Let's Talk About Hair, Baby!

Greetings all!

Tonight is the night before Chemo Round Number Two.
After round number one, I felt all positive and cheerful and pumped up.
"Woo yeah!  Down with you, Chemo!" was how I felt.
But that night, chemo Took Me Down.  Wowsers!
The celebratory supper I had enjoyed with my family that evening exploded up out of me like something from a really horrible and scary movie that involved exorcizing!  It was ugly.  And not the "beautiful kind of ugly."  This was nasty ugly.  Yucky.  Horrific.  Gut-gusting!
I kept trying to find the funny but this is terribly difficult with barf-chunks blocking your sinuses, you know what I am saying?
That night was less than fun.
The next day was similar.  I usually have a voracious appetite and food quivers fearfully before my gaping maw when I eat.  The day after Chemo One, however, I nibbled gingerly at the blandest food my hubby could find.
"Weak tea and tasteless baby crackers?" he proffered helpfully, standing (I noticed) a safe distance away lest vomit spray instantaneously from my face.
"Nibble nibble nibble sip sip" (that's the sound of me eating).
This episode would usually be followed by a record-breaking sprint to the nearest bathroom whereupon the before-mentioned food items would be delivered from my heaving innards.

So, in summary, I did not feel well after Chemo One.
On the bright side, there is a possibility that it was just the flu.  My little guy, Lochlan, was also sick the same night as me.  Poor little man. (don't tell him I called him "little"; he finds that infuriatingly condenscending.....)
Upon this dim hope, I hang my hopes for Chemo Two.  Let that just have been the flu....please?  Maybe Chemo Two will be a bland-piece-of-cake??
Time will tell.

But who wants to talk about being sick all night, right?

So, let's talk about Hair instead.  I know, I know....tonight's blog update is of the Grip-Your-Seats-And-Gnaw-Your-Nails-To-The-Quick flavour.  Sorry.  Perhaps we can discuss 18th Century Philosophy another night?

So, hair.....I've been thinking a lot about hair these past few weeks, particularly when faced with the impeding doom of losing it all (my hair, that is.  My mind I hope to hold on to for a bit longer....)

Originally I would have thought: whatever, it's just hair.  But hold on to that thought for a minute.  Consider your hair and it's evolution through-out the years of your life.  Consider your hair and what it says about you.  Consider hair, in general and the tales it tells.

Do you care about hair?
Growing showing knowing it's there
Shampoo it style it spray it into place
Colour it part it comb it back from your face
Teased twirled tossed
Parted
Braided bobbed bound in a bun
Straightened Curled Blown-Dry
Tied up in a pony tail or two
Checked carefully for GREY
every day....
Do you care about hair?

Tonight, consider the history of your hair.  If you have hair, there is a history.  And it is interesting....like the history of clothes or music or manners.  If you wish to add depth, tie in the history of your hair with the history of hairstyles in general.  Compare and contrast.  Consider what your hair history says about you.  Think about some Biblical significances of hair (Samson?  Absalom?)  What about Literature....Rapunzel?  Hmmm.....

Okay.  I will begin.  (you go next)  Here is my hair time-line.

Hairy Baby:  I was born with hair.  Yup.  My mom and dad always said, "You looked like a wee Inuit baby when you were born; you had tons of black hair."  It's true.  Photographic evidence always shows me looking all fat and disgruntled; back hair exploding from my head.  I looked like a reddish-skinned, chubby, black-haired Albert Einstein.

Helmet Head:  As I grew, so did my hair (yes, profound, I know) and I had a lot of it!  So that I could see, my mom cut this cute little bang fringe in the front of my hair and from out of this vast helmet of hair, I peered at the world.

Grunge Hair:  The early nineties were my teen years and I loved the grunge phase.  I'm not even sure if that was popular or current with the actual style of the times, but it was my style.  Long, heavy, dark hair parted in the middle and hanging way down my back.  Often it was fizzy.  And coordinated with my dad's brown sweater and, usually, silver pants.  These were great hair days!  The hair didn't look great, but it felt great!   You know what I'm saying?  Probably not.  It's a hair-memory-association thing.

University Hair:  It was still long but it became necessary to be bound up into shapeless pony tails for two reasons:  (1) to be out of the way so that I could read the giant stacks of books required to obtain my degree and (2) it was a great place to store all the pens and pencils I accumulated to write responses to all the books I was reading to gain that same degree.

Teacher Hair:  When I became a teacher at Timothy Christian School, I thought I should shape the University Hair into some sort of teacher-like semblance.  I wasn't sure really what that should look like and had this vague notion of a severe bun, but I just couldn't perfect that look.  Then I noticed a lot of the Grade 8 girls I was teaching had this messy bun thing going for them; so while they studied their studies, I would study them.  Teased, tousled, tossed up with bobby pins carelessly placed....it looked easy and I thought, if a Grade 8 girl can do it, surely can I!  Later I admitted defeat and just wore my hair Neatly Combed.

Mommy Hair:  No, I did not cut it all off.  It stayed long for a while, mostly because Paul has a hair-fetish and, with it long, he could play with it from across a room.   With the births of our lovely children (Liam, Donovan, Gwen and Lochlan); my hair was often tossed into a shapeless pony tale or clipped back with whatever was on hand to clip it back.  This made mommy-ing easier.  Changing a diaper with hair curtaining forward just isn't cool.

Mommy of Children Out of the Baby Stages Hair:  I cut it.  Okay, I didn't cut it but my wonderful stylist did (Hi, Sarah!!).  I loved this cut and have worn it for several years because if it's working for you, why change it?  Shoulder-lengthish, layered, easy to style.

Current Hair:  Awkward brush cut that I pretend is my artsy-look.  Really, I look like a monkey; specifically one of those "mon chi chi" monkey dolls (totally Google that and you will see the resemblance!)   This came about last week.  I have been told hair loss from chemo typically happens after round two.  In preparation, my oncologist nurse suggested I cut my hair for the sake of our younger children.
"It prepares them for seeing you bald."  she said, "otherwise some children are almost scared of their moms."
Hmm....I had not thought about that at all.  Gotta prepare the hair so we don't scare, ya know?

Paul and I thought it would be a great family experience to have the kids help cut my hair short to give them something in all this mess that they have control over.  This idea seemed super wonderful until my Donovan's face lit up, he rubbed his hands together excitedly and said, "Sweet!  How ugly can we make you look?"  Those words did spark a tiny tremor of worry.  He began to ruminate over mohawks and rat-tails.....
But when the day came, it really was great.  Great as in hair-memory-great.  My beautiful children; my blessings gathered round me.  Each was equipped with scissors (somehow Lochlan had got his hands on giant kitchen shears) and they cut.  Liam tried to take charge, confidently giving directives as if he knew what he was doing.
"Guys, cut about this much off."  he said and he grabbed a hunk of hair and began sawing away at it.  Sarah would have been horrified!
Lochlan soon gave up the giant shears (and my ears gave a sigh of relief) and began vigorously brushing hair off my shoulders, my arms, my knees, my nose.....

Soon, giant tufts of hair covered the floor; looking as if several chinchillas had exploded.  The kids stepped back, happy with their work.
Paul stepped forward.  He was NOT happy about all this.  I could see it on him.

"It's just hair," I said evenly, willing him to crack a wildly hilarious joke as only Paul can.  But he didn't.  He quietly picked up the razor, rested his hand heavily on my shoulder and began to cut.  He evened out the awkwardly sliced and hacked up hair.  And still he cut.
"Just getting it to all match up," he mumbled.
"It'll grow back." I responded quietly.
Then we just let the silence of a buzzing razor, four children, a dog, three birds and one cat envelop us.
(Side-note here about love.  I used to think love was an uninhibited, wildly-charged, starry-eyed feeling.  There is that still.  But richer, today, is that love that stands grim-faced but steady, heavy-hearted but here, willing to even out my shorn tresses and call them beautiful, ready with a joke when my mood is darkened by despair.  Paul, this little Mon Chi Chi, loves you.  Thanks for the haircut!)

Wig-a-licious:  Today I found a wig.  It's cute and feminine and such.  If you see me and don't feel the urge to hand me a banana, I am wearing it.

So, hair.  It's got our history all wrapped up in it.  Consider yours.

The end.

"Are not two sparrows sold for a penny?  And not one of them will fall to the ground apart from your Father. But even the hairs of your head are all numbered."  Matthew 10: 29-30