Wouldn't Give a Hair on my Head

I meant to write about a nightmare I had, now more than two weeks ago. Usually if I dream about my body hair, it's just there in the background as a simple fact about my body and something that prevents me. But this time, I dreamed about my hormones. I dreamed my androgen levels were so high that my scalp hair suddenly started falling out. Huge chunks of it just coming out on my head when I ran my fingers through it. Very I-Know-What-You-Did-Last-Summer.

Even though I knew that too much testosterone can be responsible for scalp hair loss, I was in such a panic, and I was alone. The people I trusted with my "condition" were out of town and the people who might have been available to help me were the people I wanted to hide from. And as I tried to think of who I could call, my hair just kept sliding over my shoulders onto the floor in clumps and I couldn't stop it.

The "It Could Be Worse" argument can be a little futile at times, but that dream was so vivid that I woke up covered in sweat and crying. The act of losing my hair was what frightened me, more than living with the loss of it afterward. In that purely emotional state, it was something I would not have traded to have the "average" amount of body hair.

Does it ever strike people as strange? Strange that one kind of hair is so valued when another is thought of as repugnant? If I thought about it rationally, about the time and pain and emotion I pour into dealing with my body hair every day, I know it would certainly be worth it to wear a wig for the rest of my days if I could trade in my scalp hair for a hirsutism-free life. But when it came right down to it, it was hard to argue with my gut feeling upon waking.

It may be useless to think of what we would physically give in return for "normal" bodies, but it does cross my mind sometimes.