Hair Loss

I should have known something was up when I found a long dark brown hair in my cereal this morning, that today was the day I would start losing my hair. It already started as a shocker of a day when I woke up to watch 7th Heaven and it wasn't on. I watch this show all the time, it's a bit of a routine. Even when I worked as a nurse, if was working an afternoon shift this meant I could sleep in and then watch 7th Heaven. Well, not today. Dr Quinn medicine woman has taken its place. Brett is also home sick at the moment but with an injured back from playing footy.  He can hardly bend his back, so he was still in bed this morning when I got up to begin my routine.

The routine is this: I wake up by 10am, go to the toilet, come to make breakfast which is usually a bowl of either Cheerios with honey or sultana bran. The kettle is boiled, I make my loose leaf Melbourne breakfast tea, the tv is turned on, then I take my breakfast and eat it on the couch while I watch 7th heaven. I also have my iPad buy my side and play candy crush until my lives run out. When 7th Heaven is over, that's normally tv done for the day and I'd do something else. Since being diagnosed however, I sometimes watch a bit of Fraser or Friends. Depends on my mood. Plus I have spare time!

Today was different. My routine was automatically compromised simply by Brett still being in bed. That was weird enough. He alerted me that it was 10am and I needed to get up to watch 7th heaven, so I of course got up, shuffled in my ugg boots to the tv (note I also didn't go to the toilet??) and turned it on. Channel 11. Dr Quinn was on, but I didn't panic. Maybe, just maybe it was still on as the show playing before 7th heaven? Checked the guide. Nope. Seems like channel 11 has changed everything. Fraser wasn't even scheduled for after 7th heaven.
I cried out to Brett in a childish whinge that it wasn't on. Shuffled back into the room dramatically stating that my day was "ruined!!!". After a moment, I composed myself to then continue on my "routine", making breakfast. I made it and sat down on the couch watching an encore of reef doctors, when there was my next clue to my day of disaster. The hair in my cereal. Not too much reaction was had, as it was my own I wasn't too disgusted.
After breakfast and being rebellious in doing a load of washing, I decided I needed a long shower and wash my hair. It had been a while, so in I got. Washing my hair takes a while, I have lots of it.
The more I wet it and shampooed it, chunks and chunks came out. It was knotty and being difficult. As I worked my way through the knots, it just kept coming out. I normally lose a fair bit of hair in the shower, but never to this extent. It was heartbreaking and painful to see more and more mount the shower wall.

Here are some photos of proof.

 I started putting the clumps on the shower wall, it felt never ending!

 Clumps were too heavy to stay on the shower wall and some fell.

 This one was just after brushing it post shower. You may also notice, I'm not yet bald.

 I was pretty upset. I knew this was coming, but maybe after a few more treatments as my doctor had explained. There is just no way of being OK with it. I thought I would be fine. But it hit me, the realisation that very soon the rest of my hair will follow. I won't have long, curly brown hair. I will be bald. I am incredibly sad and not sure how I will be when it comes out so much that I will have to shave it. I will just have to take one day at a time and know that this is just something I have to go through in order to get better. A small sacrifice maybe?

Here's to hoping this hasn't freaked anyone out too much and you stop reading my blogs. I'm in the process of adding a fun entry about wig shopping. Stay tuned!! Also I start my next round of chemo on Wednesday. Blog to follow.

Thanks again to all of my friends and family. XX