MESSING WITH OUR HEADS

For many balding men, wigs, dark humour and stoicism often mask deep distress. What options do they have in the battle against hair loss?

- Rhodri Marsden

When I was a teenager, my mother reassured me that I wouldn’t go bald in my twenties like my father had. “Look,” she said, pushing back her hair from her forehead, “You’ve got my hairline, not your dad’s.” Within ten years her argument was revealed to be magnificently wrong. My hairline began its slow march north, a clear sign that I’d inherited male-pattern hair loss from one of my parents, if not both of them. As the years went by I persuaded myself that ever-shorter haircuts made me look better than I used to. But deep down it felt unfair, a genetic quirk I didn’t deserve. I’d wince as the barber held up the mirror behind me, revealing an ever-expanding bald patch.

I pretended not to be bothered, and that pretence continues today, in my forties. But while stoically accepting hair loss as my destiny, I don’t like it. I’ve found myself wearing hats and growing a beard, attempts at misdirection that fool nobody, least of all me.

Androgenetic alopecia is the medical term for my inherited form of hair loss. While it affects both men and women, marketing by hairloss treatment companies mostly targets male anxieties. The industry is estimated to be worth at least £1.2 billion a year worldwide.