Alopecia and sexual orientation

What role has your sexual orientation played in your experience of alopecia? Not just from an anatomical or medical standpoint, but more so from a psychological or sociological perspective. For example, has being gay, straight or transgendered exacerbated or ameliorated the problem of living with alopecia in your particular social and cultural contexts? In other words, has being gay, straight or transgendered made living with alopecia relatively worse or better for you? Please note that I'm NOT asking whether living with alopecia is harder for males or females, but whether your sexual orientation has played a significant role in how you've experienced alopecia.

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Permalink Reply by Cynthia Lee Watkins on January 12, 2010 at 10:26am
I think so......I'm heterosexual, but because of the alopecia, and the fact I shave my head, people have started rumors that I am a "closet lesbian". And at the moment, I live with my cat, and don't date, which sort of adds "fuel to the fire". I think that's strange....how they can equate an autoimmune disorder with homosexuality, but stranger comparisons of apples and oranges have been made.
Permalink Reply by Gale Moorman on February 16, 2010 at 5:41pm
Cynthia, ignorance people can sometimes be totally obnoxious. My motto I try to live with is to "never assume anything". Those crazy assumptions like someone must be gay because...or someone must be unmarried because...etc. This is totally sickening. Just because you've shaved your head could mean that you wanna shave your head and perhaps you're not making a statement at all. It's crazy.
Permalink Reply by Pam on February 16, 2010 at 11:57am
I don't wear wigs, especially in the summer. I find wigs to be uncomfortable so I just go natural. It annoys me that people assume I am gay even though I am far from it. Even when I dress feminine people assume I shave my head to make some type of statement about my sexual orientation. I hate it.
Permalink Reply by Stuby on September 16, 2018 at 11:40am

I lost my hair very quickly at 18. I had very limited role models from the gay community, and the ones I did were often negative television ones. I did not believe at that time in a gay relations ships because I had not seen any. I felt that with my alopecia I would fit in the gay community even less, and I had had not really dipped my toe in much at the time. I thought my life was over. I worried that as I looked very young anyway, the lack of body hair would attract the wrong kind of people. When I was 23, I met the love of my life who taught me to be more confident about my alopecia. We have been together for 22 years, so no, my alopecia does not impact now, but coming out at the same time as losing my hair was really bad at the time.

Permalink Reply by Leslie on October 19, 2018 at 7:04pm

yeah, I feel dead now.

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