Chemotherapy and Hair Loss: Personal Consequences

Chemotherapy, or chemo, as it is referred to in short, is technically, treatment by means of chemicals; such a definition would cover every kind of modern drug treatment for any kind of disease. In the popular vernacular though, chemotherapy is a term that is used exclusively for the intense drug-based treatment available to cancer patients today. Oncological chemotherapy is treatment by method of very potent chemicals that are effective in addressing the spread of cancerous cells in the body. These critically important drugs are such strong chemicals however, that they have an unfortunate side effect: the body reacts to them by sloughing off hair.

To a person deeply distressed by the anxieties attendant on battling cancer, reality can seem unnecessarily harsh when it forces them to accept the additional loss of a prized part of their identity: their hair. Chemotherapy does not always result in total loss of hair; drug protocols can vary from patient to patient and can cause forms of hair loss that range from an acceptable thinning of the hair, to total loss.

While the physical effects of chemotherapy on the body's ability to hold its hair are even over the sexes, the personal consequences of hair loss happen to be much more difficult to accept for women than they are for men. While men prize a good head of hair, they are naturally prone to losing their hair with age, and most men make peace with the distinct probability of losing their hair.

Women on the other hand, have no such natural tendency to hair loss and so, have no personal preparedness for such an eventuality. Women are also greatly admired for their physical beauty and charm in a way that men are not. One of the greatest compliments a woman can receive can be admiration of her lovely hair or hair-do. Thus loss of hair for a woman means something very different from what it does for a man. For a woman, to have one of her greatest assets taken away from her in the middle of a terrible illness really would seem to be a very unkind cut.

Even so, a woman can pull off her new baldness with charm and panache in several ways. Wigmakers have a better range of merchandise today than ever before. Any good-sized town should have a wig shop with a pretty good range. This could be a good time to try out a number of beautiful hairstyles with new wigs. Women often, also choose to cover their heads up in a pretty silk scarf or a variety of soft hats.

The hair loss the chemotherapy brings on, is a luckily not permanent in any sense of the term. The body recovers from the effects of strong chemotherapy soon after the course of treatment is done with. The hair that comes back is sometimes not nearly as luxuriant as the original head; but it still approaches a healthy and unharmed head of hair closely enough as to not matter.

Surviving cancer depends crucially on support obtained from caring friends and family; the emotional costs of defying death from cancer are so high that not the strongest person would be able to bear the burden without such kind support. While problems like weight loss or hair loss might not attract enough sympathetic reaction in everyday acquaintances, close friends and family who support the cancer survivor with their kindness are sure to understand. Cancer survivors must spend most of their time around such well-meaning people then: much as Samantha in Sex and the City would do; this is the way then to get over such emotionally scarring experiences of losing one's hair.

Sources: http://www.cancer.org/docroot/MBC/content/MBC_2_3X_Hair_Loss.asp
http://www.cancerhelp.org.uk/help/default.asp?page=320