Braftovi Hairloss: Finding a Natural Looking Wig

My two or so months on Braftovi by itself wreaked havoc on my hair. It had initially got thicker with the treatments including Mektovi and changed texture from straight to curly, but I noticed mostly on my trip to Spain that I was in a heavy shed cycle. I was losing around 200 strands a day when brushing, which is why I cut my hair short above my collar bone. Sadly, the shedding didn't stop and now I'm left very thin on top with less than half the hair I had in April. It's now time to find a wig.

I met with a hair piece specialist back in early June. She showed me all the top pieces and how you can blend them into your natural hair; there's only one catch, this isn't easy with curly hair. I would have to straighten everything i have left so the textures would match. Then I could pin one of these pieces onto the top of my head to make the hair loss problem less obvious. In some ways, I can see how you can fake it with one of these pieces.

Cost wise, the human hair option is still very expensive. With my new natural hair texture, I'd never take the time to actually style it and use one of these pieces effectively. For this reason, I've opted to look into a wig. This will apparently run me up to $4000, but there is a wig a former client of my hair piece expert wants to sell. I may be able to get a deal.

What it's Like to Lose Your Hair

Hair loss takes a very emotional toll. I can't just hide this under hats and hope it grows back sooner rather than later. In fact, I highly suspect when I feel my scalp, that it's not growing back at all. For this reason, I want to find the most natural looking wig I can possibly obtain, and then I'll get used to wearing one all the time. Eventually, people might see it as natural.

Color

The first thing my hair piece expert asked was what my ideal, dream hair looked like. I sent her several pictures of medium brown hair just past the shoulder length. Hair that looked healthy and thick. Hair that is non-descript except its association with health. I ultimately don't want to be blond because that takes a lot of makeup energy. Same with being a redhead. It leaves me with a natural looking brown as the best choice.

Monday, July 27th

On Monday, I went to try on the wig. I brought Dean, so I could get an honest opinion of how it looked and whether it was worth my money. Within less than a minute, the hair piece specialist said "That's not your hair". The wig was much too large for my head and there was almost too much hair. We kept trying on wigs.

First she had me try on several blondes, but like I suspected, they all washed me out. Then she found a curly dark one, more like my natural texture, but it was too dark. Next, we tried on a lighter brown one, and I really liked the color, but the fit wasn't there. Last we tried on a golden blonde one, styled into waves, and it really looked okay on me. You can see it in the selfie below:

It looks much better than the $200 synthetic wig that I have. It's real human hair and a blonde that suits me. I like that you can tie it back and the fit is reasonably good. The only thing I don't like about it is that you can see the line where the seam is, if you look closely enough you will notice. The hair piece specialist lent me this wig for the week to see how I feel about it and if I can get used to it. It's good to get a chance to play with it. She offered it at a deep discount, so it may be a good entry level choice.

A New Wig

Getting a new wig was the other option. For this, she measured my head and said she'd look into the availability of a new one in brown for me. I do feel like I might want to look into one made just for my measurements, because I have a small head and the better the fit, the more natural it will look.

Amazon Red Head Special

Just for fun, I bought a wig by RUWISS. It's turned out to be the best thing I have tried on so far. It's a dark red, a color few people have as their natural, and it's shoulder length and wavy. It's got the perfect amount of thickness, it doesn't overwhelm my small face. I've been rocking it for the last few days since it arrived, and I think even when I get a human hair wig, I will probably still use this one for fun and self-expression.

Hair Piece Specialist #2

I wasn't getting responses to my messages to the hair piece specialist I'd first seen, so I had to find another. Luckily, there was a woman in Castlegar who does the same thing and she fit me into her schedule in early August. Just today, I ordered a human hair wig that is long and brown and paid $1900.

When I was there, she was very generous with her time and explained a lot about how a good wig is constructed. Dean went back to his house to get the wig that the first specialist lent me, and the new specialist had never seen anything like it. She explained that that front part was weird and confirmed that it didn't fit me properly. She then explained what I should be looking for and we thumbed through some magazines she had of available options. We landed on one.

When my new wig arrives, the next steps are to have her help me cut it to the right length and possibly color it with some highlights to add dimension and make it feel more me. She also offered a scalp cleaning procedure that will remove the thick dead skin which has probably increased my hair thinning. Ultimately, I'll spend a few hours in her chair to get looking my best. In a few weeks from now, when I have the results, I'll post a picture and let you see what we arrived at.