Hair-Raising Stress

Due to the pandemic, we haven’t had many dinners with friends and extended family. Our topics of conversation have been limited with the same five people, three of whom actively avoid bringing up any medical matters that might result in a lecture about fiber or exercise! As a result, I need my readers to let me know what questions or topics you would like me to bring up with DTD. You’ll get the doctor’s thoughts without the trouble of inviting us to dinner!

In the meantime I’m introducing “Freaky Fridays” where I briefly address some strange health tidbit I’ve picked up in conversation with DTD or maybe my son who’s in premed, or maybe another health care professional or just something I heard or read that I bugged DTD to clarify.

Have you been literally losing your hair during this pandemic? If so, you’re not alone and if not, be prepared that it may happen in the months to come. Apparently hair loss often occurs after an extremely stressful time, whether it’s illness or work or just high anxiety from raising teenagers. The hair loss could happen as long as eighteen months after the stressful event!

This first happened to me several years ago when I had a scary health diagnosis. I was over a year into a successful treatment regiment and feeling great when I took a nice long shower and noticed clumps of hair falling around me. After much panic, DTD explained it was totally normal and should stop eventually. He was right.

So if you start losing hair unexpectedly it may be the result of some stress that you thought you were long over. Obviously it’s always a good idea to talk to your own doctor if you’re concerned, but hopefully you’ll have a similar outcome to mine. (I now have very bushy, rapidly graying hair since I haven’t seen a stylist in quite some time, but I’m fully expecting to lose a lot of it in the months to come.)