My Cancer Notebook from the hospital says to expect hair loss within 2-3 weeks. So it's soon. I'm not vain, I don't think, but I know that I will still be a bit appalled. Lewis says we are embarrassed by the things we can't help: a fall, a blemish, an accident. It's a sign we are not at ease in our world. A Honduran friend I've known since junior high wrote me and offered to get me a cold cap, which keeps some women from losing their hair. It's a cap of ice you wear during chemo. The cold constricts the blood vessels in your scalp and keeps the chemo from reaching the hair follicles as easily.
It's tempting. But the thought of walking into the chemo suite where a dozen of us are perched throughout the room with our care-givers, quietly waiting for the iv's to finish, with a strange cap on my head that needs changing every 30 minutes makes me say no. Already I don't want to stand out. You'd think as a Gringa all my life I'd be used to standing out. No. It's not something you get used to. You never get used to the things wrong in the world. You share its embarrassment.
Besides. It would be considered one of those "rash American things."
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