Am I a Bad Parent Because My Baby Has a Bald Spot?

Seeing My 3-Yr-Old Girl Lose All Her Hair to Alopecia Was Devastating, But I Won't Let It Ascertain Her

My daughter started losing all her pilus considering of alopecia when she was 3. It was very difficult to lookout her go through information technology, simply I'm at present doing all I can to brand sure she grows up with self-conviction.

During our summer vacation last year, I noticed my then 3-twelvemonth-quondam daughter, Gwen, was missing some of her eyebrows. As we swam and played in the pool, I watched her wrench goggles on and off her little face up in a rough faux of her older sister, and I assumed that a summer of doing this must have pulled out some hair. It looked a fleck strange, but seemed evidence of fun, so I didn't worry much.

Fast forwards a yr to that same holiday puddle and I caught Gwen'southward slippery, completely hairless torso for a brief moment as she gulped a breath before wriggling away again. Her eyes were no longer rimmed with lashes or shielded past eyebrows. She didn't intendance. She was busy acting as a mermaid unicorn in hot pursuit of an evil giant sea snake. She was also too busy for my motherly worries.

Simply we soon discovered the reason for her hair loss: Gwen has alopecia, an autoimmune disorder where her allowed arrangement attacks her hair cells. In the more than common form, alopecia areata, the hair loss is patchy and may come and go. Gwen has alopecia universalis, meaning a total loss of all pilus on her body.

RELATED: Dad Shaved His Caput to Comfort His Daughter Who Was Diagnosed With Baldness

The process of hair loss itself was alarmingly rapid. After a few months of losing her eyebrows, Gwen began losing scalp hair in obvious circular patches, leading apace to her diagnosis. We figured it would stop in that location, with patchy hair loss that would grow back.

Within 2 months, notwithstanding, there were more than baldheaded spots than hair, and we began to accept that she'd lose the remainder. Nosotros talked to Gwen about information technology, preparing her for the inevitable. Nosotros put the control in her hands. On a warm afternoon in March, she decided she was set up, and nosotros gathered on the back deck as a family unit to cheer her on as daddy shaved off the remaining pilus. None grew back.

Catherine-Gwen-porch-2

Courtesy of Catherine Franssen.

Over the next few months, hair from her arms, legs, nostrils, eyelashes all fell out. We forget all the useful functions of hair as we groom and shape information technology to our ideals. Gwen'due south nose hairs were gone, and her upper lip went raw from constant wiping. We needed headbands so sweat wouldn't drip into her optics and a headwrap for protecting her head under a bike helmet. We argued all summertime well-nigh keeping a hat on her bald scalp, when she preferred just slathering it in sunscreen.

Gwen-freckles-smile

Courtesy of Catherine Franssen.

Inside a few months of her diagnosis, Gwen lost every pilus on her body. My reactions came in two waves.

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The first was the calendar week she was diagnosed. I grieved the loss of hair and I wept for her future teenage cocky. I worried and fretted and cried. My husband consoled me past reinforcing the important points: She's otherwise healthy; information technology'south simply hair; there are wigs and makeup and pilus replacements when she'due south prepare. He was right. But information technology was still scary and foreign and worrying to look at my little girl and run across her lovely head without her signature pigtails.

The second was the week that I realized there was no cure. It was April, three months into the diagnosis, two weeks into living with a bald child, and the finish of a week of specialist appointments. There are medical interventions that nosotros can effort. Something might work to regrow hair, merely information technology will almost certainly be temporary. And nothing is without side effects, some serious. I was deeply rattled—and maybe fifty-fifty beat out-shocked. I waited until everyone was off at school and fell autonomously. I decided on an impromptu eight-hour gardening session then I could sweat and weep into the clay and rant into the wild bluish sky and clothing myself out completely. And that was it. Subsequently that 24-hour interval, I was over it.

The cardinal for me was to let go of the battle for hair. I waved the white flag and said "no" to the drugs that might maybe restore some hair for some time. Anybody makes different choices. Maybe 1 of the treatments would accept worked. Possibly she wouldn't have had debilitating side effects. I chose to skip that chapter and to double my efforts in fighting the battle for her self-confidence and community.

Gwen is more than her hair, more than her appearance. Then very much more than. And I will love and celebrate and flaunt all of her. And she will abound up in a world that will meet her as hairless, gorgeous, and fantastic. It will shape her personality differently. It volition be challenging. As much as we alive in this wonderful era of "daughter power," women (and all people) are still judged on our appearances outset. Everyone says that they comprehend differences, and now we become to notice how well they do with it.

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I decided to post on social media shortly subsequently Gwen'due south diagnosis. It was a way of trying to accept a fiddling control in a state of affairs that nosotros had no command over; sharing our vulnerability before any attacks could be launched. Social media posting about Gwen's baldness turned out to be a great choice. Anybody had positive energy to share with u.s.a., and several people knew someone with alopecia and continued me to them. I was informed nearly webpages, Facebook pages, organizations, and more. Our family continues to benefit from the connectedness and educational resources shared with us.

Gwen just started kindergarten. Earlier classes started, nosotros sent letters to her teachers, classmates, and administrators to let them know what to await. Once once more, we were met with kindness and support. The next role of our journey begins.

Catherine Franssen is a professor of psychology and manager of neurostudies at Longwood University.

Am I a Bad Parent Because My Baby Has a Bald Spot?

Source: https://www.parents.com/parenting/better-parenting/positive/seeing-my-3-year-old-daughter-lose-all-her-hair-to-alopecia-was-devastating-but-i-wont-let-it-define-her/