Are You Like Me?

I'm writing this blog for both of us - to heal my trich, give you some insights and let you know that you are not alone. You are not a freak. Until now you didn't know anyone else had this problem and hid in shame and fear that someone would find out what a freak you are.You've hidden your bald spots, and constantly notice other people's hair and wonder why you can't be normal like that and just leave it alone.

Am I right?

My plucking manifests in pulling out my eyelashes and eyebrows. I can hardly believe that I sit here writing this for all to see. A year ago I would never have done this. I have had a series of breakthroughs with this compulsion over the last year and am ready to truly be healed and provide some solace, support and insights to others in the process.

How did it begin for me?

I was about 10 years old, lying on the floor watching TV. Now here's an important part - I was lying with my head on the iron wrought support of the coffee table, HIDDEN FROM VIEW.
I just pulled on my lashes very casually, as if there had been one hanging or an itch, but it wasn't an intentional pull. But I noticed that a lash or two came out. I EXAMINED THEM. I was fascinated by them - the length, thickness, the bulb on the end. Wow. I had really long, thick lashes and thick eyebrows.
So that's when it started. I kept pulling lightly to see if more would come out.
Over time, I would do it whenever I watched TV or read. I would stop as soon as I saw the damage I was doing - little spaces where there should have been lashes or eyebrows. I started using my mother's eyebrow pencil to draw them in. I didn't think it was a problem or would lead to anything more drastic.
Only once did anyone say anything to me about it: my best friend's mother gently said I should stop because eventually they wouldn't grow back anymore. Guess what? She was wrong. Over 30 years later, I'm still plucking and they still grow back.

I had very long hair and could sit with my head in a book at school and continue pulling, letting the lashes and brows fall onto the pages where I could look at them.

Looking at them was always part of the deal.

Maybe you recognize this: I pluck, I hold it up to examine it, maybe hold it for a while, but not necessarily, then let it float away. All done in secret. I could lie in bed and pluck and hold it up to any little light source for the examination part. Looking at it is really, really, important.

For many years, the damage was light, until high school. One day a girl looked over at me and said,"Ew, you ain't got no eyelashes!" I wondered if she could say it just a little louder - some of the kids in the next county maybe didn't hear. She sounded truly disgusted and I was truly mortified. This was 10th grade and I was already considered 'different': I was the 'brain', and I was Jewish - not just Jewish, but an observant Jew. I got harassed by Jew and non-Jew alike for that, as well.

That's when I started lying about it. Get this: my lashes got singed in an experiment-gone-bad with a Bunsen burner in science class. Yeah, that's it. Bunsen burners. They burned off. Not bad, eh?

I had never considered this before - I began plucking when we lived in Livonia, maybe it was around the time we found out we were moving East, to Delaware. I believe now that the trich intensified after we moved. By high school it was not uncommon for me to be missing all the lashes on my upper lid, at least on my right eye.

At this stage, I was not compulsive - it was not an urge or an itch that had to be scratched - as it is today.

For the first 15 years of my trich, I could and did stop when I wanted to. I stopped long enough to let them grow in for my wedding when I was 28 - 15 years ago. The week before the wedding, I plucked a small section out, then stopped. It is visible (to me) in one of my wedding pictures.

Boredom, stress, fatigues, static activity (reading, watching tv) were the usual conditions for the trich to kick in.
More than 30 years later, they still are.

That's enough for today. More later. I'd appreciate your feedback, insights and anything you want to share. Maybe you see something here that I've missed, and pointing it out to me can be a key to mine or someone else's healing.

Does anything in my story ring true for you, too? Let's explore it together.
This is a safe place to do it.

I was going to end the post there, then I read it and realized it was completely devoid of any emotional insights or revelations. Hmmm.

Well, I've been working with an eBook called 'What's Wrong With Pulling My Hair Out?' by Abby Leora Rohrer, a self-healed trich sufferer of 27 years. Find her links in the Resources on the side bar.
She says that we created the trich as a coping mechanism to express or deal with feelings that our environment didn't support. My overwhelming feeling of my childhood is fear and insecurity. I was not abused at home, but my insecurity stemmed from having feelings that I did not feel safe expressing, and if I expressed them, I would not be loved. I felt like I was supposed to be perfect, and anything that belied my perfection had to be kept hidden away. Though I could prove how imperfect I could be with the trich, right? My trich intensified to OCD proportions after I got married and became a stay-at-home mother shortly thereafter, which, at the time, was what I wanted! By this time, I had moved overseas to my current home of Israel. I met my soul-mate here after 2 years and we were engaged. He's known about my trich from early on and has always been accepting, loving and supportive - never critical or judgmental.

Ok, more tomorrow.