It's the year which so many deemed to be our last, 2012 the year the world ends. Strangely it seemed, at many points of the year, my world did end or change unthinkably. There were certainly points; specific, small little parts of 2012 that I wished the world had ended.
Like every year it began with a crash of fireworks and over rated celebrations, and despite the rumours it ended too, in a somewhat similar fashion and for me, on the complete other side of the world from where mine began. As I stood in front of the opera house with the Sydney harbour bridge ablaze with colour and a feeling of great appreciation towards what I was watching, what I was witnessing the words “happy new year” had never meant so much.
Many years have gone by and dissolved into the past somewhere between a blur of the year before and the year after leaving a chain of memories which over time have lost their dates. I don’t think I’ll ever forget 2012 the way I’ve forgot 1993 or 1997 or indeed the great year 2000, it has been, in so many ways, unforgettable. Twelve months of heartbreak and adventures, love and discovery, self-hatred and strength and I think above all, twelve months of varying levels of friendship.
I woke up alone on January 1st 2012, an omen some would say. I don’t recall being particularly troubled by this at the time and I think January itself continued onwards in that uncaring manner, things needed to be said but I wasn’t in any hurry to say them. I had become a master of avoidance techniques and diversions. My world was becoming boring with a hint of temptation that had hidden itself for a long old time. I was, in January, happy enough. Happy enough is a situation that I see too many people settling for. A sort of common dead end if you will. I’m 23 and dead ends are of no interest to me, I had no intention of continuing through life without being the happiest I could be. I was of course, fully aware of the effect any actions would have on others and I guess that is why January floated past without me doing an awful lot about anything, after all, I was happy enough. I had however rekindled a friendship that I wanted more than anything and in doing so, realised what I did, and therefore didn’t currently have in my life.
The last weeks of January were like a dream come true, I heard the words I had wanted to hear from the mouth out of which I wanted them to be spoken. The feelings I had put to rest long ago rose to the surface and over spilled in an array of emotion that I had never before felt and more to the point couldn’t bury and forget like I had done before.
February began as a battle in my mind. Every day I argued with myself, I wanted to be selfish more than anything but sometimes being selfish is a hard and difficult choice. I thought to myself and fought with myself over a decision that to everyone else was clear from the very start and just before I made the decision I did, I decided to make the decision that I didn’t. In reality there was never a choice to be made. I'm not proud about the hurt I caused but sometimes being selfish is the only way we progress in life. I made the decision that I believed would make myself happy, and at that time, it did. I watched the pain I caused and felt it too, but I never doubted my decision. At the time, everything seemed obvious but looking back, I feel maybe everything was tangled, confused. One decision wasn’t necessarily the right or indeed the wrong one, it was simply a way out of the other.
It was a Friday morning at work, I was tired, delirious and completely overjoyed. Your eyes told the same story. I've realised since that your eyes tell many stories some in a language I'll never understand. Maybe I never did understand.
February progressed quickly in a mix of secrets and lies sprinkled on the surface with a smug sense of happiness. So many abbreviated stories were concocted and delivered during those few weeks that I’m not entirely sure myself what did or didn’t happen. I watched as my best friend left for the other side of the world and thought long and hard about what I wanted to do with my own life.
February ended and with March I almost fell apart, it seemed I was gradually awakening from the February dream. When I was with you I felt calm, content, happy in your company. Once away I was a wreck. I was lonely in my own company for the first time ever and had no idea how to change things. I became irrationally jealous and felt for the first time in my life that I needed something more than I wanted it. I became everything I never wanted to be. I was a secret, a lie, someone else’s way out. More annoyingly, my work life and home life had blurred terribly meaning that distancing myself to regain any prospective on the situation was almost unthinkable and nearly impossible. I was a horrible person in March and I apologise to everyone I came into contact with.
I don’t know when exactly we managed to see sense, when I regained control over myself and my thoughts and when we realised what a truly terrible mistake had been made but it was at some point in April when suddenly peace was restored and I felt the way I had in January but free. Overall by April everything looked bright again, everything except work which by now I was fully sure that staying there much longer was impossible. It wasn’t a path I wished to continue following mainly because it seemed to be another one of them all too comfortable dead ends. Throughout April I reconnected with the friends that I had drifted away from since the beginning of the year and spent some wonderful time with old friends that I hadn’t seen for all too long. Trips with mum to London seem to be becoming an annual event and again we ventured into the capital for a day of sightseeing, shopping and a show, and of course, a couple of over expensive, posh chocolates from Harrods.
I had the most wonderful time in Torquay at the end of April. We drank too much, slept too little and acted as though we hadn’t a care in the world. A few things notable happened in Torquay:
I met you and I suddenly realised that I had spent too much time obsessing over something that was merely an option in my life, an option that in reality possessed very few benefits. You showed me that there was more than one possibility. It was like a weight had been lifted from somewhere, doors had been opened and I suddenly remembered who I was. I don’t think you had a lot to do with that in reality, but something in you let me see that in myself.
Then there was you, Torquay changed how I saw you quite substantially and I’m not sure when exactly that happened. I can never work you out, I’ve mentioned this before, you’re misleading and mysterious, disregarding yet appealing. I reconsidered who you were in a few minutes. I reconsidered this further a few days after we got home.
In those few days I also realised how much closer we had become as friends, through February you had been the one person that knew everything, I felt I could talk to you and you kept me sane without judging me or telling me what to do. You were always around when I needed it most and for that I will be ever grateful. The only problem with becoming such good friends with someone is that when you decide to up and leave, there’s another person to significantly miss. Luckily, the world’s survival of 2012 means that your plans for 2013 are ever closer.
May made every problem I had had this year look ridiculous, trivial, insignificant. May was the month that I literally thought my world was ending.
I guess it had been happening a few weeks before I thought too much about it, I had mentioned it to a few people but I wasn’t greatly bothered, hair falls out all the time.
It was the week before my 24th birthday, I was getting ready to go out with mum for the evening. I remember straightening my hair as I got ready, those who know me well will know this is something I’m picky about, straight hair. I was blessed with curls, I wanted straight hair, it all seems so pointless now.
I remember being careful that evening, I hadn’t straightened it for a while as I was aware I had been malting more than usual and didn’t want to pull hair out unnecessarily, but as I stood there in front of the mirror, wandering if my hair looked different, wondering if I was paranoid, the ease of which my hair was coming out as I straightened it threw me into a state of panic. I suddenly realised something was wrong, it wasn’t normal to wake up with a pillow covered in hair, I never used to be constantly picking hair from my clothes, or from the shower, or the floor, or the sofa or anywhere else that I may have been. It was a sort of sudden panic, the sort that you spiral into, thinking more and more about it, making connections, thinking of scenarios, panicked until you’re mad with it.
I didn’t want to ruin our evening out but I probably did. I pulled myself together for about a minute and then cried in the car and told mum “my hair’s falling out” she looked at me as though I was mental, said it was nothing, told me to stop worrying. I remember pulling lumps of hair, with far too much ease to prove a point, I say pull, stroking lumps of hair would better describe it. It scared me. Really scared me.
By the time Mum dropped me off home, she looked worried too, that worried me further. Things are always bad if mum looks worried.
I stood in the mirror, staring at myself, touching my hair and watching it fall to the floor and that’s when I felt it. That bald patch at the back of my head. It felt massive, like everyone could see it, in reality it probably wasn’t that big at all and the rest of my hair covered it without a problem but it was there, I could feel it, I could feel the skin on my head. I must’ve stood there for an hour, more maybe, I tried to pull myself together but my hand kept finding that patch in the back of my head and instantly bringing tears to my eyes.
I went to bed hoping I would wake up from what had been some weird twisted dream. I never woke up because I never slept that night. I lay there in the dark wondering what was happening to me. I distinctly remember wondering what outcome would be better, being seriously ill or being bald and therefore ugly for the rest of my life. I hoped I was ill.
I can’t imagine what you thought when I phoned you to say I wasn’t coming into work, I hadn’t slept, was hysterical and could most certainly not go to work, I couldn’t have people see me with a bald patch. I touched the back of my head, was there less hair now than when I went to bed?
I sat in the waiting room at the doctors, water stained cheeks, tears in my eyes, thoughts in my mind. The doctor looked at me as though I was wasting his precious time. I was in there long enough for him to touch my hair, mention alopecia and tell me there was nothing he could do. Tears rolled down my face as he handed me some papers which had been freshly printed, he wasn’t at all worried. I had never been more worried.
I watched my blood collect in the syringe and hoped that it held an answer, hoped the doctor was wrong, I hoped I was ill.
It’s difficult to explain how I felt when I got home, I was delirious with lack of sleep, crazy with worry and on the verge of devastation. I looked at the papers the doctor had printed, they had pictures of hideous balding woman on, I tore them into tiny pieces and didn’t read a word of it. I remember that morning, sitting by the river crying, I don’t think I had stopped since I left the doctors, staring into the water and trying to contemplate what was happening, trying to put things into perspective, make things seem better. It was only hair.
It wasn’t only hair and watching your hair fall out, with nothing you can do to prevent it, really is traumatic. Everywhere I went made me wary, uneasy. I wondered if people could tell although I know now that they couldn’t, not for a few more days. Everyday more hair came out, I woke every morning to strands of my own hair and stared, tormented, every morning into the mirror hoping this would be the day it stopped.
It was three days since I had seen the doctor, and I, with encouragement from mum sat once again in a doctor’s office, this time a caring, sympathetic woman doctor. She read the results I desperately didn’t want to hear and spoke kind words as I cried about not being ill. I was fine, everything perfect, no abnormalities. I just happened to be the not so proud owner of a body that had, for no specific reason, decided to fight away its own hair cells. Sadly, her kind words and caring smile was all she had to offer me, I seemed to be on my own with this one.
At work that week I covered my widening parting with a bow in my hair, the patch at the back was still covered with the rest of my hair and another patch that had developed around the side of my head could too be temporarily covered. I could barely wash my hair as the effect of watching my hair fall out in great clumps was just too much to bear. I woke up every day trying to convince myself that that was it, there was less hair on my pillow, it would stop now. But my hands continuously found their way to the patches and my mind continuously flashed the images of the witchy bald women on the doctor’s hand-out. I tried to tell people about it, about how I felt, what I thought was happening, maybe it would help me knowing people knew but I don’t think anybody actually realised what I was saying.

It was a beautiful day and you were getting married. I love family parties, weddings especially, but I couldn’t think of anything worse than getting dressed up and being seen by everybody. I felt hideous, my hair was thin and my dress was the wrong colour, white showed up every hair that fell from my head. It was humiliating having to, at the age of 23, ask my mum to wash my hair for me purely because I couldn’t face doing it myself, or alone, but I did, and she did and as I stood in the mirror, watching your reflection with tears in its eyes somewhere behind me, I knew that we both realised too much had happened for it to be normal again anytime soon.
You looked stunning as always and the wedding was beautiful but as you walked down the aisle with your hair done perfectly I couldn’t help wondering what would happen to me if my hair all fell out. Would I ever get married? Would I ever find someone to make me happy if I looked like those pictures the doctor had given me?
It was lovely to see you so happy and I think everyone had a wonderful time, despite my worrying and initial reluctance, I certainly did. The sun was shining as it should be and complete with relations, food, and terrible dancing, we were provided with the best recipe for a memorable day.
The photos I have of your wedding day are the last photos I have of me with hair.

A few days later I turned 24, By this point the hair situation had lost all control, I could no longer cover my parting with a simple bow and the patch was now patches. I wore a scarf on my head to cover my hair and avoided leaving the house unless it was absolutely necessary. I didn’t want to go out for my birthday, I didn’t want a birthday. What was there to celebrate? I was another year older and about 70% balder. Fabulous.
That weekend was the annual young farmers rally. As it happened the date came round suddenly what with everything that was going on and I was terribly unprepared with my rally entries, (I apologise sincerely for that). Luckily a last minute day off work and an evening at Clare’s meant I at least had something to enter and didn’t turn up to the rally completely useless.
I hadn’t seen any of you for a while and the thought of seeing everyone actually made me nervous, a feeling I was unfamiliar with, I constantly wondered what people were thinking, what I looked like to other people.
I debated throughout the day whether or not to go to the party that evening. In the end, I told you both I’d be there and drove home to get ready.
I decided last minute not to go, probably whilst looking in the mirror feeling sorry for myself. It was about 10 minutes after making that decision, just as I was writing out a message to you to tell you that I wasn’t coming, that I realised how much I was letting alopecia take over my life, and how much it had already ruined in a matter of weeks. I decided there and then that this was enough, for now, it had devastated me sufficiently, ruined too much. I tied a pretty scarf around my head, did my makeup, collected what I needed for the night and drove back to the party. As I drove, it already felt as though a weight that been getting stronger over the past week had suddenly weekend a little, lifted somewhat.
I remember very little of that night, but I woke up the next day in a tangled mess of gear stick, sleeping bag and steering wheel, smelling of Malibu and happier than I’d felt for some time, although admittedly that may be due to the immense amount of alcohol flowing through my veins. The good point about wearing a scarf was not only it covered up what had happened, but it covered what was continuing to happen, I couldn’t see hair falling continuously and that in itself made a huge difference to how I felt. I think maybe the seeing of it come out, the notion of the uncontrollability of it all, makes what is already a pretty terrible situation, all that much worse. It was something I had considered over the past few days, considered and dismissed, contemplated and envisioned but as I drove home that morning I decided that there was only one way that I could take control myself.
It was the day of the diamond jubilee; I drove to the farm through villages decorated with bunting, banners and a mass of union jacks. When I arrived, something royal was flickering on the television but I wasn’t greatly enthused by it all and can’t really remember what the jubilee actually entailed. Besides, I had more important things to be doing. I told Mum the plan and after her initial hesitation she took charge of the scissors and clippers. As the queen and various other members of the royal family busied themselves on the screen in front of me I watched my precious hair fall to the floor in long thick strands until it was short enough to shave.
I’ve read in several places about how traumatic this is, how terrifying, how painful to do. I think I found it liberating.
I think deep down I believed shaving it all off would mean it would be gone quicker and therefore all grow back in less time. What began as patches of hair that had fallen out, soon spread to total baldness, I only ever shaved my head twice before there was no hair regrowth at all.
The relief of not having to see hair falling and not having to guess how long it would continue for was instant but the process of having to accept what had happened took a little longer. Initially I covered my head up whenever I left the house, it was easy enough to do but it seemed pointless. I knew I had no hair under the scarf and everyone else could clearly see that too. I had taken the decision to shave my head so I took the decision to accept it and a week after shaving it went to work without covering my head.
For a while I became fixated on other peoples hair, I was never really bothered about how people looked in the past but for a while I instantly noticed how everyone wore their hair in great detail. Sometimes I would look at people and imagine what they would look like without their hair and at some point amidst this hair fascination stage I found myself going through, I began seeing hair as some strange foreign object that looked out of place on whoever it happened to be on. At night I often dreamt that my hair had grown back, I still do, very often and every time when I wake up the realisation of it being just a dream knocks me back a little. It took a few weeks before I decided to get a wig and by the time I did I had almost gotten used to having no hair.
The wig looked ok, realistic even but I instantly hated it.
I didn’t mind so much how it looked, I had chosen it after all. The problem lay in the fact that it was a wig, it wasn’t my hair. It angered me to wear the thing. It wasn’t uncomfortable but I could feel it on and knew it was there and more annoyingly was over conscious of it moving or sliding or falling off. It felt ridiculous. I was 24 years old and wearing a wig. I had shaved my head, gotten used to it and now felt that I was deceiving myself by wearing a wig. I had hair but I had to take it off every night. Wearing the wig made me feel about a thousand times more conscious than I had done with my head shaved, I felt a thousand more eyes stare at me on the street and I was a thousand times more aware that I was the one with no hair.
I wore it to work and took it off the minute I got in my car to drive home.

I often forgot that I have no hair and would catch a glimpse of myself in a mirror or a window and shock myself with the sight. I wasn’t particularly upset, or worried about how I looked, it was just sometimes I simply forgot.
For a while now I had known that work was no longer working, for a variety of reasons I didn’t want to be there, but the economic climate of England was not making it easy for me to leave. I’m qualified in an area that I’m around 300% sure that I never want to work in and am aware that my dreams of following the path that I want to will entail another stint at university, more money that I don’t really have and quite possibly the general discouragement of my family and overall disappointment and constant reminding of the fact that I previously wasted three years of studying.
I decided what I really needed was to see Helen. Three years ago, rarely a couple of hours went by without us seeing each other, when we left university we probably managed a month. I hadn’t seen Helen since she left for the other side of the world almost five months ago so I created a plan. The plans I had made to go back and study meant that I had begun to think about financing myself and had a little bit of money saved up. Just the right amount for a return flight to Australia with an extremely tight budget for a five week holiday. It happened quickly, I booked the flights before I changed my mind and requested the time off work knowing that if they said no and I had to leave it would in fact be another problem sorted.
I don’t know what made me look on a website recruiting nannys and au pairs but when I saw a job advertised for a nanny in Australia with a family that seemed to be friendly and an opportunity that appeared to be fantastic I decided to click apply and send off some details. It was several weeks later and less than a month before my flight departed England that I received the email offering me the job.
As hard as we had tried in the past few months we both knew that we had pushed our friendship beyond ruin. More importantly it played on my mind every time we spoke that since my hair had gone, since I looked different, you were a completely different person around me than what you were before. For the first time ever, I felt awkward around you. I don’t know why then that telling you I was leaving was harder than anyone else, I tried four times in one week and every time the words never came out and every time I went home wondering what was making it so difficult.
Everything happened so quickly that I didn’t really have time to think about what I was committing to, I sorted out my belongings, said goodbye to the people I needed to and badly packed a case and a rucksack with what I believed would be necessary for a year of pretty much complete unknown. Several times I remember lying in my bed trying to imagine what it would be like in a months’ time and not being able to picture anything because I assumed it would never actually happen, that something would change.
That day came round so quickly, there I was, at the airport, more excited than I can possibly ever remember with not a single doubt in my mind. It was difficult saying goodbye and walking away from you all and as I sat waiting for my flight I did think about the coming year and the distance between us. I thought about who I’d miss, who I wouldn’t and who I’d be glad to come home to. I had prepared myself for a terrible 23 hours, I had heard nothing but bad stories about flights from England to Australia but as it happened, I enjoyed the flight, it seemed to go quickly and I found myself on this mysterious side of world without a touch of jetlag. I knew from the moment I booked my flights that I had made the right decision but on seeing you, for the first time in months, any tiny hints of apprehension as to what I was actually doing vanished. My first five weeks in Australia were possibly the most fantastic five weeks I’ve ever had. The sights I saw were completely overwhelming. Every day I saw something I had never seen before in my life, every day I learnt something new. It never worried me that I didn’t know anyone here, it wasn’t a thought that I thought too often. I met more people in those five weeks than I could ever have imagined, several of which I am genuinely thankful to have met. You were like a breath of fresh air when I met you, we laughed and drank and you asked all the right questions. I hope I meet you again. Those weeks soon ran out, and with little money left, although nervous for the first time since arriving, I was pleased to be starting work. As I flew over the lights of the city, I wondered what the next few months of my life had in store for me. I knew little about the people I was living with and nothing about the place where I was living but from above, as the darkness filled the air, the lights of Sydney seemed welcoming and exciting.
I soon settled into my job, into my home and in doing so the time began to fly. I’ve spent four days a week with the most adorable children and together we’ve spent the majority of the past few months playing in the sunshine. They’re at an age where they grow so quickly and in just a few months I’ve watched them grow and learn and develop. It seems almost every day they say new words or learn to do something they couldn’t before master, it’s a wonderful thing to be able to witness.
I had a lot of worries with regards to my hair before I left England. I worried more than anything that it wouldn’t grow back and I worried too much about what other people thought. In the first few weeks of being in Australia my eyebrows and eyelashes completely disappeared and with that I reached a whole new level of self-consciousness. I returned to the stage of hating seeing myself and for a while could feel people’s eyes looking at me wherever I went. Even now, though I want my hair back more than anything in the world, I think it’s the fact that I have no eyebrows and no eyelashes that bothers me the most. For the majority of the time I forget about it, I answer peoples questions when they ask me, I do my make up in an attempt to make myself look half decent and I accept that there’s not really anything I can do. Of course there is always moments when I hate what’s happened, I hate not knowing why it’s happened to me and more importantly I hate not knowing what’s going to happen but I realise now how ridiculous my initial feelings were when it first happened, I’m not ill, and I should be grateful for that. I have no hair but I’m literally having the time of my life.
On my days off I’ve been able to explore Sydney itself and the surrounding areas either alone or in the company of some of the many new people I’ve met since being here. I’ve abseiled and sunbathed, watched films and live music, been to the beaches and the mountains, on trains and on boats and on buses. I’ve met lots of fantastic people in Sydney but I’m so glad I met you, even if you didn’t stay around for long enough! We had some wonderful weekends and adventures and I think settling into my new surroundings would’ve been a million times more difficult if you weren’t around. I hope, despite the distance between us, we will continue having adventures in the years to come.
I was aware there were some distant family members living somewhere near Sydney and, although slightly nervous and unsure what to expect, I hoped I would get to meet them at some point during my time in Australia. I am so glad we got in contact and have enjoyed every minute I’ve spent with you all. From the moment we met, you have been so welcoming and you made my Christmas special even though I was thousands of miles from home. It’s a strange and wonderful phenomenon that despite distance and time, family is always family.
I’ve never been far from home, and never for very long at all and as a result I did worry slightly that I‘d miss you all a little bit too much. I look forward to speaking to Mam whenever we get the chance, and am excited whenever the post arrives with something from home, I love hearing from my friends and family and knowing what you’re all up to, but I’ve never felt homesick, I’ve never once felt the need to get a flight and leave this adventure behind. Every day I wake up pleased that I’m here, pleased that I’m having a year doing what I want to do. In saying that, I am desperately excited to see everyone at home, but not before I’ve finished my journey.

Happy New Year!!