Hello Folks: I came down with an acute case of Alopecia about two years ago and it was clearly linked to extreme stress. First I lost my beard on my chin and then I progressed to HUGE bald patches on the back and sides of my head. About a year ago my hair began to return as I noticed that I was starting to lose my body hair. Now I have a full head of curly and bushy hair while I think I'm still in the process of losing my body hair! How weird! I was under the impression that once this 'condition' progresses to your body that you now have Alopecia Universal and you can pretty much forget about any sort of recovery. Wrong! Clearly, Alopecia can affect different people in many different ways. My beard has yet to return, and my legs and arms look as though they've been dipped in Nair! I think that my recovery was linked to identifying the source of stress in my life (easy to find) and then eliminating it. Since I'm still living with Alopecia, and it's still very much a part of me, I do worry a bit that it could return to my scalp at any moment, but I don't loose any sleep over it. My affliction seems contradictory to everything I've ever read or heard about it, and it did not follow the predicted course. So I would encourage everybody to hang in there, hope for the best, don't beat yourself up, and remember that whatever doesn't kill you makes you stronger. And by the way, my daughter is growing a ponytail to donate to Locks Of Love and I'm thinking of doing the same! --John