I had gastric bypass surgery almost six months ago (yes, it has been that long! My six month surgiversary is on May 18th, 2010!), and about two and a half months after surgery I started experiencing hair loss. It was pretty dramatic for a good four to six weeks. I’m still losing hair, but nowhere near at the rate I was before. Fortunately I have very thick, coarse hair, and a lot of it, so despite pulling out huge wads from the shower drain and my brush every few days, and finding dozens of loose hairs floating all over me and throughout the house, you would never know by looking at me that I was losing my hair. Believe me, I know that I’m blessed and I’m very grateful for the thick/coarse/large quantity hair genes.
But I’m definitely appreciating my hair a lot more these days, and I’m doing what I can to take care of it. I brush it daily, but I don’t over-brush. I shampoo and condition it with specially formulated products. No hair dye other than harmless vegetable-based dyes have touched my hair since July 1st, 2006. I don’t use sprays and gels very often, and I never ever use a hair dryer.
But truth to be told, I never used to be conscious of good hair care. Here’s a good example of how nonchalant I was about my hair: from September 1999 until July 1st, 2006 my hair was constantly being subjected to hair dyes and bleaching. In one month alone I would dye my hair three or four times, maybe bleach it and dye it hot pink, and then toss in something dark a few weeks later. Needless to say, my hair was quite damaged, so it’s no surprise that in mid 2007 I wound up chopping off a good six inches of it.
But that’s all in the past, thankfully. Aside from the occasional bit of volumizing mousse or vegetable-based hair dye, I don’t do anything to my hair to damage it any further than it has already been damaged from nutritional deficiencies! Of course, now that summer is just around the corner, good Hair Care is on my mind once again. You see, the local pool opens up in exactly three weeks and three days, and we plan on spending a lot of time there this summer! High temperatures + blazing sunshine + chlorinated water is never good for the tresses, so I’m already checking out potential hair care products that I can use throughout the summer in order to protect my hair as much as possible. WEN’s Healthy Hair Care System seems promising. It’s $30 for a monthly supply, but the products have all sorts of great ingredients, and I’m particularly interested in the Re Moist Intensive Hair Repair Mask — it sounds like something I could definitely make good use of this summer!
Do you have any recommendations?



One response to “I like having hair” - Jump to comment form