Monday, September 04, 2006
Contagious Alopecia
PIB recently wrote a post on her battle with the contagious disease known as Alopecia. Now...many of you may be thinking, "I was told that Alopecia wasn't contagious." Hear me out:
No one in my family (that I am aware of) has ever suffered from Alopecia...unless you consider male pattern baldness to be disease related. PIB always had a healthy head of hair growing up. Then, one day...one fateful day in college, she made the decision to move in with someone suffering from an extreme case of the disease. Supposedly it was a huge intervention if and whenever this girl discovered a single hair growing on her toe. PIB began developing symptoms of the disease after only a few months of living with the girl. God knows what would have happened had PIB continued living with the girl for an extensive period of time. She terminated living arrangements (primarily due to the fact that she had graduated) before the disease had a chance to spread to the rest of her body.
I took up residence with PIB for one summer... Thankfully we were living in a very large house where contact between the two of us was kept to a minimal. I did not develop the disease. However, I recall shedding a lot more during the period of time I was living with her. Dolly was not as lucky. PIB took Dolly under her care shortly after moving home...showering her with love, and (unfortunately) the disease. Dolly, being a dog, was unaware of the detrimental effects that would soon come as a result of sharing a bedroom with PIB for two years. I brush her almost everyday, and every time I remove enough hair from her coat to create another Dolly. Sometimes I worry that I will catch the disease from being around Dolly, but so far the disease has been unable to make the move from animal to person the way that it apparently was able to move from person to animal.
Why anyone that suffers from the disease would actually want to donate what little hair they have left, I don't know. I do admire PIB (from a distance) for her courage in donating what she could knowing very well that they do not make eyebrow wigs. However, I do wish that she would let me borrow her Dyson.
No one in my family (that I am aware of) has ever suffered from Alopecia...unless you consider male pattern baldness to be disease related. PIB always had a healthy head of hair growing up. Then, one day...one fateful day in college, she made the decision to move in with someone suffering from an extreme case of the disease. Supposedly it was a huge intervention if and whenever this girl discovered a single hair growing on her toe. PIB began developing symptoms of the disease after only a few months of living with the girl. God knows what would have happened had PIB continued living with the girl for an extensive period of time. She terminated living arrangements (primarily due to the fact that she had graduated) before the disease had a chance to spread to the rest of her body.
I took up residence with PIB for one summer... Thankfully we were living in a very large house where contact between the two of us was kept to a minimal. I did not develop the disease. However, I recall shedding a lot more during the period of time I was living with her. Dolly was not as lucky. PIB took Dolly under her care shortly after moving home...showering her with love, and (unfortunately) the disease. Dolly, being a dog, was unaware of the detrimental effects that would soon come as a result of sharing a bedroom with PIB for two years. I brush her almost everyday, and every time I remove enough hair from her coat to create another Dolly. Sometimes I worry that I will catch the disease from being around Dolly, but so far the disease has been unable to make the move from animal to person the way that it apparently was able to move from person to animal.
Why anyone that suffers from the disease would actually want to donate what little hair they have left, I don't know. I do admire PIB (from a distance) for her courage in donating what she could knowing very well that they do not make eyebrow wigs. However, I do wish that she would let me borrow her Dyson.
