I handled the whole hairless LuLu situation pretty well yesterday. Maybe it’s because I received the news over the phone and could prepare myself for the mental picture. Maybe it’s because she had done a much milder version in the spring. But yesterday was more about doing triage for Super Dad (who had been caught in the eye of Hurricane LuLu), and figuring out how to make lemonade out of her chopped up hair style.

Today, I’m mourning the loss of her hair. LuLu has beautiful black silken hair. We haven’t seen it for a while. Last spring’s incident forced a very short “boyish” hair cut, that while cute, had lots of people calling her “he”. She didn’t mind; she was actually amused. Still, that was not the motivation for yesterday’s incident.

Now she looks like…and this will not be PC…a cancer patient. And there’s nothing any of us can do. Perhaps 6 months from now her hair will look similar to where it was when she started. Perhaps…

Please know that I’m not suggesting that the struggles of those who have cancer and lose their hair is in any way less difficult than this situation. They’re in a life-threatening situation. We’re in a life-altering situation. But, humans make judgments on what they see. And many people will assume, upon seeing LuLu, that she has been physically sick in some way. (And in a very real, neurological way, they are right.)

So I know part of this morning’s grief and pain for me is that once again, I have to be steeled for what “they” think. The “they” who don’t know us and will make assumptions based on what they see. We all do it. Even me, knowing all too well that things aren’t what they appear, I still make assumptions based on appearance. We just can’t help but apply our experiences, our frame of reference, and our belief system to any situation we encounter.

And this causes my grief as well…knowing the looks, stares and questions we will get. I truly am so much more able to handle the looks and stares than I used to be. It’s the inevitable questions we will get that I dread.

One thing that parenting LuLu has taught me is that no one ever actually dies from embarrassment. It is just an idiom. You may feel like you want to die – or at least be invisible. But actual death is not an option or a way out of the embarrassment.

Truth is the whole mourning of her hair is all about me, not about LuLu. She actually kind of likes her hair this way. She likes “looking like a boy”. And she’s receiving some sensory input from rubbing her hair. “It feels good, Mom!” If I’m appalled and frustrated by this (which I am), it’s more about who I am than who she is. It’s my hang up. It doesn’t matter that it would be most moms’ hang up. The point is, it’s still MY problem, not HER problem. It’s about my expectations for her, my dream of who she is and what she looks like, and my desire to make her “normal”.

It is important that I recognize where the mourning is coming from. Because, as LuLu awoke today (looking more like the Dali Lama I’ve decided that GI Jane), she was still the same LuLu she was the day before, and the day before that, and last week. It’s just that she’ll now use less shampoo.

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