how come I don’t have good hair?” Chris was very curious as to how she came up with that question so he sat out to find out. He went in salons, barber shops, and beauty supply stores to find out all the information he needed to know.
Whut good do combin’ mah hair do you? It’s mah comfortable, not yourn." "It’s mine too. Ah ain’t been sleepin’ so good for more’n uh week cause Ah been wishin’ so bad tuh git mah hands in yo’ hair. It’s so pretty.
All of my life I have been called countless names, some of which irritated me and some did not bother me at all. In elementary school, when kids thought about the name ‘Jackie’ they tended to connect it to Jackie Chan thus calling me ‘Jackie Chan’. Furthermore, the kids seemed to link the name to being a masculine name the majority of the time, which began to annoy me since I answered the question, “Why do you have a boy’s name,” so many times. As years went by, I became used to being asked the question and the kids matured, thus stopped calling me ‘Jackie Chan.’
Growing up I always felt like I was not “pretty enough,” due to the fact that I compared myself to the girls I would see in the media. I will always love Barbie and Disney, but as a kid I hated that I was not a pretty blonde girl like Barbie, and most of the Disney princesses. The underrepresentation of people of color in the media
Imagining if I transformed into the opposite sex for a week, my experiences of truth and reality would be quite different, yet strikingly similar to my life as a woman. Although my peers would accept me the same and know nothing altered, my mindset would have done a complete 180 degree flip. Although it is the expectation that humans identify with a single gender, multitudes of modern Americans refuse to succumb to this idea and prefer to identify with a sense gender fluidity. “The term "gender identity” . . . refers to a person's innate, deeply felt psychological identification as a man, woman or some other gender, which may or may not correspond to the sex assigned to them at birth” (par. 2). Some refuse to accept that gender is as one may say black or white, male or female. However, if I transfigured into a man, I would need to adjust my sense of reality in regards to the new expectations that come with the given gender.
At birth everyone is given a set of identities but as they grow up and find their place in the world with people they love those identities will change. I believe that changing identities throughout life will help a person develop into a better person. If a person has identified as multiple different things in his or her past then he or she will be more willing to accept and appreciate those who are different. I grew up being taught to always treat others the way I wanted to be treated and at times that can be hard, but I have always strived to be a kind and caring person.
I usually don’t (lies) but I’m having some trouble cause I gotta keep adjusting the light on this screen. LOL. Anywho I wanted to talk about a topic that’s kind of in the spotlight right now, hair loss. If you haven’t heard already, Jada Pinkett Smith has opened up about her hair loss issues. She mentioned a time where she first noticed “handfuls” of her hair in her hands while showering.
I can't remember the day my hair and I parted ways. We used to get along when we were young! Displayed in the ponytail fountain on top of my head, she was quite cooperative....