I have the glamorous and degrading ALOPECIA AREATA, a condition which causes my hair to fall out in copious amounts when I'm under stress. I've wrestled with this disease since the age of ten, when the boy I like in primary school noted that I have a ,"funny bald patch," on the crown of my head. About the size of a quarter, this was just the beginning of my so far, twelve year battle with my so called, 'Curse.'

Its wrong to call it that and right now in my more mature state I refer to it as, 'that thing I have with my hair,' but back in highschool all I knew was that it was my mortal enemy. I considered it the death of my self-esteem as my hair receded from my head and eventually my eye brows followed suite. My mother tried everything from the painful cortisone injections, to all the creams and butters, but to no avail.

The cruel joke with Alopecia is that it allows your hair to grow when you're calm, something which is hard to attain when you attend an all girls school where body image is anything but a taboo subject. Despite that, I managed to get through highschool, with my hair yo-yoing back and forth. Hair loss became the norm for me and luckily I never got bullied, which is a blessing in itself.

Architecture was whole different ball game. Once I was in college, my independence blossomed as did my hair and after three years, I had a mane of beautiful brown hair to call my own and with the help of a thick fringe, a lack of eye brows wasn't an issue. Life was good.

That was until my Masters came around and things began to go backwards. Uni became substainually harder, lecturers became harsher and my view on life became a whole negative drone on not being able to perform well enough. A vicious cycle developed: I'm stressed-my hair falls out- I'm stressed about my hair falling out- I stress more.

At this point, I have a beautiful boyfriend who was there to see my fall from grace. He witnessed my hair falling out like winter leaves and eventually my eyelashes too, but still he didn't flinch when it came to supporting me. I knew it wasn't because he was fufilling his role as a boyfriend, but also because he has his own insecurities about his hair-being a 25 year of RED HEAD, that dyes it brown.For a while through the pains of Alopecia, he was the one thing I had going for me, a glimmer of hope in the dispair of loosing what to women is a valuable asset. If emotions were a currency, I would be grossy indebt to him as he's being my rock that I've desparately clung too over these years.

Now, I'm totally bald and after being diagnosed with Anxiety, I finally feel that I've come full circle when it comes to understanding my mysterious ailment. Anxiety is a totally new concept that I'm having to grapple with along with the idea that I one of millions who are now taking medication to deal with it. Still I after all the pain and confusion that this ailement has caused me, I am happy say that I'm finally content with life however it goes. Alopecia has taught me to be patient and kind to myself and from the little tufts of black hair that are appearing on my head, I think for once I'm doing it right.