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According to new research one in five women is now affected by hair loss. Linda Kelsey, who started shedding hers in her thirties, offers some advice on beating baldness

Women, it seems, really are catching up with men – but not in a good way. First it was heart attacks, then it was cirrhosis of the liver as a result of teenage and twenties binge drinking. Now we’re going bald as well. A study of more than 2,000 women found that one in five suffers or has suffered from hair loss.
Linda Kelsey: ‘baldness is scary for men and doubly so for women’
I’ve never been in the Penelope Cruz league when it comes to hair, but there was a time in my teens when I sported a chunky fringe (rather more impressive than the one Kate Moss manages today) and shoulder-length flick-ups.

There’s a photo of me around the age of 20 posing next to my mustard-yellow Mini, and I sometimes gaze at it wistfully. It’s not my youth or the cute car I miss, it’s all that hair.

I started to notice the excess shedding in my early thirties, but at the very moment I was beginning to panic about it, I became pregnant. Pumped up with hormones, my hair grew in thickness as fast as my waist.

About three months after giving birth, I noticed my hair falling out in handfuls, a natural process in many women as hormones return to pre-pregnancy levels. The difference in my case was that my hair kept on falling. Blood tests revealed that even though the iron level in my blood was normal, my iron stores (ferritin) were on the floor. Ferritin deficiency can affect the follicles and lead to hair loss. Boost the iron store, boost the hair – or so the theory goes.

advertisementIn my case, it wasn’t so simple. What I found after a visit to trichologist Glenn Lyons at the Philip Kingsley Clinic, is that like many women, I was also a victim of androgenetic alopecia, an inherited condition which causes gradual thinning of the hair over many years. It’s not quite as horrendous as it sounds.

Unlike men, women almost never go completely bald. The total – and sudden – hair loss suffered by TV presenter Gail Porter is very rare indeed. Over-the-counter remedies, such as Regaine, or the 3M drops I get from the clinic, both contain minoxidil, an antibiotic with the side-effect of promoting hair growth.

It appears that they’re even more effective for women than for men. They’re a pain to apply on a regular basis, though, and they make the hair sticky so that you have to wash it almost every day. But I’ve certainly seen positive results. Now, I only lose the “regular” amount of hairs, around the hundred-a-day mark.

My hair yo-yos between periods of relative stability and what the pros called Chronic Telogen Effluvium (TGE) – excessive shedding in which the sufferer loses more than double or treble the amount of hair that falls out naturally every day. Stress is a factor, but the effect on the hair of a bereavement, for example, or a problem at work might not show up until several months later. A thyroid imbalance, undiagnosed diabetes, polycystic ovaries and certain prescription drugs can all cause overt shedding.

I’ve had two bouts of TGE in the past three years – the first a few months after major surgery (another well-known trigger) and a more recent one, the cause of which I’ve not worked out. In each case, I’ve found myself crying into my hairbrush as it filled with hair.

Though the hair has pretty much recovered after a few months, I bought myself a wig on a just-in-case basis.

I’ve worn it only twice as it made me feel self-conscious; on seeing me in it, a girlfriend whom I hadn’t let in on my secret squealed: “Your hair’s amazing! You look like an ad for Toni&Guy!” I take comfort from another friend who bought a wig during chemotherapy. Her hair has grown back even better than it was before, and she only needs to wheel out her impressively natural-looking wig when she can’t be bothered to spend ages styling her hair.

We spend billions in pursuit of swingy, silky, lustrous hair because we understand just how potent a weapon it is in our sexual armoury. On a rare good-hair day, I feel more feminine, confident and attractive. If hair loss is scary for men, it’s doubly so for women. How many men would ask a bald woman for a date? Would any woman turn down an interesting guy purely on the basis that he didn’t have much hair?

Glenn Lyons firmly believes that women’s hectic, do-it-all lifestyles are contributing to hair-loss problems. The good news is that most can be alleviated by paying more attention to your diet. “Good nutrition with regular meals and a balanced intake of proteins and carbohydrates is vital,” he says. Thin women are visiting his clinic in increasing numbers; for some, a gain of two or three kilos has been sufficient to halt hair loss. Recently, a renowned dermatologist advised me to eat 2oz of lean red meat a day for its nutrient value.

There are lots of over-the-counter products and vitamins that promise to improve hair, but you’re far more likely to achieve the results you want if you understand the underlying cause. If hair loss is keeping you awake at night, you shouldn’t even consider spending a small fortune on products until you’ve had a health check. GPs don’t know much about hair, but they can investigate what problems might lie beneath, and you should insist on having your ferritin levels checked. Meanwhile, I’m knocking back gelatin pills, applying hair drops and hanging on to every strand I can. Twice this week I’ve had good-hair days – and for me that’s very good news indeed.

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