A Hairy Situation

I know what you're thinking.

Cut that child's hair already.

It's just that I really don't know what to do about it....



You see....



Elizabeth developed a new habit over the summer.

I think the official name for it is trichotillomania but she refers to it as "the crazy finger".

About July I started to notice her hair would have tiny little knots. I didn't think too much about it at first because we were swimming at the pool daily and I figured it was just a side effect from the hours of wet hair. One morning I was combing her hair and the entire left side of her head was covered in them along with a few very small stark white bald spots. I blamed myself, thinking I was combing too hard, felt very guilty about it for a few days and then noticed the bald spots were spreading. All the way around her head. By mid-August she was almost completely bald on one side of her head and I had filled two sandwich bags full of the knots she'd pulled free that I'd find on the floor, in her bed, or in the tub.

And this was the other side of her head. The one not effected by her brother's Zohan auditions.

It's actually starting to grow out some and what you see here is not near what it was like this summer. We would go places and people would stop and coo at her and tell her how pretty she was and once I even went to our local consignment shop and let her pick out some books and the lady gave them to us for free and told us she'd pray for us. I thought that was mighty nice and it did not dawn on me until a friend pointed out that she looked like she'd had recent brain surgery.

When I'd catch her with her hands in her hair she'd tell me, "Mom, I can't stop my crazy finger!". And now I wish I had a picture of her waving the crazy finger in the air so you could see why I'd fall on the floor laughing. Yeah, yeah, you shouldn't laugh at your possibly mentally ill child, but it was funny.

Inside, though, I was sick. Maybe she was developing anxiety, depression, OMG what if she has some sort of metabolic, vitamin deficient, tumor-growing, drop dead illness??????? Really?

And just about the time I was making doctor appointments, school started and we don't see Crazy Finger so much anymore.

Schizophrenia or boredom? Hmmmm.....

So another year of lopsided hair. Another year of wacked out school pictures. Another year of whispering, pointing parents wondering.

One day this will be hysterically funny. These pictures will look awesome in her wedding slide show I'm sure, but right now I am just looking for a way to cover up the bald, hence, the long bangs that I use as a comb over.



Kinda like this.

I wonder where I can find a child-size wig....