Men's Hair Loss - A Big Deal or Are We Just Big Babies?

My hair started falling out in my early twenties. I’d just graduated college and was heading to New York to pursue a career in acting when I started noticing little wisps in the sink every morning. I tried to ignore it at first— thought maybe it was just normal wear and tear, but the longer it went on, the more each strand began to resemble a little exclamation point on the porcelain. I hadn’t yet wrapped my head around what I was going to do if I started balding - this was the early aughts and the only treatment that had hit the mainstream were those Hair Club for Men ads with older dudes getting out of pools with water draining off their fake looking hair. So I just let it ride. After a year or two, as my forehead began to resemble a half-eaten arugula salad, the generic version of Rogaine hit the market and I started slathering foam on my scalp. But I didn’t really notice much of a difference.

When a role I was playing in grad school called for me to shave my head, I jumped at the chance— maybe this was the solution. Maybe I’d look so good with a shaved scalp, I wouldn’t have to worry about keeping up the hair routine for the rest of my life. But to my disappointment (cue sad trumpet sound, “Wah-wahhhh…”) I looked terrible. See, I’ve got what some might call a cromagnum brow, which takes over my whole head, so I looked like a walking version of Half-Dome. You could free-solo that thing.

So with any hope of being the next Bruce Willis or Jason Statham flushed down the hair-covered toilet, I started seeking out other treatments. Because I was, and still am, quite vain. My whole life, it seems like a pretty large part of my identity has been tied to my looks, which I know, is not a super-cool trait, but hey, honesty is the best policy, right? But that’s why (I’m told by my therapist) I might be more concerned with losing my hair than other men. But I’m not so sure I’m actually much of an anomaly. When I polled my group of dude-friends, almost all of them admitted to having some insecurity around their hairline, even the ones with thick scalps. So it’s obviously not just me. And it makes me wonder if the stress over our hairline is connected to a deeper, more existential kind of anxiety. It’s so obvious and trite to say that men worry about balding, but maybe there’s something more profound going on in the process? Or maybe we’re just cry babies. Let’s find out.

First, let me say off the bat - I’m super envious of the men out there secure enough to shave their heads and not concern themselves with the hair thing in general. I wish I could do it. I’ve got buddies who shave their heads and look amazing and don’t have to deal with all the BS that comes with middle-aged hair loss. If you’re one of those dudes, or married to one of those dudes, I salute you.

Secondly, I’m not advocating any sort of treatment here or suggesting that all men are the same. I’m more interested in the notion that men aren’t supposed to be vain or think about their looks. Like, how did that become associated with manliness? I’d venture to say the alphiest of the alphas care about it. Because it’s the one physical attribute we can’t really control. Not that losing our beer guts is easy, but there’s always diet and exercise. Hair is different. That train is going no matter what. And, at least for me, I feel like there’s a connection - even if it’s made up and subconscious- between losing my hair and losing my youth and virility. It’s like a physical marker of time. And that can spur a bit of an existential fluttering.

It’s also the most forward facing, visible attribute we have (other than height, which is a whole ‘nother can of squirmy worms) and therefore the thing that gets noticed first. I mean, I never want to imply that men get judged on their appearance anywhere near that amount that women do, y’all get the short end of that stick and it sucks, BUT, I do think the hair thing is something we can’t hide. Like boobs. They’re out there and get judged. Although I’m told that women aren’t nearly as concerned with follicles as we are with chesticles. We’re the worst. But even if we are misperceiving the importance of our hair to the outside world, it doesn’t make it less of a minefield for anxiety. Which I guess could be said for any body issue.