There are a lot of things cancer takes from you, but hair hits different.
It’s not just hair.
It’s identity. It’s femininity. It’s the way you recognize yourself in the mirror.
It’s the thing you didn’t realize you were attached to until it started falling out in your hands.
If you’re reading this because you’re about to lose your hair — or it’s already happening — I want you to know something:
You are not vain for caring. You are human.
People love to say, “It’ll grow back,” like that magically makes it easier.
But losing your hair feels like losing the version of you who existed before cancer barged in without knocking.
It’s like the world sees you as sick before you’ve even tried to understand what that means for yourself.
And if you’re terrified?
If you’re angry?
If you’re grieving?
If you want to scream into a pillow or sit in the shower and let the water hide your tears?
That’s okay. Every one of those emotions is valid.
I cried for mine. I grieved it. I held clumps of myself in my hands and wondered how something so small could break me so deeply.
And then one day, somewhere in the middle of all that fear, I realized something:
Hair loss didn’t make me less of a woman. It made me more of a fighter.
I didn’t lose beauty — my definition of beauty changed.
There is a moment, somewhere down the line, where you look at yourself and realize you didn’t disappear.
You’re still you — just stripped down to the core.
And that core is strong.
That core is resilient.
That core was always the real source of your beauty, long before hair ever was.
And listen — you don’t have to be brave about it every day.
Some days you’ll rock the bald head like it’s your superpower.
Some days you’ll want your favorite beanie or a wig that makes you feel familiar.
Some days you’ll want to hide under the blanket and not be perceived at all.
None of those days make you weak.
They make you human.
They make you surviving.
They make you doing the impossible while the world still expects you to function like nothing’s changed.
So this is for you — the woman staring at a mirror, the woman collecting hair from her pillow, the woman who doesn’t recognize her reflection right now.
You are still beautiful.
Not because of your hair.
Not in spite of losing it.
But because you’re standing in a storm most people will never understand, and you’re still here.
Still showing up.
Still fighting.
Hair grows back.
But the strength you’re building right now?
That becomes part of you forever.
And on the days you can’t find that strength, let me remind you:
You are still you — still worthy, still luminous, still a whole woman — with or without a single strand on your head.
Mojo’s Note (because he insisted):
Hi, it’s me. Mojo.
Your unofficial emotional support potato.
I just want to say: you’re still the same person I would follow into any room… even the vet’s office.
Hair or no hair, you still smell like my favorite human.
And if anyone makes you feel less than beautiful, let me know.
I bite ankles. Lovingly.
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