Sandy started scalp pulling at 11 - At 43 she still can't tell her closest friends
I believe I was around 10 or 11 years old when I first started pulling my hair.
I can remember playing on a tyre swing and my hair got wound in the rope. The only way I could get free, was by pulling my hair out. It hurt really bad by doing that, but I tried unsuccessfully to get free without pulling my hair out.
The next year I started school at a different location with some of my friends and new people. I had a teacher that seemed a little dramatic in the way he would get your attention, and students were afraid of him. My family would catch me pulling my hair and tell me to stop it. I started seeing a therapist, he wasn’t real sure what was wrong with me. I don’t remember much about my visits. Then I was sent to see a dermatologist. He prescribed different shampoos and medications, but that did not work either.
When I was in the eighth grade I made the cheerleading squad, by this time I was not completely bald, but I was wearing a fall. I had my hair cut so that my fall would not fall off my head while doing the different tumbling routines. The lady that cut my hair cut it so short I looked like a boy and was teased.
By the time high school started, I was partially bald on top and could cover it. Then after high shcool, I was able to pull my hair back in a barrette or pull it up in a pony tail, so that no one would see the baldness. I am now 43 years old, and have a little more control over my pulling. I still cannot tell my closest friends that I have this problem, for fear they would not understand. I am glad to finally have found that it is a disorder that is treatable and that I am not the only person out there that pulls my hair.
Thanks for letting me tell my story. It is good to know that there are websites where I can find other people like myself….
Take care all!! :-o)
Sandy
