Beauty…

People are beautiful if you love them.

When I awoke this morning,  I realized that 10 years ago, just around this time, my hair started falling out due to the chemotherapy I was enduring.  I won’t lie and tell you it was ok with me, because I distinctly remember that it wasn’t at all.  One particular day, I started crying in the shower because as I was washing my hair, my hands were coming away littered with clumps of my hair detached from my head.  It was, simply put, overwhelming.  And if you’ve been there, you know what I’m talking about ~ just not fun at all to say the least.

It was a few days after this gut wrenching beginning of baldness that I decided to take control of the side effects before they completely did me in.  Being the ‘girly girl’ that I can be, I decided to cut off my hair with the help of my supportive, loving hubby and a good bottle of champagne!  I tied my hair into little pony tails adorned with pink ribbons (ok a little theatrical,but I didn’t care) and we popped open the bottle of bubbly.

Hidden in our bathroom as our boys were safely watching the famous purple dinosaur Barney, we began to cut my hair because I wanted to feel like I was in control (even if were only technically that I was cutting it before it fell out)!  As I snipped off the first pink ponytail, leaving what seemed to me a giant sized hole in my pageboy, I handed it to my hubby reverently.  And I cried and I laughed because I couldn’t believe I had just cut off my own hair!    I won’t say that I was strong and did it without tears because life is about truth and my truth was that it was a hard thing to do, but it had to be done and I did it…and I am glad that I did it because I needed that reminder later on.

Perhaps because of the bubbly, or because it’s been a chemo-induced 10 years of time since then, I am a bit fuzzy as to whether I charged ahead and took off the rest of the ponytails, or if my hubby did.  However, one thing is certain, by the end of our hair-cutting session, I looked like Mia Farrow in Rosemary’s Baby.   My normally brown pageboy with bangs, was now a close to the head, cropped version of Mia’s hairdo.  Lucky for me, my hubby was willing and able to stand by me while we took this stage of our journey together.

Shaving my head with the flowbee (or whatever that thing is called) was simply not a viable option for me.  I was not able to fathom going that far.  So we finished all the bubbly we could and together we emerged to see the boys and their reactions.

And there was none.  Simply put, hair or no hair, I was still Mommy…and they didn’t even notice ~ even when I showed them and asked if they liked my new ‘do…they were completely blase about the whole thing which I found so crazy because here I’d cut off my hair and my hubby had done the finishing touches to it so it didn’t look too awful and the boys were non-plussed.

What an amazing lesson for me ~ you see, I was still Mommy ~ still ME ~ and it took their non-reaction to make me see that ~ no matter what changes are made to my outer shell ~ I am still me ~ and so I send on this tidbit to you.  No matter what outer changes you are dealing with, deep inside you are still you.

Connect to that ‘me’ place today and know that I am applauding your Beauty!

xo

P.S.  And yes, I still have the first pink-ribboned ponytail hidden away in my jewelry box.