‘‘ Screw-ups’’ 103
I had very unusual blond hair, great hair— my best feature, by far. It was how people remembered me. Ironically, I lost the one thing that always defined me: my looks. It’ s a pain being bald. I have to wrap fabrics on my head, take them off and put them on. When I lie down, they make a big bump.
For Deborah, the psychiatrist with breast cancer, losing her braid was‘‘ more devastating than anything else,’’ because it was her‘‘ mark’’— a defining feature of herself. She no longer even recognized herself, and dreamed of having her hair again.
All my life, I had a very long braid. The first time I lost my hair on chemo, I was losing hair everywhere, and didn’ t want to cut it. Half my pillow would be full of hair. A friend who shaves his head said,‘‘ We’ re going to shave your head. I’ ll do it for you. Just forget you had hair.’’ But that was more devastating than anything else: to shed my hair in the shower. Because it’ s part of you— you are shedding part of you. You get chemo and feel pain, but still keep you, yourself. But when you lose your hair, suddenly you become a totally different person. You don’ t recognize yourself. My hair grew back, but curly. Everybody thought I had a permanent. Then when I had radiation to my head, I lost my hair completely. I didn’ t know that after radiation, you can’ t grow your hair back at all. I still dream that my hair is back— a real stupid dream, but I have it.
As a scientist, Deborah tried to dismiss her unconscious desire for her hair. She had to change her self-image to that of a cancer patient. But she found this transition hard, and felt she now looked‘‘ unhealthy’’:
When I look in the mirror, it’ s not me. It’ s not my hair. My eyebrows now are very light. They used to be thick. My face looks round, and used to be skinny. In the mirror, I don’ t see myself. It’ s a different me: a cancer patient. That’ s my image of myself now. I don’ t know if other people know my diagnosis. Sometimes I feel they do. At a café, a woman had a wig. I said to a friend,‘‘ She’ s a cancer patient. I’ m sure!’’
Deborah suggested how radical transformations in outward selves shaped senses of inner selves as well. Theories of social construction suggest that identities are socially built. Yet here, more complicated, dynamic