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scram's avatar
scram
Member
3 months ago

Regrowing hair

This possibly sounds silly and vain however, I am looking for advice on regrowing my hair post chemo. I have been looking online but hasn’t been helpful.   The first hair that came through was grey and crazy and is now an inch long and there is a black ‘sheen’ coming through now.  Should I get number two all over to tidy up and have hair all same length and then start growing OR just persevere until it gets some length and then deal with it.  I have mostly been accepting the au natural look which is looking very nutty professor at the moment.  
thanks in advance

 

6 Replies

  • I'm just starting to regrow hair too. Not as long as yours yet! Just fuzz so far. I think I'm going to leave it until there is a bit of length so the hairdresser can actually do some sort of actual style. But I guess I will have to wait and see.

  • Hi scram, I'm a year down the track of regrowth. My hair came back pretty much the same colour, possibly a bit darker brown. I let it do its own thing with a light trim at 6 months and 10 months. It's a bit wavey on top and curlier at the back, but not tight curls. I've been lucky that it grew back fairly even and was ok to leave alone. At times it was a bit wild with a life of it's own, it went through a 80s phase and I'm now into 90s grunge. I'm aiming for a shaggy layered bob, almost there! 

    My hair is pretty thick, so I'm back to shedding quite a bit, but I'm still getting regrowth, so I'm not panicking, and figure it will settle down with time.

    My eyebrows grew back pretty quickly, my eyelashes are still limping along, but they were always fairly short anyway, I was hoping they might grow back long and lush 🤣 but unfortunately they are just short.

  • Definitely not silly - we all look forward to having hair again. Having had dead straight hair all my life, I had lambswool at first - chalk white and violently frizzy. It gradually became more of a steely grey and very curly, but not quite frizzy. At that stage I found a regular trim helpful  - it gave my hair a better shape. Over time it turned much more auburn - and with considerably less grey than I'd had before chemo! It was a fairly slow process from curls to a bit of a wave which I enjoyed. Be prepared for some other changes - my hair texture (quite coarse) became much finer and about 18 months in, my shed pattern changed, initially a bit alarming until I checked the wide range that is 'normal' and realised that my very thick hair previously was probably due to an extremely low shed pattern! Agree entirely with Tri​ about the undersung value of nose hair, and my 'new', very tiny eyelashes were just visible as the last of the old ones floated onto my cheek. Best wishes.

    • scram's avatar
      scram
      Member

      Thank you for sharing your experience.  It will be interesting to see what my hair does over the next year.  Pre chemo it was armpit length and a mixture of grey and light brown.  What came through first is grey frizz and now a lot of very very black hair is sprouting, crazy stuff.  Might just go with the flow and have some fun with it, who cares what other people think. 

  • Hiscram​ I had a good laugh at the “nutty professor” description.
    Not vain at all, it’s a real milestone so congratulations to you. From previous posts about how hair comes back it seems everyone is different.  But I have noticed a few saying their first regrowth seemed to be a bit random and eventually it settled into something else. Eg my hair grew back (this was about 18 months ago) in a fine fuzz all over but once it got a bit of length (maybe 2 cm) I developed quite a curl. I have always had straight hair. 

    Once it got to a point where it was a “pixie look with mullet” I went to the hairdresser and had a number 2. Now it’s straight again and although I have good coverage it doesn’t have the volume. I think that’s down to the oestrogen prevention hormone treatment (Aromatase Inhibitor) I am now on for a few years but that’s just a guess. 
    Hope you get some joy from seeing the return of your hair. My eyebrows, eyelashes and nose hair (who knew it was so handy) took a little longer.

    • scram's avatar
      scram
      Member

      Thank you for sharing your experience.  Eyebrows and eyelashes are making a return but looking forward to nose hair returning, I too didn’t realise how precious those hairs were. 
      I have started on hormone blockers and about to start radiotherapy.   Interesting that your hair texture changed after that first cut.  I am now actually looking forward to the ever changing hairstyle.