My name is Brittany Peterson, I am nineteen years old and I have Alopecia Universalis. As I sit in my dorm room floor, I struggle to find the words to talk to you about my disease because it is such an emotional, and frustrating matter for me. No piece of paper will accurately capture or express to you what I've been through, but for every other child that has to deal with this disease, I will try and make this paper as good as I can, and speak for all the voices that can't find the words to speak for themselves.
So I will start at the beginning, which for me starts around age thirteen when I lost my eyebrows. Alopecia was just setting in, and I was horrified, what was I going to do? This was eighth grade, no boy in the eighth grade would want to date me after looking like I'd just taken a razor to my eyebrows. I was mortified, but as many have told me, life could be worse, so I did what I had to and took up the "art" of eye brow drawing, which did not go so well considering, I was never really an artist.
Oh, eyebrow drawing was the worst, I hated it, but not nearly as much as I hated losing my hair sophomore year of high school. High school was hard enough, I went to a small catholic high school where I spent months with girls I hated sitting silently at a lunch table fearfully agreeing with whatever they said. I remember not brushing my hair or touching it fearful that it would fall out, I even avoided showers because I could not face the drain which would be filled with my hair every single time I finished. I even remember getting up in one of my classes to hand in a paper and I came back to my seat to find a girl looking at the strands of hair that I shed all over. After that, I began brushing my hair at home, I'd rather lose it there then at school, in front of a bunch of judgmental kids.
I asked myself every single night after crying, why me? What did I do wrong? I did everything to try and get my hair back, I tried creams that gave me awful visible red rashes that itched. I tried cortisone shots which I'd get all over my head, and six to seven injections in each eyebrow. Even now I emotionally remember the moment where I was holding my mother's hand crying because the injections hurt, and I remember thinking to myself enough is enough. I was done with shots and torture treatments to be normal, I was done, I didn't ask for this and I wasn't going to deal with physical pain anymore, the emotional pain was bad enough.
Soon enough I switched high schools, hoping that a public high school's torture might not be as bad. Of course, kids are cruel everywhere, I had people humiliate me and loudly ask about my wig in class. I had people write on my desk "fake hair," after I got my first wig, which cost my mom a good two grand, and not mention it was itchy and hot, and I was unable to put it up in a pony tail. Let me have you keep in mind that none of these kids knew if I had cancer or not, they made fun of me because they were ignorant and cruel, but that didn't make it hurt any less.
I still deal with struggle with different issues in college such as sleeping in my wig because I'm too embarrassed to take it off, or when I'm at the gym and I want so badly to just air my head off but I don't dare expose my head to cute college boys. Let me explain to you that I do love and except myself (to a certain extent) but I should not have to open up and explain an emotional issue right off the bat when I first meet someone, don't I have a right to privacy?
The wig(s) I own is beautiful, and my mom and dad saved every extra dollar they had to buy me that instead of a new car. My wig currently costs five grand and it is necessary to have two of them so I can send one to be repaired when I need too. Also, repairs for this special prosthesis can range from twelve hundred dollars to three grand. I'm not saying I need every dime of my wig covered, but I am going to have to deal with this disease every day of my life, everyone deserves to feel some amount of normality. Which is why I am frustrated to even have to give you an explanation as to why people with Alopecia deserve this money. Everyone with Alopecia deserves privacy, and the right to lead a semi-normal life, and wigs allow us to do this. I shouldn't have to fight for money so I can feel normal, and beautiful like everyone else. I pay taxes, work hard, and go to school so one day I can maybe start a career in medical law and get justice for people with my condition. Don't get me wrong, Alopecia has done beautiful things in my life and made me who I am, but I shouldn't have to fight to get money to buy wigs for a disease I never wanted, or asked for. Please hear my plea for help, and support Bill No. 417. This way every child with Alopecia, can spend their time worrying about normal issues, like grades, sports, normal kid things, and not have to worry about every day humiliation and how they will afford to pay for their next wig. Thank you for taking time out of your day to read my written testimony, it doesn't just mean the world to me, it means the world to everybody struggling to cope with Alopecia.