Going bald builds character
This thought has been taking up space in my brain for a while now, prompted by someone on Twitch asking Northernlion for advice about losing his hair.
I then saw this HackerNews post[↗] and read the comments and realised I'm apparently in the minority in how I view my male pattern baldness.
The general consensus seems to be: going bald is bad and taking drugs to prevent it is fine.
The health implications and side-effects of drug use aside, what irks me the most about this mindset is that it takes the easy way out. Something happening that you don't like? Here, take this miracle cure.
It's like all those adverts for "get abs quick" devices. If it was that easy to get pronounced abdominals, then everyone would have them.
As a (partially) bald man, I get it. Hair is part of a person's identity. As a metalhead, trust me that I know all there is to know about identity and hair. But that's where the character building comes in - going bald means having to deal with loss. It's having a part of you taken away against your will and having no way of stopping it. You go through all the classic stages of grief, but those taking hairloss drugs are stuck at stage 3: Bargaining. You have to let go of that in order to reach stage 5: Acceptance.
Losing your hair forces you to adapt. It makes you reform your identity. It's hard (and I expect most bald men can remember the exact moment they first realised what the future would hold for their hair) but that horrible sinking feeling in the pit of your stomach is something you can overcome. You can learn to deal with it and be stronger and more confident afterwards.
In the end there are really only a few things that are important to remember about going bald:
- You're not alone - about 50% of all men have male pattern baldness.
- Lots of people find bald men attractive. The rest won't look twice.
- Combovers look terrible.