The Art of Getting Stared At by Laura Langston

Author:Laura Langston
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub
Publisher: Penguin Canada
Published: 0101-01-01T00:00:00+00:00

Kim’s comments send me straight to the bedroom mirror. I stare at the contours of my cheeks. I don’t think I’ve gained weight. I tug on the waistband of my pyjamas. If anything, my clothes are looser. Probably because I can barely choke down Kim’s crappy health food.

But as I study my face, a lava flow of hot panic bubbles up. I do look different. Not quite myself. It’s not the spots. I can’t see them from this angle. I turn my head. There they are. I straighten my head; they disappear. And yet ... I stare into my face, now flushed with worry. Maybe my thinning hair is changing my appearance. Making me look heavier.

Desperate for I don’t know what—support, reassurance, ideas to keep myself looking like myself—I crawl into bed with my laptop and visit a different alopecia chat room, one I’ve never checked before.

Big mistake.

I’m both horrified and fascinated by the incredibly personal details people share. The entries from guys moaning about their receding hairlines make me wish they were here so I could slap them (a receding hairline? Please!). Messages from the serious sufferers talking about treatment side effects make me want to vomit. But the entry that hits me hardest and makes me cry is from a twenty-seven-year-old Irish woman who says her life was ruined when she went from a full head of hair to bald in a month.

Her words slam into my chest like a physical punch. A month? I curl into a fetal-like ball and resist the urge to run back to the mirror to see if I’ve lost more hair in the last ten minutes.

Eventually I pull up YouTube, where I watch our stupid shoe video about a thousand times until the sharp pain in my chest shrinks back to the small knot of panic that’s taken up permanent residence behind my breastbone. And then, with images of yellow shoes dancing through my head, I turn out the light and try to sleep.

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