Recently I filmed myself grilling in the backyard. A timed scene so I could put the phone far away. It was my wide shot, I guess you could say. All good. I slapped some music on the video and posted it to Instagram. Case closed.
Then I rewatched it. I noticed something. My hair looked a little thin on the top. WTF?
A sharp feeling of panic set in. Was I going bald?
The top of my head is the one part of me I can’t see in the mirror. Everybody else gets a better look up there than I do.
So I started taking meta-like selfies in the mirror and zooming in to see the damage. Yep, I could see a lot of scalp.
Then I started asking people, and they would break the bad news to me. It’s thinning.
I asked my wife first, since she knows me best. She told me the truth. She also said it looks worse when it’s wet, and that it’s not bald so much as thinning.
If only the rest of me were thinning, I would have taken the news better.
Then I brought it up with a friend. More of a complaint than a question.
He said, who cares, we’re all aging. Clearly he has moved on.
My barber told me at my last cut that I’m doing fine. Which sounds better until you consider he has a pretty tight cut himself. I’m not sure he’s a neutral third party on this.
Thinning hair is pretty normal. It still hit me harder than I was expecting it would. Maybe because it was more of a surprise to me.
The signs of aging can show up in photos a lot clearer than in the mirror. Which is weird, because you look at the mirror a lot. Weight gain. Wrinkles. Nothing like a photo posted on social media to bring it all to the surface. Another reason we should get rid of those sites.
So is this the crisis I am making it out to be? Maybe not.
For those who don’t know me, I am 6’5. So it’s not the end of the world. As one friend said to me, a large percentage of the population can’t even see the top of your head. This is true. So, as long as I don’t sit down too much, no harm, no foul.
Time to get a standing desk.
Now that I think of it, my dad had thinning hair on top too. He had some pretty nasty sunburns on his head. If they are reading this, sorry to my teens. Enjoy those flowing heads of hair you got now.
Going forward, what do I do? Thinning hair is not a health problem. I don’t need more pills to keep things in check.
So what do I actually do? Embrace a really short cut. Become a hat guy. Or just stop thinking about it.
I think you know what I will end up doing.
Outside of that, there isn’t much to do, unless I want to start trying crazy schemes or magic products.
If you are wondering if the teens have said anything about it?
They haven’t said a word. Not because they’re being polite. My hair just wouldn’t register as something worth being concerned about in their teen world.
I’d have to shave my head before the subject ever came up.
Like many things, I do feel comfort in the fact that I’m not alone in this either. A lot of guys find out about their lack of hair from a photo somebody took, or a video they shot themselves and watched one too many times. By the way, here is the reel.
At the end of the day, age is undefeated. And until someone figures out how to keep us all from getting older, that’s just how it’s going to be. It’s not worth the stress, especially when you know stress can actually lead to hair loss.
Time to book a haircut.
