Dear Body of Mine:

ATTENTION!!  To those reading this entry – there will be a photo after this dialogue that may be, to some readers, disgusting and gross. You might want to turn your head and move small children and animals out of the room. Don’t say I didn’t warn you.

Dear Body of Mine: I realize you’re under a fairly large amount of stress lately.

• The bedroom and bathroom and closet and hallway are still torn apart with progress moving at a banana slug speed.
• The person who’s in charge of this renovation is less than dependable which adds to this chaos.
• School will be out in a few days and even though my kids are older, there still are lessons to get them to and running them here and there to friends’ houses.
• You have people coming to stay in a week for two weeks while the house is still chaotic and this is stressful.
• Trying to maintain five acres (actually four now with Mario!) and the huge garden plus animals is a little stressful.
• You have a second degree Black Belt test coming up in August that you really must and want to pass and the back is still not cooperating.
• Your daughter wants to start painting and re-carpeting her room as soon as the mess in your area is done (say somewhere around 2015).
• You’re still sleeping in the cave basement with a third of your clothes in one room and another third in another room and the last third hanging over chairs and couches.

And I agree that all those things can cause a certain amount of anxiety in one’s life; I’m going to give that to you.

BUT, this …. THIS is absolutely unacceptable:

This is what is happening each time I wash my hair and has been going on for the past two months. I’m actually afraid to wash my hair for fear of losing so much. I know I’ll be bald in a couple of months. Then I will look like Daddy.

My hair is falling out en mass. It’s all over the car, on my rugs, in my bed – wherever I lay or sit or stand. When I brush it, the pile looks just the same, which makes me not want to brush it. Since I’ve been rather lucky that I’ve had really thick hair all my life, this is a shock to my head and senses. My ponytails are considerably smaller in size and hair combs that used to not fit all my hair, are now holding it perfectly.

I finally showed The Spouse what was going on  (I try to not worry him since his stress exceeds mine by 200%) with my hair issue. His eyes almost fell out of his head.

He and I went to the O Holy Internet and I picked just the first four causes of massive hair loss.

Obviously stress and lack of sleep (which I have both) were causes but surprisingly, a shortage of iron came up as the third (the fourth was lupus which was quickly dismissed). This I can see since I’ve cut my food consumption way back (trying to fit into my pants again and training for the BB test) and apparently, I cut some other nutrients as well.

So I’m back on some major iron and trying to eat more artichokes and eggs, which are high in iron.

And I certainly don’t want the conversation I had today with Owen to happen again:

Owen: Kiki (with arms folded, serious face) … does hair fall out of your butt?

Me: (trying not to laugh) Why … no Owen. It doesn’t (at least I’m thinking it doesn’t). Why?

Owen: Well, I just went potty and there’s a whole bunch of long hair in the toilet.

Me: Oh … that’s just because I’m losing my hair.

The other things – stress and lack of sleep – will have to heal a little a time when things calm down. I hope.