SMOKE & MIRRORS

Well, who’d have thought that some of the wigs would look so real. Don’t get me wrong, there were some shockers, but overall they were quite good. When we got there we met Sue (the wig lady) and she showed us through to her room. It was quite a big clinical room with a stool and mirror at one end but it wasn’t full of dummy heads with wigs on them like I thought it would be. Sam was given some brochures to look at and shown some options. Apparently, the longer the hair on the wig, the less realistic they look. We were told that we wouldn’t be able to come away with a wig today because they would need to order them in her natural hair colour. It would take a week for them to arrive and then Sam would make the final choice from the selection that was ordered. Sam was a bit disappointed because she was hoping we could get home tonight, I would shave her head and then she could just pop the wig on so that it would lessen the impact of having no hair. As Sue started sorting the wigs, it was decided that we would start off with a short haired wig first and then slowly work our way up to some bob cuts. Sam was saying that the one thing that she isn’t used to (and this only applies to women as men never understand it) and that’s having a fringe because she’s never had one. The problem is that all wigs come with one.

As Sam sat in the stool ready to start trying some wigs on, it became very obvious that this was going be a lot harder than she thought it would be. It’s almost as if the whole thing was becoming real. I could see the emotion in her face as the realisation that her hair was going to dissappear and this substitute was going to take its place hit home. Sue stood back as Sam had a little cry and then the nod was given to proceed. As each wig was tried on, the more relaxed Sam became and the more relaxed she became, the more she started to enjoy herself. After all the wigs were tried on Sue said that she would order a couple in Sam’s own hair colour and they would be here next week.

While I’ve been writing this post, Sam had a phone call from Sue. Unfortunately her appointment to pick up her wig is not for another fortnight. Sam is gutted. She doesn’t think her hair is going to last 2 more days and I know that she’s trying to resist having her hair shaved off when she doesn’t have her preferred option of covering. She’s bought a couple of scarves but when she tries these on they just scream “CANCER VICTIM!! LOOK AT ME!!” and just amplifies the fact that she’s ill. I think she should just bite the bullet and shave her head but I’m very aware that her reaction is going to be a bad one. The whole hair loss part of this horrible experience is really becoming much harder and trickier than both Sam and I thought it would be.

A couple of things I didn’t realise and learnt tonight:

You still have to shampoo and wash a wig (Really??).

Also I didn’t know that after you order a wig and get it home, you can then go to a hairdressers and get it cut to a style you like (what happens if it gets cut wrong? Won’t that just ruin it? It’s not like it’ll grow out afterwards).