The Five Stages of Grief

A couple of years ago my friend Nate and I were standing around shooting the breeze. At one point Nate mentioned something about his hair. Nate had, shall I say, less than a full head of locks. The baldness was in its opening stages for him. I looked at his hair and then felt the top of my own and felt comforted. I grinned at Nate mockingly and made the comment to him (because I am a supportive friend), “Man if I ever started to lose my hair I think I would kill myself.” Nate laughed at me but in his eyes I thought I saw a hint of murderous rage.

Fast forward to the winter of 2003. I was playing music at the time and Sabrina and I trekked to the city to take some promotional shots of me posing introspectively at different parts of downtown. One of the pictures was me walking up the stairs from the subway. A week later we got them developed and when we got to said picture I froze with terror. I turned to Sabrina and screamed, “What the hell is that!!” The “that” to which I referred was the giant horseshoe pattern my hairline was forming on top of my head. Sabrina grabbed me as I tried to dive headfirst out of the second story window.

Now there are five stages to grief. Denial I had been taking care of for years. The Anger was immediate and ruthless. I blamed Sabrina for not telling me. I got mad at my parents and grandparents for what I deemed to be just another in a long lines of personal genetic disappointments. Bargaining was a two-sectioned stage. I quickly realized that hair growth supplements were not 100% guaranteed and also inordinately expensive. So I lost bargaining on a monetary level. Then I bargained with the hair itself. I tried combing it this way and that, spiking it, gelling it, anything to hide the obvious. This went on for awhile until I realized I didn’t want to be a “comb over” guy. Then came Depression. Now this stage stuck around for awhile. I would examine every picture of myself to see the best or worst angles for my hairline. I also realized that even baldness wasn’t going to give me a break. Instead of receding back into a respectable widow’s peak I was doomed to have the dreaded horseshoe pattern with triangle patch in front.

Only now after four years have I finally started the Acceptance stage. I probably tried to fool myself before into thinking I had come to grips with the situation. I hadn’t. I was kidding myself. Slowly though I have begun to accept. When I look in the mirror I know what I am going to be seeing. When I see pictures I know what to expect. There just isn’t going to be hair there anymore and that is okay. That’s karma and I regret my words to Nate. If I had just bit my tongue I would combing my gorgeous locks laughing at all of those bald bastards out there.