From no hair to grey hair: reflections on beauty from the original Single Bald Female
A decade after losing my hair for cancer, I reflect on what my locks mean to me
I got my first grey hair during lockdown. I turn 40 this year, so I’ve had a good innings, but still my first thought was to feel a bit miffed. Then, moments later, it occurred to me: I’ve lived long enough for my hair to go grey. Going grey is great.
Ten years ago, I lost my hair for cancer.
It happened in stages. I was diagnosed with breast cancer in June 2012, when I was 29 years old. There was a lot going on that summer – the London Olympics, my 30th birthday, my best friend’s wedding – so it simply wasn’t convenient to be bald. Thankfully, I was able to have surgery within a week of diagnosis, and the six-week recovery period before chemo bought me time to keep my long hair intact.
The day before starting chemo, I cut my long, dark hair into a pixie crop to lessen the shock of losing it all at once. I loved that haircut, but I couldn’t enjoy it, what with the looming dread of waiting for it to fall out. Chemotherapy is literally a cocktail of chemicals that gets pumped into your veins. The aim is to blitz the cancer cells, but it can’t distinguish between good and bad, so it kills your hair cells too.
Three weeks later, my hair began to fall out. We had planned a party for my mum’s 60th and I really wanted to keep my hair until that day – that was my milestone. But after three days of not washing it, my hair was so lank and greasy that I could bear it no longer. On the day of the party, as the guests began to arrive, I sat in the bathtub and pulled out all my hair, clump by soggy clump.
My big brother was the one who knocked on the bedroom door to check if I was OK.
“I’m bald,” I said – a friendly warning for what he was about to see.
But he didn’t flinch. He just sort of nodded, nonchalant, an acknowledgement that he was cool with this; that he wouldn’t love me any less because I was bald.
I shoved on the neon pink wig I’d bought for a fancy dress party and walked to the village salon, asking my childhood hairdresser to shave my head. I remember a kid in the salon asking her mum: “Why does that lady have pink hair?”
She was teary-eyed as she shaved off the remaining soft tufts of hair that held, steadfast, to my scalp. It took all of three minutes, before I walked back to my parents’ house and into my childhood bedroom, ignoring the guests downstairs. I put on lashings of mascara and my favourite earrings, then took some selfies.
The resulting image is pretty much the only one I have from that time, and it actually makes me feel happy. I wasn’t scared then. I’d already had my first chemo; I’d had successful surgery and been told the cancer hadn’t spread. I was luckier than so many of the women I’ve met since. Let’s not forget, it was just hair.
It hit me three months later when my eyebrows and lashes fell out. We were in the depths of winter; I was reaching the end of chemo and my energy levels had hit rock bottom. A national newspaper had sent a photographer and make-up artist to shoot me for an article but I had the worst cold and my eyes were streaming. She couldn’t fix the fake lashes to my face – it turns out you need real ones for that.
I felt ugly and undesirable, but at the end of the day, it was just hair.
For a year and a half after chemo, I took a daily selfie to track my hair’s growth. My favourite stage was the buzz cut, which made me feel edgy and cool; the worst was the stage between pixie and bob, waiting for my hair to grow below my neck.
When I look back at this video, I see all the different places where I took my daily selfies – at my parents’ house in Yorkshire, at my flat in Dublin, in hotels in Vietnam, the Philippines and Hong Kong, where I took my first big trip post-cancer. In Spring, Summer, Autumn, Winter. I look happy in the pictures because I was optimistic – every day my hair grew was another day alive.
Fast forward a decade and my hair is the longest it’s been since before cancer. There’s a bald-ish patch at the back that I hate when I see it in clothes shop changing rooms, and my hair is lacklustre. My eyebrows never grew back but I happily endure the annual torture of microblading. I am envious when I see women with thick, full locks, but I remind myself I’m here, I’m healthy and I’m happy.
And, at the end of the day, it’s just hair.
My debut novel Single Bald Female is out next week. Pre-order it now to read a story about breast cancer, hair loss, love, friendship and so much more.
The crumbs
A rundown of the simple things I’m enjoying right now.
What I’ve been reading:
— Careering by Daisy Buchanan. I will lap up any book about magazine life but I also loved the sex, the friendships and the humour (SO smart, SO funny). It made me want to read it all day and then watch The Bold Type on repeat all evening.
— The Girl on the 88 Bus by Freya Sampson. A heartwarming story with a brilliant twist, Freya’s second novel kept me guessing until the end. It had me sobbing in places, but ultimately left me warm, cosy and wonderfully uplifted. (Out 9th June).
— The Fake-Up by Justin Myers. I’ve loved all of Justin’s novels and this was no exception. Cheeky, fun and uplifting, it’s just what the world needs right now.
What I’ve been eating:
— As part of the celebrations for my best friend’s 40th, we enjoyed the Japanese izakaya feast by Machiya from Dishpatch, a brilliant alternative to Deliveroo that lets you order in restaurant-quality food from the best chefs in the UK. Lush.
On dating and heartbreak
Besides cancer, Single Bald Female is about love, friendship, heartbreak and loss – all issues that fascinate me. In my new podcast, Life in Food, I dissect those topics from a unique culinary lens. If you missed the first episode on Food and Cancer with Kris Hallenga, you can catch it here.
For episode two, I spoke to Australian author and podcaster Jessie Stephens on Food and Heartbreak, and why the movies always show women eating ice cream from a tub when they’ve been dumped, when in reality when we’re heartbroken we can’t eat at all.
For episode three, I interviewed The Fake-Up author and columnist Justin Myers about Food and Dating, delving into first-date faux pas and the gentrification of junk food. We discussed Yorkshire puddings, fish finger sandwiches and Joan Collins, though not all on the same plate.
If you’re enjoying the podcast, be sure to subscribe so that you don’t miss an episode – and listen out for next week’s episode on Food and Healing with yours truly!
One week to go
Just a few days to go before my baby is out in the world! Single Bald Female is already in a few of the Waterstones branches and I’m thrilled to see people reading it already. It’s officially out on April 14th and I would be ECSTATIC if you would pre-order it.
Pre-order Single Bald Female, out 14th April.