I've been through so many stages of this disease in the past 12 months.  And each has been harder to accept and deal with than the one before.

First, last summer, I watched my little soul patch be whittled away to nothing.  But it still seemed to be locally confined to my face.  I hated the random patches where whiskers still persisted, and explored permanent removal of lingering hairs and endured hundreds of shots, but the fight was a losing one.

Then, this January, I was…

I've always hated my head.

It is a giant pumpkin head.  Hats don't fit.  My football helmet had to be specially ordered.  I learned how to sense when topics were getting close to something about heads or head size and developed the coping mechanism of how to make jokes about myself quickly before anyone else could.

In 1988 I started cutting my own hair - learning styles that seemed melon-head friendly.  Ultimately tight sides and a flat or spikey top…