Myrna J. Buckles - Wigs, Scarves & Lies: Why Your Hair is Thinning and How to Grow it Back

Why Your Hair Is

Thinning and How

to Grow It Back

Myrna J. Buckles

NEW YORK

LONDONNASHVILLEMELBOURNEVANCOUVER

Wigs, Scarves, & Lies

2019 Myrna J. Buckles

All rights reserved. No portion of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any meanselectronic, mechanical, photocopy, recording, scanning, or otherexcept for brief quotations in critical reviews or articles, without the prior written permission of the publisher.

Published in New York, New York, by Morgan James Publishing in partnership with Difference Press.
www.MorganJamesPublishing.com

The Morgan James Speakers Group can bring authors to your live event. For more information or to book an event visit The Morgan James Speakers Group at www.TheMorganJamesSpeakersGroup.com.

ISBN 978-1-64279-032-0 paperback

ISBN 978-1-64279-033-7 eBook

Library of Congress Control Number: 2018941778

Cover & Interior Design by:

Megan Whitney Dillon

Creative Ninja Designs

In an effort to support local communities, raise awareness and funds, Morgan James Publishing donates a percentage of all book sales for the life of each book to Habitat for Humanity Peninsula and Greater Williamsburg.

Get involved today! Visit
www.MorganJamesBuilds.com

For Dan, my support and my rock, even when the path was not clear.

There is no greater thing you can do with your life and your work than follow your passionsin a way that serves the world and you.

S IR R ICHARD B RANSON

I know you woke up very early this morning, hours before anyone else in your family even thought about waking up. Every morning you have a routine that includes painstaking attention to every detail of your hair. The fear of being found out drives you. So, you wake up at 4 or 5 am every day, shower, and apply your foundation, mascara, blush, and a little eyeliner so you feel a little more like you used to before you started losing hair. Then you spend the next hour and a half carefully and strategically drying and arranging your hair.

You see yourself in the mirror, and the reflection looking back at you says its time to get to work disguising your hair loss. Youve checked the weather forecast to make sure it isnt going to be overly windy and looked at your schedule multiple times to make sure you havent overlooked an outside event or activity. Your son has soccer practice tonight, so you know you absolutely cant forget to take the ball cap that goes best with the outfit you chose for today. So many things to think about every single morning, its draining.

You have a rhythm when you comb your hair in the morning: comb, scoop, comb, scoop, hair into the toilet; comb, scoop, comb, scoop, hair into the toilet. You maximize every strand of your hair as you fix it, this hair over that hair; first you brush left, and then you brush right. Horrified, you notice your part is much wider than you thought, so you move your part one millimeter to the left of where you typically part it. Oops, that wont work, too thin there, so you go a millimeter to the right of your typical part, and that looks like it will work.

Your thoughts often drift back to times when you got caught outside without one of your trusty baseball caps, and the wind was blowing like crazy like the time you decided to walk across the street to lunch with friends, only to be devastated by the wind blowing your hair so much you ended up in the bathroom trying to recover your composure and hairdo. Your thoughts slowly skim over the same ground they do every morning: all the camping trips, hiking trips, swimming, and other invitations you have dodged or begged off because of your hair. You know there is no way you could join your friends on these outings and keep your hair loss a secret, plus you feel too ugly and embarrassed to be social. Your greatest fear is someone finding out about your bare spots on your scalp. So, you avoid places with mirrors and strong overhead lighting. You like softer lights that have been dimmed.

Whew! You breathe a sigh of relief, still trying to get your hair just right to cover up any gaping areas on your scalp. You absolutely dont want to be found out by your coworkers, friends, or worst of all, your boss. That would be far too embarrassing.

I have always had a passion and drive to help others, and that resulted in getting involved in a hair product business. Through this business, I have had the phenomenal opportunity to meet and become friends with women I likely never would have otherwise encountered.

As I shared my products, I realized I had not effectively dealt with my own hair loss. Ironically, I didnt have any idea just how bad my hair looked until I improved my hair quantity and quality and decided to look back at pictures from before I started using the products. What makes it scary is just how deep in denial I was! It wasnt until my hair started growing back in that I realized I had buried the truth deep within me. Thankfully, I began connecting to myself and to you and your hair loss.

I know how hard it is to share with anyone that your hair is falling out. Have you even been able to convince yourself to talk to your doctor? If you have, you may have heard your concerns and struggles dismissed as no big deal. So many of us have heard that, as well as the dismissive, Its not life threatening.

I cant imagine hobbling into the doctors office on crutches and wearing a full leg cast and hearing the doctor say, Oh, its really not a big deal. After all, it isnt life-threatening. It may or may not heal up. Be prepared to replace your leg with a transplant in a year, maybe two. I would think the doctor had lost her mind, and I would set off to find a different doctor! Yet this is what has happened to most of us who consult doctors about our hair loss.

So, I am writing this book for you. Like you, Ive struggled with hair loss. And Ive worked with many women who are in the same boat. Take my client Ann, for example. Little does her doctor know how depressed she is or how difficult it is for her to get up in the morning knowing she has to comb her hair, shower, and style it as best she can. Or how much hair she scoops up after her shower each day and throws in the trash. It is a part of her, and yet here she is, throwing it away by the handful. You and I know she is sobbing off and on during the process, making it take longer than ever to get ready for her day.

The few friends she has confided in have told her that they really cant tell she has lost any hair, but she can actually see her bare scalp in the mirror. She knows they either arent paying any attention or are lying to her. She gets so uncomfortable when she spends any time with them.

As Ann begins pulling back from the activities she loves, others who dont know Ann, or those who havent dealt with hair loss, may think of her as a victim, stand-offish, depressed. It may even confuse her friends who feel her pulling away and wonder if she is offended or overly sensitive. If she is outside and the wind is blowing, it will mess up her carefully styled hair, moving the strands that she spent an hour and a half painstakingly arranging this morning. You know. You have dealt with it too. None of us wants to be found out!