STRESSED OUT

Worried about thinning locks? Here’s what you need to know about the effects of stress on your hair.

Thinning locks? Anxiety may be the culprit

SUSAN WAS STARTLED TO find bald patches as she styled her long hair. “I was panicked and a little embarrassed,” she recalls. (We’ve changed her name to protect her privacy.) The then–27-year-old had been working long hours at her demanding broadcasting job while tending to her mother, who was battling Stage 4 cancer. The result: stress-related hair loss.

Typically, we lose between 50 and 100 strands of hair a day. But, for some of us, a high level of stress—job loss, death in the family, divorce or illness, for example—can trigger changes in our stress hormones, which can shorten our hair’s normal growth cycle by sending hair into a premature resting phase. Therefore, more hair than usual could fall out after the 100-day resting phase, which means that, about three months after a traumatic event, hair loss may be noticed by some—but not everyone. “There are many people who lose a spouse or someone in the family and don’t experience any hair loss,” says Dr. Jeff Donovan, director of the hair-loss program at Women’s College Hospital. “It’s very individual.”

There’s little that can be done to prevent stress-related hair loss. And if you’ve suffered from this kind of hair loss before, says Dr. Donovan, you could experience it again after another stressful event. Forget about quick fixes, medication or Rogaine—a product containing minoxidil, which stimulates hair growth in some people; he says they don’t usually help with hair loss that is a result of stress.

So what can you do? The only treatment is time. “There’s nothing that can be done that will slow or stop this loss,” says Dr. Donovan. “Once the stress returns to a normal level, hair grows back. In nine months to a year, you’ll look the same as you did before the stress happened.”

That was Susan’s experience. “I wasn’t prepared to cut my long hair, so it took a couple of years for my new hair to catch up,” she says. When her new strands matched her longer hair, she celebrated. “I remember thinking, It’s official.”

As for other women who may be coping with excessive hair loss, Susan says to take heart. “It won’t last forever. Your hair will come back.” She adds that, although you might feel like everyone notices, people are usually kind. “Most people understand that this can be very difficult—for you to put yourself out in the world when this is happening,” she says. “It’s really about being kinder to yourself. No one else is watching as closely as you are.”